[Start]

Situation Report, 15th March 2016

DEFINITELY STILL NOT DEAD.

Yours sincerely,

—FernandelDeLaFrance.

[Break]

To everyone who has found their way here, greetings and welcome.

If you came here after reading a story of mine, hello again, and thank you for having having taken the time to look at my writing. If you came across this profile by accident, not really knowing nor caring what I write about - welcome, and may I interest you in taking a look at the stories below? I can vouch for well-written grammar and spelling, if nothing else, and I try to write stories that any reader will be distracted and amused by. And if that isn't your cup of tea, well, take a look at the collection of my favourite stories. Perhaps you'll find something interesting in that list, considering that I try to read entertaining fanfiction as well as write it.

But if you came to this profile page to find out who I was, then a warm welcome to you.

I am a fledgling on this website. I only joined up very recently, and so far I have been enjoying every minute of it. But even though I may be a bit of a newbie when it comes to this useful and addictive website, I have been writing fanfiction for quite a while, and only recently decided that I should publish it. It's a pastime of mine, meant to hone my writing skills, distract me from my otherwise mundane existence, and otherwise provide amusement and distraction to people. And I thought that if other people made the effort to write fanfiction of a very high quality, I should attempt to do the same - otherwise, we'll run out of good stories one day, no?

Of course, quality lies in the eye of the beholder - which means YOU. If you were amused, distracted, horrified, or amazed by one of my stories - if I simply made you feel something, if my work had an impact on you - then my job here is done. If not, then I will try harder to become a better writer. I'm stubborn that way.

English is not my mothertongue. I started to learn English many years along with dozens of other children in a classroom. English was always the 'cool' language, and in those days it was mangled and butchered by those who knew nothing about it, me included. Or frankly, I didn't really care much about English. A few years later, I got my hands on a few books in English (especially the Harry Potter series - which were avidly read in our entire household - Thank you, JK Rowling) that I was motivated to learn English, knowing that there was an entire world out there, a world with magic and mysteries and stories whose intricacies I could not understand simply because I couldn't understand that elusive foreign tongue with its strange sounds and melodies.

And so I read, I read and read until I had learned English, driving my teachers and family up the wall while I was doing it, and spoke and learned until I was one of the best in my class. Until I could understand any book in English that I came across without wondering 'What is that supposed to mean?' Until I could understand thick accents from all over the world and make friends with the people speaking them. And English has been an incredible gift to me. It gave me understanding, it gave me friendship, and it gave me a measure of self-fulfilment.

And here I am before you, standing there unobtrusively and speaking with a soft British accent that isn't really that of my own people, but has become mine nonetheless.

My pen name on this website is one that I chose on a whim, really, even though it was a well-meant whim. Ever seen those old Don Camillo movies and TV series? They were brilliant, and I really enjoyed them as a child. Fernandel - known to the authorities as Fernand Joseph Désiré Contandin - was a French actor and singer, and the kind of man that was able to put smiles on people's faces wherever he went, mine included. I still envy him for that, even though he is long dead and gone, and out of a deep respect for him and his work, I decided to try to do the same. I'm not very good at comedy, but I'm doing my best.

My profile picture is the work "I Will Protect You", by DEVIANTart user 13nin. Take a look at some of that painter's portraits of manga and anime characters, not to mention that of many other characters of many different media. It's brilliant stuff; I can only recommend it.

So, yes. I will keep writing, and I hope that you will be entertained enough to keep reading. Until then, enjoy.

[Break]

My Author’s Creed:

For my Zero no Tsukaima and Assassin's Creed crossover, The Q Continuum and I had a lot of fun by writing an 'Author's Creed' for us writers in the fanfiction community. Well, he wrote the basics, I adapted it a bit to make it flow better. All the melodrama in this is mine, not Q's. Hope you like it!

There are many stories that are nothing more than... pastiches, written by unimaginative copycats and lazy writers, repeating word for word events in other stories and wasting the time of the one reading it.

And then there are many stories that are written by shallow and greedy men pandering to their audience, not daring to break out of the cage they have built for themselves, to surprise them, to create something new.

And then there are those who blindly follow what is known as the 'canon', not daring to break out of the mould that the original Creators gave us. Yet if they gave us such great gifts of imagination and the ability to exercise our free will, is it not a travesty for us to cling to stringent and arbitrary conventions, to write stories that make no effort to create something new, something inventive, something different

And that is why, Author, realize the truth of these words.

Where other men blindly follow others, fearful of creating something entirely their own, remember: Nothing is true.

Where other men are limited by the fear of their audience's backlash, by mainstream demand, terrified of breaking the mould and example set by society and their peers, remember: Everything is permitted.

To write what is right, and right what is wrong.
We work in the dark to serve the light.
We are Authors.

Nothing is true. Everything is permitted.

[Break]

Quotes that might interest you:

"Critics constantly complain that writers are lacking in standards, yet they themselves seem to have no standards other than personal prejudice for literary criticism. (...) such standards do exist. Matthew Arnold set up three criteria for criticism: 1. What is the writer trying to do? 2. How well does he succeed in doing it? (...) 3. Does the work exhibit "high seriousness"? That is, does it touch on basic issues of good and evil, life and death and the human condition. I would also apply a fourth criterion (...) Write about what you know. More writers fail because they try to write about things they don't know than for any other reason."

—William S. Burroughs, "A Review of the Reviewers"

"Any healthy organization can survive individual divergencies, and may even profit from them. Compulsory unification of opinion can only achieve the unanimity of the graveyard."

—Adm. Hyman G. Rickover, United States Navy(Plaque in the lobby of the eponymous Rickover Hall, United States Naval Academy)

“In many ways, today's threats are harder to observe and understand than the one that was once presented by the U.S.S.R. … We have slain a large dragon. But we live now in a jungle filled with a bewildering variety of poisonous snakes. And in many ways, the dragon was easier to keep track of.”

—R. James Woosley, Director of the US Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) 1993-1995, on the fall of the USSR

SM.: “I speak only for myself, mind – it is my own truth alone – but man as part of a movement or a crowd is indifferent to me. He is inhuman. And I have nothing to do with nations, or nationalism. The only feeling I have – for what they are – are for men as individuals; my loyalties, such as they may be, are to private persons alone.”

JD.: “Patriotism will not do?”

SM.: “My dear creature, I have done with all debate. But you know as well as I, patriotism is a word; and one that comes to mean either my country, right or wrong, which is infamous, or my country is always right, which is imbecile.”

—Stephen Maturin and James Dillon; Master and Commander; Page 166; written by Patrick O’Brian

"An economist is someone who knows a hundred ways of making love, but doesn't know any woman."

—Unknown Economist

[Break]

So, yes. I will keep writing, and I hope that you will be entertained enough to keep reading. Until then, enjoy.

[End]