A Defense of Fanfiction
"How juvenile!" the English teachers cry
With upturned noses and with faces wry-
"Of all the follies of the young, the worst
Must be this vice, in which our age is cursed!
To borrow plumage from another's crown
And generally to only tear it down
With nonsense, purple prose and stupid views
And (horror of our clan!) the Mary-Sues!
But 'tis not only in the young the sin
Abounds- the elders too will take it in
And secretly will scrawl the dull romance
Of Potter's angst or Sparrow's timely chance. (1)
Where went the age when genius flourished thus?
When cleverness alone received the fuss?
When only brilliant authors joined the fray,
And Poetry, not Buffy won the day?"
So say the wits, but how can I agree-
Condemn myself and all to misery
For using characters that are not mine
Is pleasanter than they can e'er divine!
If one can find a fandom that is right,
It can afford all manner of delight,
And so with haste I must my post defend
And know that failure else may be my end.
To Ye, my grim detractors I shall speak
And prove that I as well can be a geek
And that a learned lady still can love
The trivialities you disapprove. (2)
'Tis true that there's a lot of garbage writ,
But ardent fans aren't oft' the cause of it,
For there are plenty authors that are paid
And still write crap without another's aid!
The silly sagas gracing Wal-Mart's aisles
The "Harlequins" that woman's time beguiles,
The magazines where movie-stars are shown
Th'absurdity of all are quite their own.
And yet they still protest- "though this is fact,
The fan-fic writers have no better act
Show us a fan-ish author else with wit,
Or we shall not believe a word of it."
Thy wish is granted- I can name a set
Of authors who are still respected yet
By even thee, my intellectual jade,
Whose work (though older)'s of a fan-boy shade.
Behold great Thackeray, whom you should know
Wrote quite a tale respecting Ivanhoe,
Or Fielding, whose parody sublime
Of Pamela has stood the test of time.
Of course, there's an American- Brett Harte
Whose version of Jane Eyre must warm the heart
(At least with mirth)- Then Prior's verses, sure,
Upon the wife of Lemuel Gulliver,
And what to make, upon that sort of head
Of Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead?
Why, can it be the Literary Great
Will bear to stoop to such a trivial fate?
And though you weep, the writer downward bends
And put another's work to their own ends,
Pray, can it be a lesser, venial sin
For we, the minor authors to give in?
If to the vice we yield with urging fine,
'Twas for our predecessors' paradigm!
So grant us mercy if you p'raps can stand it,
It was our forebears' flame, we all just fanned it.
(1) Referring to Harry Potter and Captain Jack Sparrow, respectively.
(2) A common rhyme, even though the two words don't really sound much alike in most accents.
( 3) The authors referenced here are William Makepeace Thackeray, Henry Fielding, Brett Harte, Matthew Prior and Tom Stoppard.