On Fanlore, users with accounts can edit pages including user pages, can create pages, and more. Any information you publish on a page or an edit summary will be accessible by the public and to Fanlore personnel. Because Fanlore is a wiki, information published on Fanlore will be publicly available forever, even if edited later. Be mindful when sharing personal information, including your religious or political views, health, racial background, country of origin, sexual identity and/or personal relationships. To learn more, check out our Terms of Service and Privacy Policy. Select "dismiss" to agree to these terms.
Citizens Against Bad Slash Interview with Wax Jism
| Interviews by Fans | |
|---|---|
| Title: | Citizens Against Bad Slash Interview with Wax Jism |
| Interviewer: | |
| Interviewee: | Wax Jism |
| Date(s): | July 11, 2001 |
| Medium: | online |
| Fandom(s): | 'N Sync, slash |
| External Links: | interview is here, Archived version |
| Click here for related articles on Fanlore. | |
Citizens Against Bad Slash Interview with Wax Jism was posted in 2001.
It is part of a series of interviews posted to Citizens Against Bad Slash in which fans were each asked the same ten questions.
Some Excerpts
I'm extremely picky, to the point of being a horrible, pretentious snob about what I read. Typos and bad grammar will put me off, at least if there isn't brilliant prose to be glimpsed between the misses. I really hope I'm not lying or deluding myself when I say I demand the same thing from my own stories, though. but I want good writing, dammit. A good idea or a good *story* isn't enough if the writing is flat. Of course, my taste in good writing might not be the same as everybody else's.What impresses me: quotable lines will get me. good use of descriptive language. Snappy dialogue. Good, multi-dimensional characterisation. Somewhat believable plot (I am pretty willing to suspend disbelief if the writing is beautiful, though).
What turns me off: bad language (really bad language makes me absolutely rabid; I'm not a native speaker, I had to learn this language through hard work. There are no excuses for a native speaker to have poorer English skills than the dumb foreigner, okay). cardboard-cutout characters, use of cliches without irony or awareness. Some words, like 'orbs' (can't explain that, but it gets me frothing), 'cum'. Oh, epithets: 'the older man'. Fear of the word 'said'. The usual stuff, really. But mostly it's a question of whether the author has 'It' or not. and defining 'It' is beyond me. I just know, man.
If I'm blocked, I just do something else. fiddle with my site, go cruising teeniebopper sites for hot pics of the Infant, stare at my posters. Watch a video, read slash. Keep myself occupied and not thinking constantly of my inability to write. Then it comes back. Usually before I have a nervous breakdown. I have no idea what causes it. I have up days and down days. I'm not good at writing on command, so I've basically had to go with the flow.
I mainly read stories written by my friends, because I have (on purpose, I might add) befriended most of the cool writers in the fandom. Call me a starfucker. Sometimes I will dare tread new paths, and sometimes I am pleasantly surprised. If I find someone I hadn't read or heard of before, I immediately pimp her/him out to my friends. And write feedback. I'm not very good at writing feedback, I confess. I tend to hit people up on AIM and tell them they rock on a regular basis, though. also, if something catches my attention, I will put a link in my livejournal.
I write RPS, so the characterisation issue is a little more ... fluid than in character slash. I suppose the most common problem seems to be fleshing out the characters from the narrow, one-dimensional media image to something more closely resembling a human being. How to do that and still stay in a recognisable character.
Talk to people. We're a friendly bunch. Get a livejournal, I guess. most of the action seems to be there, at this point. I don't know. I got my place in the fandom by being noticed by a popular writer. That works, but it takes a bit of being in the right place at the right time.