Jews in Fanfic

[mofic]

I imagine we have a number of fanfic authors in this community. I'd love to hear how folks deal with Jewish issues in writing fanfic, if at all and any related thoughts on the topic

Comments

[kassrachel]

This doesn't entirely answer your question, but I've saved links to some terrific stories that play with Judaism in interesting ways, or explore characters' own Jewishness. (I was working on a list of my own stories like that, a while back; I should see if I can dig up that post.) There were a bunch of good Jewish!character stories written for daysofawesome last year. Anyway, here are two HP links: The Heart's Obligations -- a Jewish Hogwarts AU by schemingreader. And I wrote a HP story that has a lot of Judaism in it, even though the characters aren't Jewish; Clay, in which kabbalah is used to go after Voldemort. *g*

And as a bonus, here are two terrific SGA Pesch stories: Urchatz by miss_porcupine and The Pretty Peculiar Pegasus Pesach by roga (which just got recorded as a podfic!)

[mofic]

Thanks for all the links! I will check them out.

[kassrachel]

You're most welcome!

And ooh, you're making me want to actually write the post I've been meaning to write about Tales of Feldman, a classic ST:TOS zine that shereld sent me earlier this year -- it's a fan-written novel that centers around an OFC, whose last name is Feldman (and who is very Jewish, in her own quirky way) winds up accidentally married to Spock. It's awesome. :-)

(I'm on another continent from my copy right now, but I'll try to get a post about it online before the holidays...)

[eveningblue]

it's a fan-written novel that centers around an OFC, whose last name is Feldman (and who is very Jewish, in her own quirky way) winds up accidentally married to Spock. It's awesome. :-)

Wow, I would be totally interested in this, as well. Is it recently written, do you know?

[darlas_mom]

Last year, I co-hosted a fic-a-thon with kangeiko that was devoted to exploring the religiosity of various characters in various fandoms, and there were some great fics dealing with different characters' Jewishness. They're all here: ninebillion. (My personal favorite was "If I Remember Thee Not" by rivrea, about Willow, with some great scenes of Chanukah, Pesach, Purim and Rosh Hasana (which I think I just spelled wrong--sorry

[darkrosetiger]

I think what I asked at the time was "Can you give me the Jewish equivalent of a Britpick?"

My suggestion, along the lines of bibliotech's "Blackwhack" was "Jewreview".

[roga]

Hee, I think Jewpick would work for me :-) I am also very much in favor of using "jewfic" or "jewyay" as genre titles.

[kleenexwoman]

I once wrote part of a story set in the X-Men movieverse dealing with a B'Nai Brith Youth Group chapter made up entirely of mutants. (I wouldn't link it here since it's embarrassingly badly-written--I was fourteen and in B'Nai Brith at the time.)

I've been in fandoms where characters whose religions aren't specifically stated have set off my "Jew-dar"; when writing them, I've tended to throw in references to Jewish authors or thinkers, religious or cultural traditions, or sensibilities--in effect, writing the characters as Jewish without explicitly stating it, and assuming that readers will get it. (Some do. Some don't get why I have characters who they think of as default Christian putting pebbles on graves or talking about tikkun olam in relation to the existence of parallel universes

[eveningblue]

When I first got interested in Starsky & Hutch fandom, I was thrilled to see so many people had taken Starsky's implied Jewishness and run with it. It had never even occurred to me that people would do that, but in exploring the character many fans also wished to explore his background, culture, religion, etc. The tantalizing clues in the show made people want to know more, so they wrote it (the same is done with Hutch, of course, but in his case fans seem to be more intrigued by his implied wealthy and educated background than by his possible religion, so that's what I saw more of in fanfic that explored Hutch's background

[sainfoin_fields]

Oddly, I think the most Jewish piece of fic I wrote was a (sadly unfinished) Firefly story that featured no Jewish characters (although I'm now wondering, partially from the previous post, if Wash might be interpreted as a stealth Jew). The story is set on a planet of settlers descended primarily from Latin America, and deals with the concept of clinging to a cultural identity when a majority wants the minority to assimilate. Complete with Psalm 137 quotage! As a secular Jew with ties to Mexico, that was very much informed by my cultures, and was something I felt a little more comfortable with than the only piece of explicitly Jewish fic I think I've written, a double drabble about the German Jewish character in the lovely WWI film Joyeux Noel, celebrating Rosh Hashanah.

[nyssa23]

Wow, I *love* the idea of Wash being a stealth Jew! :D And as a Latina Jew myself I will definitely be checking out your story.