Elysian Fields (Buffyverse website)
| Archive | |
|---|---|
| Name: | Elysian Fields |
| Date(s): | 2006 - |
| Archivist: | |
| Founder: | Angelic_Amy, Megan, Spike_spetslayer, HollyDB, Spikeslovebite, Schehrezade, pfeifferpack. |
| Type: | fanfiction |
| Fandom: | Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Angel |
| URL: | Elysian Fields(archived link)] |
| Click here for related articles on Fanlore. | |
Elysian Fields: The Definitive Spuffy Archive is a fanwork archive dedicated to the Spike/Buffy (Spuffy) pairing.
As of 2024, the archive hosts over 7,000 works written by 1,003 writers.[1]
Established in 2006, Elysian Fields is one of the oldest remaining archives dedicated to the Spuffy pairing, with a thriving member base and community. Several long-time fanfic writers— angelic amy, Megan, Schehrezade, spikeslovebite, spike_spetslayer, pfeifferpack, and HollyDB—cooperated to form the site, and Elysian Fields officially launched on October 25, 2006. The name “Elysian Fields” was suggested by Holly as the mythical resting place of great heroes, with the site itself designed with the assistance of Mandi (of the now defunct Vampire’s Kiss).
The initial conception of Elysian Fields was modest, with many of the features prevalent today yet to be added. Permissible content was also different, as at the time of the archive’s founding, threesome fics were disallowed. There were no site events or regular recognition efforts, such as the site awards that are issued to authors and commenters each month and at the end of the year. These accolades, events, and categories have been added to or expanded as administrators came and went.
From 2006 to 2022, Elysian Fields enjoyed the privilege of being helmed by half of its founding members—Angelic Amy, Megan, and pfeifferpack. Holly remained an administrator until she stepped down in 2011 to pursue a career in publishing. In 2013, Susan became the first non-founder archive administrator after volunteering tech assistance, helping the site recover from a devastating crash and making a slew of improvements to the archive during her tenure, including the ability to save or second site challenges, comment responses, and much more. The vast collection of works on Elysian Fields, particularly those that predate the archive’s founding, is credited to Megan and Amy, who (with permission) manually added hundreds of legacy fics by inactive authors or approached authors with the invitation to upload their backlists. Additionally, Amy was instrumental on the accounting side of managing an archive of this size. In 2017, OffYourBird became the second non-founding administrator and led the charge in transforming Elysian Fields from an archive to a community. She managed the social platforms and instituted many policies, initiatives, and events still in use today, including but not limited to Secret Santa, the official EF weekly writing sprints, and the community check-in.
Workloads varied among the administrators and the roles each played in terms of site operations and maintenance, going back to the site’s inception. By the time Holly returned as an administrator in 2020, each administrator had a specific defined role that divided the workload. Megan and pfeifferpack reviewed unvalidated submissions; Amy led events; Susan served as tech support; and OffYourBird ran member relations. As Holly was to fill Susan’s role upon her departure, she began trying to learn the back-end to ensure site events and processes remained consistent.
Amy and Megan remained with the archive as administrators throughout 2021. Following their departure at the beginning of 2022, kats_meow was recruited to oversee submissions and ensure compliance with site rules, such as proper tag usage, though her tenure wasn’t a long one, as she and OffYourBird stepped down from Elysian Fields in early 2022. Shortly thereafter, DarkVoid116 and EllieRose101 joined the administrative team as coding and tech support and event planner, respectively, and helped usher in a new era at Elysian Fields alongside founders pfeifferpack and Holly. In 2023, cawthraven joined the team, taking over coding and tech support as well as providing community management and tag oversight, allowing Holly to focus on overall operations, social media, and member relations. Elysian Fields achieved status as a not-for-profit the same year.
Today, Elysian Fields is a nurturing community comprised of talented creators, energetic readers, and enthusiastic stand-abouters, with a growing social presence that occasionally garners media attention. Most of all, it is passionate about exploring, analyzing, continuing, restructuring, or reinventing Buffy and Spike’s story and its profound impact.
Announcement
The time has finally come to announce the coming of a new opportunity for authors in the Spuffy fandom. The Sisters in Solace welcome you to Elysian Fields: The Dark Solace Spuffy Archive. We have scoured the field and collected as many authors who gave us permission so that you have the benefit of a kick-ass line up of fiction to read—either for the first time, or to renew your love of some old favorites. And we want more. Choose your poison, canon, AU, or all human. We have all ratings, including AO (but you must be logged in as a member to access those). Join up so you can post! And more importantly, be involved with reviewing! The one who leaves the most reviews each much will be allowed the chance of selecting the featured fic of the following month. We value everyone in this community, whether you’re quiet, vocal, like claiming fics or hate them. Whatever Spuffy means to you, we want it to mean it for all of us.[2]
References
- ^ Elysian Site Stats, acessed 14 Sept 2019.
- ^ LJ Announcement by megan-tam-fics, 2006-12-01. Accessed 14 Sept 2019.