I think this is part of why I don't write fanfic. I play it out in my head all the time, but I don't have a particular compulsion to write down the explorations of all the little side stories. It's like they already happened, whether I was there or not. (Unless it contradicts what actually happened, in which case I still feel no need to share.) Whereas in original fic, the characters haven't gotten their main story and won't unless I write it. So I have to.
This is not to say that I don't think fanfic should happen--far from it. It's just why I personally don't seem to have a need to write it, even when the characters are talking to each other in my head.
No, I get what you're saying -- the side-stories playing out in my head thing happens all the time with me. I think my impulse to actually write some of those stories down comes more from excitement about sharing them with other people, even if "other people" only really refers to one person.
I...think this is why I feel so terrible about my own original writing and why I give up so quickly. It's...because I'm not interested in my own characters, it feels like. I'm more interested in playing with someone else's character who interests me than coming up with someone who I'll get bored with in less than a week.
It's a weakness of mine, and one I fully admit I have to work on.
That's understandable -- it's hard to come up with characters from scratch, which is why a lot of writers borrow so heavily (whether consciously or not) from archetypes and tropes and people they know and other people's characters and on and on and on. Heck, a lot of my original crowd began their lives as other people's characters. And I don't think I ever really worked to file the serial numbers off them, other than tweaking some stuff about appearance -- the differences emerged organically as I thought about how to make them work in this new setting, and sometimes that new setting made those characters head off in way different directions. So yeah. Expies are great, and there's no shame at all in having them around!
I wanted to actually comment on this when I saw it on tumblr but well, tumblr is the worst for comments.
That said, I actually went from writing original stuff to fanfic, and I do agree that plot is what defines the difference. It's like fanfic is Mr Potato Head with an infinite amount of supplies to make faces, original fic requires that you grow the potato before you can play with it at all. While when I was doing original fic I tended to like writing one off character pieces, I always came back to one storyline that I refined until I finally nailed it a few years later (and then somehow I dropped the ball completely and got bored and it's been doing fanfic ever since.)
I'm curious though, because do you think one requires MORE energy than the other, or that it's different energies that are expended? (I ask because I always felt more work went into original stuff for me and then fanfic was farting around even though one can get either AU'd into pretty much original fic territory or start playing with formats like twitter fics
I like the Mr. Potato Head metaphor, and I'm filing it away for future use.
I think the energies are different. When you're writing fanfic -- or when I was most actively involved in writing fic, anyway, because it's changed for me since then -- you're also participating in a community. And being part of that community requires a lot of energy, depending on how involved you want to be, but generally if you want people to be involved with your stories, you have to build up relationships either with them individually or with the fandom-as-a-whole. Having done that sort of thing, it's as draining as trying to figure out trade regulations for an original setting, if not more so. Even if you are better at separating writing from community production than I was, well, I'm actually better about not falling into research holes when I write original fiction, because when I'm behind the wheel, I can make shit up with impunity. When I'm playing in other people's worlds, not so much
( ... )
Potatoes are the answers to a lot of things, I've found.
Hm, the community element is interesting because it's something I hadn't taken into account (which I guess says a lot about how involved I tend to get) but I think it makes sense. It seems that in both case you require stamina in great amounts just for extremely different reasons and one is really not easaier than the other
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It's a weakness of mine, and one I fully admit I have to work on.
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That said, I actually went from writing original stuff to fanfic, and I do agree that plot is what defines the difference. It's like fanfic is Mr Potato Head with an infinite amount of supplies to make faces, original fic requires that you grow the potato before you can play with it at all. While when I was doing original fic I tended to like writing one off character pieces, I always came back to one storyline that I refined until I finally nailed it a few years later (and then somehow I dropped the ball completely and got bored and it's been doing fanfic ever since.)
I'm curious though, because do you think one requires MORE energy than the other, or that it's different energies that are expended? (I ask because I always felt more work went into original stuff for me and then fanfic was farting around even though one can get either AU'd into pretty much original fic territory or start playing with formats like twitter fics
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I think the energies are different. When you're writing fanfic -- or when I was most actively involved in writing fic, anyway, because it's changed for me since then -- you're also participating in a community. And being part of that community requires a lot of energy, depending on how involved you want to be, but generally if you want people to be involved with your stories, you have to build up relationships either with them individually or with the fandom-as-a-whole. Having done that sort of thing, it's as draining as trying to figure out trade regulations for an original setting, if not more so. Even if you are better at separating writing from community production than I was, well, I'm actually better about not falling into research holes when I write original fiction, because when I'm behind the wheel, I can make shit up with impunity. When I'm playing in other people's worlds, not so much ( ... )
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Hm, the community element is interesting because it's something I hadn't taken into account (which I guess says a lot about how involved I tend to get) but I think it makes sense. It seems that in both case you require stamina in great amounts just for extremely different reasons and one is really not easaier than the other
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