#writer function

[sbooksbowm]

The ‘Does this make sense?’ check: Chapter 2, Part 1, writer function

Turns out that this chapter was way too long for one post, so I broke it into three parts, one for each section. Hooray! Also, because this was originally written for an audience with 1) little knowledge of fandom and 2) little knowledge of Harry Potter, I edited out the explanatory asides about fandom-specific terms, assuming that if you are reading this here, you are more familiar with either/both. 

Introduction: the multiple jobs of a fic writer

This chapter focuses on the function of the fic writer: what does the fic writer do to distinguish herself from the author of the source text (so she is not simply replicating the source text but transforming it), articulating a new interpretation of the work (so making difference that is interesting to read), while maintaining the integrity of the universe in which she writes (so not deviating so much so that her characters/premise are unrecognizable to the reader)? It’s a tricky balance to strike! 

Part 1 looks at how writers balance the source text and fannish discourse in crafting their fic. 

Part 2 looks at how writers signal the ‘writerliness’ (or, open to interpretation-ness) of their fics to their readers by using Author Notes. 

Part 3 looks at what fannish contexts are necessary to read fic, particularly knowledge of fandom tropes to make works legible. 

This section looks at the writer as function of the text, or, to quote Kristina Busse, how fic is ‘the collection of the choices made’ by the fic writer in selecting which parts of the source text she will foreground [1].

This writer function also demonstrates how fic makes source texts ‘writerly’, or ‘constructed with every reading process’, as opposed to readerly texts, which are ‘closed and only need to be interpreted by readers’, to use Roland Barthes’s concepts [2]. The source text’s ‘writerliness’ allows fic writers to simultaneously assert themselves apart from the source text author in order to establish their vision while they necessarily rely on accepted understandings and interpretations of the source text within the fan community in order for their work to be legible. In each of the works I examine—Annerb’s ‘The Changeling’ (Parts 1-3), gedsparrowhawk’s ‘Hogwarts, to welcome you home’ (Parts 1&2), and waspabi’s ‘Hermione Granger’s Hogwarts Crammer for Delinquents on the Run’ (Parts 2&3)—the writer selects different elements of the source text and fandom conventions to make their work legible while holding themselves apart from the source text author. 

Part 1: the fic writer as function of text 

Busse writes that ‘the fan fiction writer is constantly engaged in creating her own individualized version of canon: she foregrounds certain facts and scenes and overlooks others; she makes some aspects of the story more central to her reading than they may be in the source text’ [3]. In practice, the writer balances transformation with obfuscation, drawing on a fannish framework while articulating her own interpretation, lest an interpretative community reject a characterization that veers too wildly from the known, accepted, and loved.

Alternative Universe fics play on the resonances of the original work such that they are recognizable to reader by adopting the structure of the original stories, replicating those events, and then twisting them slightly, inheriting the author’s intended meaning so that it contributes to the aggregation of the fannish interpretation. Writerly intent is a multi-faceted force that draws from source text, interpretive functions, and fan frameworks to produce a recognizable yet distinct work.

‘The Changeling’ by Annerb exemplifies this balance: ‘The Changeling’ retells the Harry Potter series from the perspective of Ginny Weasley, who is sorted into Slytherin House rather than Gryffindor House. Annerb plays with the reader’s knowledge of the canonical events of Harry Potter and subverts the expectations around characteristics of Slytherin members, writing redemptive arcs for many of the characters who were otherwise villainized or ignored and creating a fully realized student body. She executes on a favored fan interpretation of redeeming Slytherin members who are invested in House unity but spurned by prejudice, and she complicates the characteristics of other houses, highlighting their fallacies. Annerb centralizes an oft-discussed fanon of Harry Potter: what is the Slytherin perspective and how are they a part of the school? Ginny becomes the point of view for observing and catalyzing this transformation.

Annerb plays on the known conceptions of Ginny, refracting her strength, resilience, and humor through new circumstances of isolation from her family in a different house and commitment to an anti-hero status. She shifts Ginny’s context and writes out the personal and emotional repercussions of that change. The draw at the start of the fic, as the reader cannot know how different the story will be when they first read it, is asking ‘what if Ginny were in Slytherin?’, foregrounding the reader’s expectations of both who Ginny is and what Slytherin is, then slowly unraveling and reimagining both.

Another example, ‘Hogwarts, to welcome you home’, by gedsparrowhawk, demonstrates the tension between avowal of authorship (e.g. ‘JK Rowling wrote this’) and disavowal of authorial rights (e.g. ‘JK Rowling’s version is wrong’).

‘Hogwarts, to welcome you home’ is a Post-Series Alternative Universe that disregards the epilogue in Deathly Hallows and makes Harry Potter a professor at Hogwarts. In this, gedsparrowhawk overlooks the epilogue (which was criticized by many fans for many reasons) and centralizes Harry’s skill in teaching and his relationship with his godson, drawing on a popular fanon that rejects the notion that Harry would become an Auror. It also addresses a major criticism of the epilogue, which fails to acknowledge Harry’s post-war trauma; gedsparrowhawk rectifies that with an explanation of what Harry did immediately after the war, a confrontation with the portrait of Albus Dumbledore, and McGonagall’s own observations of Harry’s changed behavior. As such, ‘Hogwarts, to welcome you home’ offers one interpretation that does ‘not necessarily align with expected intended readings yet are shared by a sizeable number of readers’ [4]. 

In this case, the expected intended readings were written by JK Rowling in her epilogue, which pictures a peach-pie middle aged Harry in a stable relationship with his wife, Ginny, father of three children, seeing off his sons to Hogwarts with his best friends, Hermione and Ron, who are also in a happy marriage with two children. The idyllic conclusion to the series frustrated many readers, who wanted a deeper look at how the aftermath of the war affected Harry. A scroll through the comments section of ‘Hogwarts, to welcome you home’ suggests as much, with many readers commenting some iteration of ‘this is the epilogue now’. gedsparrowhawk successfully manages the tension of disavowing Rowling’s authorial rights in rewriting the epilogue and reinterpreting apparent themes in the source text.

Both Annerb and gedsparrowhawk use different perspectives (a common trope), and both make changes that resonate with popular fanons (Slytherin redemption and Professor!Harry). In these cases, the changes place both writers in opposition to the source text author, rather than in conflict with particular fannish factions; by situating their works with popular tropes, they signal their awareness of the fannish discourse and the reliability of their interpretations. 

Citations 

Busse, Framing fan fiction, p.107. 

Busse, p.25.

Busse, p.108.

Busse, p.109.

[sbooksbowm]

The ‘Does this make sense?’ check: Chapter 2, Part 2, writerly texts

Part 2 looks at how writers signal the ‘writerliness’ (or, open to interpretation-ness) of their fics to their readers by using Author Notes.

Part 2: writerly texts and authority 

By reinterpreting a source text, fic writers transform it into a writerly text, ‘which are constructed with every reading process’, as opposed to readerly texts, which are ‘closed and only need to be interpreted by readers’ [1]. All fic is writerly at its core, articulating the subtexts and unexplored potentials of the source text. Even canon compliant fic is writerly, in that it extends, fills, and adds to fic. 

In considering how writers establish their interpretations, Busse argues that fan communities exemplify how ‘meaning production is negotiated among readers and writers, and the way authorial ethos remains central to textual interpretations’ [2]. Busse uses authorial ethos to explain how authorial identity provides a ‘moral authorial character’ through which an author signals politics and experience, and not necessarily interpretative intention [3]. The authorial ethos poses complications for interpretative fan communities when authors retcon their own work with their developing politics. That is: when an author says or does something that makes certain subversive readings, particularly those around identity, seemingly impossible given their conflict with those authorial statements. Fic writers may openly disavow an author in their author notes, claiming the source texts as their own both in their transformation of the work and their rejection of its canonical author. 

Disappointment with the author can be a fundamental motivator in fic production, as fannish interpretation will often privilege the coherence of the fictional universe over the authority of the text by insisting that the author failed (I’m paraphrasing Goodman here). Goodman characterizes the writerliness of fic (that is, the openness of it to interpretation) through fannish disappointment: some fans want to fix what went awry with canon. They may acknowledge an author’s authority but ‘contest the ways in which it is wielded’, claiming the author cannot be trusted to maintain in-world consistency and seeking to rectify or explore the alternatives if only this one thing were different (see: Sirius takes care of Harry, Remus lives, etc) [4]. Fic writing, then, is a form of text reading that rejects the distinction between author and reader, as the fan reader becomes the fan writer in order to execute her vision. All of this work is writerly, or taking the source text and recreating it with every new interpretation.

Fic writers further signal their own works as writerly by affirming readers’ ability to build on their work, continuously constructing their fictional worlds through every new interpretation. In the concluding A/N of ‘Hermione Granger’s Hogwarts Crammer for Delinquents on the Run’, waspabi writes ‘This story is complete and there will not be sequel, or at least not one from me—if you are interested in exploring this universe yourself, you are more than welcome to have a go!’ [5]. Annerb writes in her AO3 biography, ‘blanket permission to fic my fic. Blanket permission to podfic. I’d love to know you did it, but no need to ask permission’ [6]. Both writers also link to works inspired by their own at the end of their fics, and by explicitly opening their works up to further construction, they affirm the writerly-ness of their fics and the writerly ethic of fic production. 

Author Notes and Authority 

Writers of works-in-progress (WIPs) who engage with readers by encouraging authorship, continuations, or collaborations, crediting or linking their betareaders (pre-readers who may edit for clarity, grammar, plot precision, etc.) in their Author Notes signal another form of writerly behavior in fic production. In general, when works are advertised as WIPs, ‘they advertise their open status and writerly quality’, some going as far as asking readers ‘to collaborate in meaning production either imaginatively by envisioning various narrative threads as they wait for an update, or literally by inviting feedback and discussions about the story line’ [7]. 

Of the textual output attached to fic, Author Notes provide a localized example of the tensions fic writers negotiate between author, reader, and writer—author notes can establish the authority of the fic writer, nod to fanon, or cite the collaborative nature of fic by thanking betas and supportive friends. Herzog argues that A/Ns are a distancing and situating mechanism: ‘each A/N serves as a manifestation of fannish authority in providing a framework for writers to address their audience and thus negotiate between individual approaches and communally held beliefs before their readers enter into the fictional universe of their stories’ [8]. Herzog emphasizes use of A/Ns to establish authority, but I have found that citing betas and prompts in A/Ns demonstrate how fic is collaborate, writerly, and communal. The use of A/Ns contextualizes fic in fannish community by acknowledging how community members contribute to fic, regardless of whether or not the fic writers employ A/Ns to shape reader interpretation.

Textual material in the form of A/Ns also reinforces one of Coppa’s definitions: that fanfiction is not only made outside the literary marketplace, but to the standards of fannish community. When these citations are lost, perhaps due to pulling fic to publish in the traditional publishing circuit, the fic loses its identification with fandom and its situation in that community. Reentering the traditional publishing circuit refuses the subversive nature of the fandom communication circuit, distinguishing again between author and reader, and divorcing fic from the fannish response that make it both legible and even possible. As Fansplaining’s survey suggests, not every fan is opposed to for-profit fic; rather, fans bristle when the writers abandon or fail to cite the community origins of the fic within the traditional publishing realm [9]. 

None of the writers I cite refuse fannish spaces: both waspabi and gedsparrowhawk cite the Tumblr prompts upon which their fics are based (although the link for ged’s prompt is now broken). In the A/N for Chapter 7 of ‘The Changeling’, Annerb thanks her beta-readers as well as her readership, ‘who took a chance on the slowest updating WIP fic by a brand new author in the fandom…Six years later, here we are’ [10]. Were Annerb to ever pull ‘The Changeling’ for publishing, the potential loss of this A/N erases a significant piece of the fic’s history: that its 11 chapters were written and shared over the course of six years. For these three writers, A/Ns function as housekeeping, rather than negotiate authority and expectations to the reader, but they situate the fic in the larger context of community inspiration, feedback, and encouragement that encircles fic production, as visualized in the response zone of the community model.

Citations 

Busse, Framing fan fiction, p.25.

Busse, p.20.

Busse, p.20.

Lesley Goodman, ‘Disappointing Fans: Fandom, Fictional Theory, and the Death of the Author’, p.664.

Waspabi, Author Note, ‘Hermione Granger’s Hogwarts Crammer for Delinquents on the Run’, Archive of Our Own.

Annerb, AO3 Bio.

Busse, p.148. 

Alexandra Elisabeth Herzog, ‘“But this is my story and this is how I wanted to write it”: Author’s notes as a fannish claim to power in fan fiction writing’, 3.1.

Bethan Jones, ‘Fifty shades of exploitation: Fan labor and “Fifty Shades of Grey”’. 

Annerb, Author Note, ‘The Changeling’, Archive of Our Own.