h
#Can you just imagine if there were people passing by #and they heard Cedric saying that to Harry? #they’d probably be thinking that they would go to that restroom #and make looove and shit #and then when Cedric died #it made sense why Harry was like on top of him and bawling #BECAUSE HIS BOYFRIEND DIED #omg that hogwarts student probably thought they were Sherlock figuring all this shit out
I bet all the students shipped them.
I bet they called them Harric
Sometimes people get upset because slash fanfiction exists. Sometimes it’s because they’re scandalized; sometimes because they feel nothing should happen in fanfiction that’s not explicit in canon (I’m not sure why these people read fanfiction in the first place, frankly). Others seem to feel that slash fanfiction is some kind of criticism of the existing relationships in canon. Why can’t they just be friends? people ask. What’s wrong with them being friends?
There is nothing wrong with any two characters being friends. Nothing at all. People (like me) who write slash fanfiction aren’t opposed to friendships, and aren’t necessarily using their writing to project what they think should happen in canon. It’s rarely a prediction of what they think will happen. To see all fanfiction as a rejection of what’s happening in canon is a mistake.
I am endlessly interested in why people write fanfiction, or draw fanart, or make fanvids, or participate in fandom generally. Everyone has their own story, and I love to hear those stories (though it’s practically a rude question to ask). As a general rule, people who produce fanworks do so because they enjoy the original material and want to take it for a spin on their own terms.
Sometimes they’re trying to “fix” it; sometimes they’re drenching themselves in it and rejoicing in it. Sometimes fanfiction is written to point out a perceived flaw in characterization or plot, but often it’s no criticism at all. It’s a space to experiment with what-if scenarios, dream up new stories, fill in missing scenes, take characters in new directions. We do it because we love it. We love what’s there. We want to see more, play with it, drive it to places we find emotionally satisfying. We try it on in a million different ways, because we love it.
Fandom is its own universe; each piece of fanfiction creates a little universe of its own. We make our mark in the tiny ways we divert from the canon narrative, in the new things we have characters say, and the unique details we add to their settings and spaces. We add ourselves to a universe we love. Not necessarily because we think it needs us. Just because it’s fun, and we want to be there, we want to leave something behind.
All narratives are open to interpretation, and fanfiction (and other fanworks) is a way to describe how you see something you love, or another way the story could have gone, or a way to skew what you see on the screen to create something new. Looking at it from another angle doesn’t mean you don’t love what you see. Taking a very close friendship and making it romantic isn’t a rejection of that friendship. It’s just taking a story in a different direction. We can write what we write and still love the friendship we see on screen. The friendship exists already; we might not feel compelled to write about it. Maybe it’s just done so well on the screen that we want to leave it as it is. We love a romance, so we write romance. This isn’t cognitive dissonance for most of us. Fanfiction is only a personal version of the story to play with, not (necessarily) a strident plea to revisit the whole thing.
In sum: fanfiction is (for the most part, in my opinion) made of love.
timeandrelativedim-shutupwesley:
So I was watching Robin Hood…
I thought I reblogged this but according to the notes, I didn’t. It was made to go with my fan fiction, lol I feel special :) Thank you, Angela!
