Of Alternate Universe Fics and Their Nature
| Meta | |
|---|---|
| Title: | Of Alternate Universe Fics and Their Nature |
| Creator: | jessicaqueen |
| Date(s): | 2005-09-11 |
| Medium: | online |
| Fandom: | multifandom, Harry Potter |
| Topic: | alternate universes |
| External Links: | here (archive) |
| Click here for related articles on Fanlore. | |
Of Alternate Universe Fics and Their Nature is a 2005 meta essay by jessicaqueen that gives advice about how to write a good alternate universe, particularly canon divergence. It was listed on metafandom in September, 2005.[1]
Some Topics Discussed
- Canon divergence
- Being jossed
- Harry Potter fanfiction
Excerpts
Many of the fics I've written are AU by choice rather than by default, meaning that they were different to canon when I wrote them and that was exactly my intention. I like changing the little events and seeing what can consequently become of the situation. I personally believe that changing one event in the universe, which seems tiny compared to the scale of the universe itself, can change the entire world. And that, I believe, is the most intriguing aspects of the AU genre.
We've all wished that something in a book or movie hadn't happened at one time or another, I'm sure. But what really would have happened had that event been avoiding, or had something that was previously missing been encorporated?[sic]
The question of whether the alterations made are too grand or, alternatively, not grand enough in comparison with the event changed is an important one. I've read countless fics in which Harry is sorted into Slytherin instead of Gryffindor, yet all that varies from the original novels is the positions of the names in the text. [...] This type of fic generally doesn't work because the elements of AU are used incorrectly. The changes are, by turns, too large and not large enough. To say that Harry being sorted into a different house would automatically make Draco Malfoy a nice person, for example, isn't a viable stance.
Having said all of this, most bad AU fics are only bad because they lack explanation (or for the same reasons many other types of fics are so ordinary, but we won't go there). So the crux of the matter, I suppose, is that you can write whatever outcomes to a small difference in canon events you like, within reason, by simply explaning the reasoning behind it all.
On a different but somewhat related note, I'm also particularly intrigued by fics that are written in accordance with canon and then are later made AU by new canon material, but still manage to . The Harry Potter universe, as I mentioned, is plagued by this type of AU, which isn't necessarily a bad thing. Many of them are way off track, of course. Some of them seem very reasonable and believable, but Rowling simply goes in a different direction. But there are some fics whose ideas mesh very closely with Rowling's, and that stuns me. Not so much now, when we're so close to the end and have pretty much all of the information anyway. But to those people who wrote fics which were on the right track back when PoA or GoF was the most recent book released, I raise my figurative hat to you. That's just amazing to me.
Comments and Reactions
[author_by_night]
I like a good AU; the problem is that they're very hard to write, and require thought. And characterization is tricky - on one hand, you need them IC, but on the other hand, a given situation might make them a little different from the character we know.[2]
[jessicaqueen]
That's exactly it. But as I said, as long as a plausible explanation is given, I'll roll with the OoCness (as long as the fic doesn't advertise in the author's notes or summary that it's OoC, because to me that says that the lack of proper characterisation is pointless and is only present because it would have been too much effort to do otherwise). Of course, the difficult thing is making that explanation, that link between how it was in canon and how it is in the fic. It's not easy to make the explanation both interesting and plausible, and even then you can still go over the top with your OoC characters. It's hard. But hey, it's what I love doing.[3]
[semirose]
[...] It's alot of fun seeing how just a few small changes can change everything and it's fun to be in the world that's vaguely familiar and be able to see how those canon characters would act like that in the proper situation. Sometimes the author is so good that you can just see how everything that's happening in the AU happen in canon.
However AU's also tend to be the worst fics (after bad romances, which will probably always top because there will always be a 12 year old kid who thinks it would be so cute to have Harry and Ginny go and fall madly in love and fight and then break up and make up all in 1000 words) because like you said people either a)don't elaborate enough or b)slightly rearrange canon material making it not really AU at all. I can't believe that people think the only thing that would change if Harry was put into Slytherin is the name of his tormentors and friends. There are of course some good Harry in Slytherin fics, but the bad ones that just spit out canon nearly verbatim seem to reign supreme.
I think the hardest thing about writing AU's is the amount of back story you need. [...][4]
[jessicaqueen]
Also, I'm in total agreement with you about the fact that the bad AUs out there are topped only by the bad romances. There are so many bad fics out there that are like PWPs, without the porn. So you have to ask yourself, what's left in them. Not a hell of a lot, and certainly nothing good. Give me a romance with some plot and an adult vocabulary any day.[5]
[alixtii]
[alixtii quoting jessicaqueen's essay]
But if that spell had never been cast, would Book 6 have looked a lot different, or would it have just occassionally mentioned Sirius' name in the present tense rather than the past? Who can really say for sure, apart from maybe Rowling herself?
You seem to be conflating two questions here. The first, how would Rowling had written Book 6 if she had not killed Sirius. This is mostly a question of psychological history, and the answers would probably be relatively unrevealing. Also, because Rowling in writing the text taking into consideration things which do not enter into the way we consider the fannish construct of canon--for example, theme--elements would have been inserted which would not follow causally from the change. For example, she may have felt the need to kill Remus instead. This would spring from narrative logic, not causal logic.
When we investigate canon, on the other hand, we tend to simply consider the causal effects of various events, because we are treating the source text not as a text but as a series of facts about a supposed reality. Insofar as this is the case, Rowling is probably the least qualified person to consider what difference a change is make, because she is by necessity too focused on the narrative logic of the text to pay more than cursory attention to the causal logic.
The key, I think you're right in pointing out, is explanation. When we write our fics, we're caught up in our own narrative logics, because we have something we the fic to say, even if we're writing pr0n. What we need to do, then, is retain JKR's initial causal logic (insofar as it can be called logic at all) while replacing the narrative logic--the soi-disant "intent." We do that by filling in the blanks, by creating plausible extrapolations, etc. An AU retains the overall structure of the causal logic while making one or two specific changes, permitting (it can be argued) a fuller narrative logic which is more clearly distinct from the original source text. But the principle is the same as in a canon text in which Hermione is a robot (because this in itself is not enough to make a fic AU--do we know that she isn't in canon?).
So I think you're right on. I really shouldn't have written any of that, as I have schoolwork to do, but you really got my brain working. So I'm simultaneously thankful and not for you making me think. But thanks anyway.[1]