#fannishness

[touchstoneaf]

All I'm missing now is a decent Wonder Woman and a good future version of Lex to put with Superman.

Not sure why Nine and Ten look like they're fighting over Rose, though, that was not the intent, LOL

[balrogballs]

I could have sworn you answered this before but what was the reason you put your AU in the 70s and not in modern India? I was reading up on some history and it got me curious if the story would still work. Or is your Comrade a sign of the times.

I answered a version of this yes, but happy to answer again on my catchup journey! Apologies for the delay.

Oh, it would work fine with a few tweaks to make it sound a little less “how to avoid your tankie dad and civil service girlboss mum trauma dumping in your Instagram activist daughter’s DMs”… half the tragedy of Prayers is that little has changed and much has worsened. Not just on the Kerala end, hell, the British-activism-knowing reader would know that the only thing that’s changed on that front too is the fact that whatever university makes the order to not enter the burning building would also have a 2-mil “decolonising budget” lmao.

It’s simply that I would not be the right person to write that contemporary version, and it could easily feel and read as outright voyeuristic, specifically on the Kerala end, if I were the one to do so.

Apparently necessary disclaimer that obviously I don’t apply this level of self-crit to everything I write and nor am I saying it should be the standard when writing AUs or that there’s a ‘right person’ to write any story whatever, obviously not at all, I am just explaining about this specific story and how I went about it.

And no, this isn’t me saying ‘write what you know’, of course and absolutely not, but rather talking about textual reception.

Obviously I am not going to get into the “fanfic as Text” discussion because I would genuinely rather get eaten alive by lice but how texts are read matters just as much as how they’re written. I wouldn’t, at this point in time, be able to write that contemporary story in a way where it could be read, by a global audience who for the most part don’t have too much background on the region, as anything other than the gospel truth about Indian Muslim life on the North Kerala coastline in 2025. Or, you know, an accurate “representation” (🤪) of it.

As in, take Arundhati Roy—who is a remarkable writer, one of the most talented people I’ve ever read who writes at great personal cost to herself. I’ve also seen how she’s read and taught here in the UK and a lot of these readings either entirely miss the caste aspect of her fiction or, and this is just as damaging, treat her as a sole authority and expert on both caste and Kerala, while she does not ever claim to be either and, more importantly, very much has her own caste-goggles on in some ways, which iirc she herself has acknowledged re: GoST. If god-tier 100% gold standard writer Roy is read like that, then believe me when I say 2% stainless steel Balrog “shakes ass at Elrond” Balls is not going to even attempt it.

Essentially, it wouldn’t be fair to the story itself, or the context or the characters, for me to write it in such a way. For me, it would imo defeat the point of telling this specific story to this specific audience, if I were to tell it in a way that is more likely to position me as an authority figure on a region which, while I know very well and spend a decent chunk of time in every year, I don’t actually live in.

And presenting it through a historical lens yet looking at themes that are very much relevant in both contemporary India and contemporary UK-academia is the way I chose because it has that level of detachment and gap where the reader can, if they like, make those connections themselves. Or not! You can just enjoy the story and not think about that if you so choose, either works. Essentially, I didn’t want the story to look like I was “telling” people anything, and having that arm’s length distance of 50 years was conducive to that… not to mention the fact that my grandparents etc were involved in these events so technically I get a “closer” look than I would in contemporary terms.

Hope this answered it ok!

[faorism]

Rules: Make a poll with five of your all-time favorite characters and then tag five people to do the same. See which character is everyone's favorite!

tagged by @redgoldblue and i cheated and added two more because they are rare choices that deserve more than being honorable mentions

top of the faves?

eliot spencer (leverage)

riku (kingdom hearts)

chancellor lapin cadbury (d20 crown of candy)

kakashi hatake (naruto)

wyll ravengard (bg3)

summer roberts (the oc)

sasuke uchiha (naruto)

Voting ended onJul 9, 2024

i invite you all but specifically @suddenrundown @cloysterbell @draculastarion @psqqa @clearskiesandmistyeyes @zigraves

(i was originally just gonna write TOP? as the poll question but realized that would be confusing considering the amount of bottoms/aggressively switch folks on that list...)

[schniggles]

genuinely puzzled about why READERS of fic seem to be put out about the possibility of more authors archive-locking their works on AO3. all you have to do is make an account and then literally nothing is different? AND now you can make bookmarks on-site? it’s a win all around

[bomberqueen17]

replying to replies about not looking for more fandoms to be in

lazaefair replied to your post “Hey is there anyway I can tempt you into The Old Guard fandom? I...”

mooooooood. Exact reason why I haven't watched The Untamed or Guardian despite already reading fanfiction in both fandoms! I usually chalk up my resistance to knowing that I get hyper-identified with characters and it takes up emotional resources, and if I'm depleted on that, I can't watch anything new. Sounds like your brain knows you just don't have the spell slots for more parasocial friends.

Yes this is it exactly. I have never been one of those people that can bounce among different worldbuilding situations, and write in more than one fandom at once-- I can write more than one story, but I can’t really do a whole separate fandom all at the same time. I have tried only a few times, and maybe I could grow into it, but.

I desperately, desperately want to write original shit. I am so desperately tired of trying to fit the things I care about into the cracks left by (usually) rich white men and committees and things, around the canons they created to sell, and it’s great to find places to expand into and fill and heave like ice to make room for the things I care about, that’s not what I want to do all the time.

So I’m not exactly looking for more fandoms to involve myself in. I get that’s not usual; most fannish people are generally fannish, and are always looking for new things to be fans of.

I’m generally not. I want fandoms because if I find something other people care about, then I can talk about the things I care about and people will listen, and if i do it with the faces and voices of characters people are invested in, then I can have an audience and not be alone in the dark with this horrifyingly overactive imagination.

But the point isn’t the source material, for me. I like characters, sure, and there’s nothing insincere about my fannishness-- but I’m not looking for new places to catch my imagination. I just don’t want to be alone. If I can find something people are willing to talk about, I’ll stay there as long as people are still willing to talk about it.

ravenreyamidala replied to your post “Hey is there anyway I can tempt you into The Old Guard fandom? I...”

There are very short comic books that the movie follows very closely if you want to read those instead and then spoilers!

Ah see the point isn’t that the box glows, the point is that the box has additional worlds and characters in it, and I don’t have room in my life for them. I’m afraid negotiating different methods for me to sneak around my own brain’s limits isn’t going to change this fairly major portion of my personality, alas.

I’m glad the fandom’s so cool, and I probably will someday watch it and be like ah yes this would’ve been just the thing, but I am really, really, really not looking for a different fandom to be a part of at the moment. I just don’t want to be alone, and the Witcher hasn’t gone off the rails into being insane yet, possibly because S2 is delayed-- I don’t delude myself that’s going to go anywhere good, though I hold out hope it’ll do better than... what was my last big fandom? Ugh. Yeah.

Gods I’m just so tired of being reliant on other people’s canons. But I’m more tired of being alone. All I want is not to be alone.

[cacchieressa]

My writing year in review post. In the next couple of days I will be linking my yuletide stories here as well.

[peterbscaprisweatpants]

Me @me before I hang out with people:

Me @my long suffering friends:

(The Germans, Fawlty Towers, BBC2, 1975)