How to Write an AU or a Sure Way to Slip Slowly into Madness
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| Title: | How to Write an AU or a Sure Way to Slip Slowly into Madness |
| Creator: | Trixie |
| Date(s): | March 5, 2001 |
| Medium: | online |
| Fandom: | The X-Files |
| Topic: | |
| External Links: | How to Write an AU or a Sure Way to Slip Slowly into Madness |
| Click here for related articles on Fanlore. | |
How to Write an AU or a Sure Way to Slip Slowly into Madness is an essay by Trixie.
It was posted to the X-Files website Working Stiffs in 2001.
Some Topics Discussed
- how the author decided to write the story Quis Si, an AU
- X-Files fanfiction
- AUs not necessarily written out of dissatisfaction, but for the what-if factor
Excerpts
When I set out to write my own AU, "Quis Si," it didn't come about because I had the thought "You know, I don't think the universe Chris Carter created is =interesting= enough for me to write about, so I think I'll create a brand spankin' new one." Rather, a seed idea popped into my mind: What would Mulder's life be like if his sister hadn't been abducted?
The most obvious answer was "Samantha would be in his life." Beyond that, I didn't know. And it started to bug me. The notion infested my brain until I sat down and started working out the particulars. From there, it snowballed. Samantha's abduction was a turning point in Mulder's life. His interest in the paranormal (or so I theorized for creative purposes <g>) was built on the foundation of her unexplained disappearance.
My entire theory was based upon the principal that, had Mulder not been traumatized by his father's lies, his sister's abduction, and so on, and so forth, he would never have stumbled upon the X-Files, something he only did =after= his post-hypnotic regression therapy. Ah, but is that perhaps a catch? Can I say he never joined the FBI, and give him an entirely different background?
No, is the answer I came up with. Because while Samantha's abduction scarred him, it didn't necessarily shape the career paths he took. I'd say going to Oxford had nothing to do with her, and he was recruited into the Bureau during his time at Oxford. Ergo, Mulder would still join the Bureau -- but without his "quest" it is decidedly unlikely he'd choose to stay there for very long.
If you haven't gotten it by now, let me spell it out: The most important ingredients to creating a successful alternate universe (that is, if you consider my AU "successful" -- and really, if you don't, why are you reading this? Are you mocking me? Laughing with your friends at my horrible punctuation and grammar? Wondering why on EARTH I was asked to write this when I'm so clearly incompetent?) are the details. (And not getting distracted by all the other nonsense thrown at you along the way. It's extremely important to get your facts straight before you set out. If you don't know where you are, where you're characters are, you're screwed before you get out of the gate.)
Another detail that came to my attention, once I'd figured out Mulder wasn't too long for the Profiling life, and certainly would never stumble upon the X-Files, was what on earth to do with Scully.
It would stand to reason that if Mulder's life were different, naturally, Scully's life would have to be, as well. Not her formative years, or the time she spent in school, college, and so on. But the big years -- the years she'd spent working with the crazy guy down in the basement.
The Dana Scully we all met in the Pilot, I think most of us can agree, is a billion miles from the Dana Scully we see currently inhabiting our screens all these years later. Which made me consider, had she never found purpose with the X-Files, would she have knuckled under to familial pressure and gone back into medicine?
I've just taken note of how many question marks I've used so far, and it reminded me of one of the best ways to ferret out a whole new world (great, now that's gonna be in my head all night): Ask yourself questions. No question is too freakish, no answer to obscure. After all, you never know where a seemingly idiotic question might lead you.
Don't write an AU just to write one. Do it because there's something you desperately want to know about, and there's just no way for it to happen in "reality." Be true to your characters, and I promise, they'll come through for you in the end.