filing off the seriAl nuMbers
67
differences between the texts foregrounded in the juxtaposition, but the
depiction of characters, events or settings allows for gaps and often remains
flat or even fragmented, because fans can infer their knowledge from the
pre-text. Fanlore implicitly points to these textual features of fanfiction
in its entry “Filing off the Serial Numbers.” Counting the fragmentation of
depictions as being among the key difficulties when appropriating these
texts for a non-fan audience, Fanlore explains: “[F]an fiction often depends
a lot on the audience’s shared knowledge of canon and thus elides a lot of
information integral to plot and characterization.” 27 In reviews, readers
frequently comment on backstories and features or character traits that
these characters possess, which are not introduced (again) in each fanfiction. Often, fan readers envision possible continuations based on their
understanding of the fanfiction and its conventions by referring to the
pre-text. As the adaptation of the pre-texts transitions the narratives to a
space with specifically different production and reception practices, the
rewritings of fan authors, and the comments and input of other fans accompanying it, highlight the practices of reading and writing itself. Because
fans as readers and authors discuss the construction of the text and the act
of recreation and appropriation involved in it, fanfictions are explicitly read
as adaptations. The act of reading a text “as an adaptation,” as Hutcheon
explains, lets the “adapted text […] oscillate in our memories with what
we are experiencing. In the process, we inevitably fill in any gaps in the
adaptation with information from the adapted text.” 28 This oscillation in
the reading process between fanfiction and pre-text, the filling of the gaps
and recognition of the difference between the texts, is an essential part of
the pleasure of fanfiction reception. The fragmentation of the fanfictions
these processes allow for is probably also the reason many cursory readers
and critics discard fanfiction as bad writing, without understanding its
specific practices of writing and reception and the pleasures that authors
and readers can experience in the process.
Scandalous adaptation and commercial success
With the deletion of her online fanfiction texts and the creation of her
pen name E.L. James, Leonard distanced her professional writing identity
from her former appearance as Snowqueens Icedragon and obscured the
27 “Filing off the Serial Numbers,” Fanlore, accessed Jan. 3, 2017.
28 Hutcheon and O’Flynn, 120.
67
differences between the texts foregrounded in the juxtaposition, but the
depiction of characters, events or settings allows for gaps and often remains
flat or even fragmented, because fans can infer their knowledge from the
pre-text. Fanlore implicitly points to these textual features of fanfiction
in its entry “Filing off the Serial Numbers.” Counting the fragmentation of
depictions as being among the key difficulties when appropriating these
texts for a non-fan audience, Fanlore explains: “[F]an fiction often depends
a lot on the audience’s shared knowledge of canon and thus elides a lot of
information integral to plot and characterization.” 27 In reviews, readers
frequently comment on backstories and features or character traits that
these characters possess, which are not introduced (again) in each fanfiction. Often, fan readers envision possible continuations based on their
understanding of the fanfiction and its conventions by referring to the
pre-text. As the adaptation of the pre-texts transitions the narratives to a
space with specifically different production and reception practices, the
rewritings of fan authors, and the comments and input of other fans accompanying it, highlight the practices of reading and writing itself. Because
fans as readers and authors discuss the construction of the text and the act
of recreation and appropriation involved in it, fanfictions are explicitly read
as adaptations. The act of reading a text “as an adaptation,” as Hutcheon
explains, lets the “adapted text […] oscillate in our memories with what
we are experiencing. In the process, we inevitably fill in any gaps in the
adaptation with information from the adapted text.” 28 This oscillation in
the reading process between fanfiction and pre-text, the filling of the gaps
and recognition of the difference between the texts, is an essential part of
the pleasure of fanfiction reception. The fragmentation of the fanfictions
these processes allow for is probably also the reason many cursory readers
and critics discard fanfiction as bad writing, without understanding its
specific practices of writing and reception and the pleasures that authors
and readers can experience in the process.
Scandalous adaptation and commercial success
With the deletion of her online fanfiction texts and the creation of her
pen name E.L. James, Leonard distanced her professional writing identity
from her former appearance as Snowqueens Icedragon and obscured the
27 “Filing off the Serial Numbers,” Fanlore, accessed Jan. 3, 2017.
28 Hutcheon and O’Flynn, 120.