I meta'd for a grade
Apr. 7th, 2011 04:13 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
anghraineThis isn't the female characters meme, because I'm like a week behind. However, I was going through some of my folders and found -- well, see the title. The Diana Gabaldon brouhaha was raging at the time, so I sat down and tapped out a few pages of furious meta, then decided it would be much more satisfying as Serious Academia That Is Serious (And Therefore Worthwhile). This is somewhat less work than actual meta, because then I don't have to translate out of Pedantic into Merely Pretentious. I got an A, and my class loved it, so hurrah.
I used to say that fandom was ruining my GPA, but in this last year and a half or so, people being wrong on the Internet have actually improved my grades. Anyway, this comes from a place of anger and was targeted at my (American) classmates, so it's fairly US-centric, a bit incoherent and more than a bit hyperbolic, but I like to think that I harnessed my powers of getting-pissed-off for good instead of evil.
So, the meta!
The Cult of Originality
Diana Gabaldon, author of the popular Outlander series, recently dismissed all derivative fiction as illegal, immoral, and artistically worthless. Setting aside her grossly hyperbolic comparisons of such works (to crimes as varied as white slavery, adultery, and pot farming), she might as well have spoken for the entire literary community. Indeed, a number of prominent authors, including George R. R. Martin, rushed to agree with her: with the possible exception of romance, it's difficult to think of another genre held in such utter contempt, almost uniformly derided by today's audiences.
Derivative fiction goes by a number of names, some with highly ambiguous meanings. For my purposes, the term refers to all fiction which derives the characters or the plots from other works -- specific characters and plots, not types.
For instance, Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet expands upon the story found in Arthur Brooke's The Tragical History of Romeus and Juliet and William Painter's Palace of Pleasure. It is quite literally a classic form of derivative fiction. On the other hand, while the aforementioned Martin's A Song of Ice and Fire is plainly inspired by the Wars of the Roses, he does not recast the historical figures and events in a fantasy setting, but invents his own under the influence of that history.
For simplicity's sake, I will ignore all film adaptations -- although some, such as Amy Heckerling's Clueless (which transports Jane Austen's 1815 novel Emma to 1995 Beverley Hills), seem highly derivative. There is a patina of respectability about adaptations that is rarely extended to derivative fiction, and they must therefore be excluded from this discussion.
For most of human history, fiction was a perfectly valid, perfectly respectable, response to another work. Writers could, and did, publish speculations about missing scenes and future developments. They could even pull a Shakespeare, and simply rewrite the original stories – from different points of view, in different styles, whatever suited them.
In the western world, this tradition goes back at least twenty-four hundred years, to the ancient Greek tragedians Aeschylus, Sophocles, and Euripides, who recreated stories from mythology and, specifically, Homer’s Iliad and Odyssey. Ovid and Virgil followed in that tradition; the latter’s Aeneid is effectively a fan-written sequel to the Odyssey, like Euripides’ Helen.
These kinds of works combined the interpretive experience and the creative one. They were at once readings of the sources, and creative works in and of themselves – analysis in narrative form. Often, they were neither good art nor good analysis, but as the same might be said of anything, this did not lessen their validity as a form.
For centuries on end, what mattered was not who created a work first, but who did it best. Shakespeare’s As You Like It, a retelling of Thomas Lodge’s Rosalynde, is only one of hundreds of classics which benefited from this tradition. Nobody would dream of condemning these as inferior products of talentless hacks, men and women who didn’t have the imagination to come up with their own ideas, pale imitations of the originals, not Art at all.
Today, however, there is no chance of even a lesser genius publishing such a response to contemporary literature. Artistic interpretation is almost solely the province the author, at least socially. In the popular conception, as in Gabaldon’s, narrative interpretation is also the author’s legal prerogative.
In fact, derivative fiction falls under a grey area of the law. In the United States, some derivative works fall under fair use, a sort of exception to modern copyright: it includes “parody, symbolism, aesthetic declarations, and innumerable other uses” and is decided on a case-by-case basis. Thus far, there is no firm precedent for dealing with derivative fiction. It may or may not be legal, but at this juncture it is not necessarily illegal either.
However, modern obsession with copyright and trademarks – that is, with originality – has ensured that most rights lie with the original authors. Terror of loss in today’s litigation-happy atmosphere keeps most derivative authors confined to the Internet and fanzines. There they are largely ignored by the original authors, and condemned by the populace as Dungeons and Dragons-obsessed nerds living in their mothers’ basements, or middle-aged housewives with no intelligence and no life.
Certain exceptions are made. Critical works are more or less acceptable. Wicked became its own franchise, complete with sequels and a Broadway musical. Moreover, we find considerably less prejudice against derivative works when the original is out of copyright.
After all, Jean Rhys’ Wide Sargasso Sea (a subversive, post-colonialist retelling of Charlotte Brontë’s classic Jane Eyre) is a highly regarded piece of literature. While Seth Grahame-Smith’s retelling of Pride and Prejudice, which involved shoehorning zombies, ninjas and double entendres into the original text of the novel, may not be considered “literature,” it spent weeks at the top of the New York Times bestseller list. Grahame-Smith inspired a genre and received a movie deal.
On first glance, that is only rational – if there is no copyright, it’s not illegal. However, we very rarely see an argument along the lines of “derivative fiction is wrong because it’s illegal at this point in time, in this country.” Rather, it’s “derivative fiction is wrong because it’s morally wrong to use characters and stories that you didn’t invent. It’s like camping out in your neighbours’ house, and stealing their milk.”
If derivative fiction is morally wrong, why is it only wrong in particular cases? That is, if it’s immoral to write derivative fiction, shouldn’t it always be immoral? Instead, it’s only treated as wrong in a very particular modern context: namely, when it isn’t explicitly legal.
For centuries, it was both moral and legal, and we do not consider those works immoral in retrospect. Yet at the same time, our modern concepts of author’s prerogatives are treated, not as culturally and socially specific, but universal rights. Apparently American law, circa 2010, should be considered a perfect reflection of absolute morality.
The last objection is more of an assumption. An original work must be of higher quality than an original one! Why? Because – because – because it’s original! Who is to say, however, that a mediocre writer cannot have a brilliant idea, and execute it badly? What is Rosalynde to As You Like It?
However, even if the original work is unadulterated genius, that doesn’t mean the derivative one cannot have merit as easily as the original work does. Nobody could call Hamlet mediocre, but neither is Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead.
In the popular conception, derivative fiction is worthless, completely lacking in creativity, and at best, nothing more than training grounds for the real work of original, professional writing. It only ceases to be so when authors can find someone to pay them for it – and then, magically, it’s worthwhile in and of itself.
Forget Paradise Lost and The Inferno, Grendel, the collected works of Shakespeare, Virgil, and Euripides. In a world where “derivative” means inferior and “original” means better, The Sheik’s Virgin Mistress and Twilight are the future of literature.
I used to say that fandom was ruining my GPA, but in this last year and a half or so, people being wrong on the Internet have actually improved my grades. Anyway, this comes from a place of anger and was targeted at my (American) classmates, so it's fairly US-centric, a bit incoherent and more than a bit hyperbolic, but I like to think that I harnessed my powers of getting-pissed-off for good instead of evil.
So, the meta!
The Cult of Originality
Diana Gabaldon, author of the popular Outlander series, recently dismissed all derivative fiction as illegal, immoral, and artistically worthless. Setting aside her grossly hyperbolic comparisons of such works (to crimes as varied as white slavery, adultery, and pot farming), she might as well have spoken for the entire literary community. Indeed, a number of prominent authors, including George R. R. Martin, rushed to agree with her: with the possible exception of romance, it's difficult to think of another genre held in such utter contempt, almost uniformly derided by today's audiences.
Derivative fiction goes by a number of names, some with highly ambiguous meanings. For my purposes, the term refers to all fiction which derives the characters or the plots from other works -- specific characters and plots, not types.
For instance, Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet expands upon the story found in Arthur Brooke's The Tragical History of Romeus and Juliet and William Painter's Palace of Pleasure. It is quite literally a classic form of derivative fiction. On the other hand, while the aforementioned Martin's A Song of Ice and Fire is plainly inspired by the Wars of the Roses, he does not recast the historical figures and events in a fantasy setting, but invents his own under the influence of that history.
For simplicity's sake, I will ignore all film adaptations -- although some, such as Amy Heckerling's Clueless (which transports Jane Austen's 1815 novel Emma to 1995 Beverley Hills), seem highly derivative. There is a patina of respectability about adaptations that is rarely extended to derivative fiction, and they must therefore be excluded from this discussion.
For most of human history, fiction was a perfectly valid, perfectly respectable, response to another work. Writers could, and did, publish speculations about missing scenes and future developments. They could even pull a Shakespeare, and simply rewrite the original stories – from different points of view, in different styles, whatever suited them.
In the western world, this tradition goes back at least twenty-four hundred years, to the ancient Greek tragedians Aeschylus, Sophocles, and Euripides, who recreated stories from mythology and, specifically, Homer’s Iliad and Odyssey. Ovid and Virgil followed in that tradition; the latter’s Aeneid is effectively a fan-written sequel to the Odyssey, like Euripides’ Helen.
These kinds of works combined the interpretive experience and the creative one. They were at once readings of the sources, and creative works in and of themselves – analysis in narrative form. Often, they were neither good art nor good analysis, but as the same might be said of anything, this did not lessen their validity as a form.
For centuries on end, what mattered was not who created a work first, but who did it best. Shakespeare’s As You Like It, a retelling of Thomas Lodge’s Rosalynde, is only one of hundreds of classics which benefited from this tradition. Nobody would dream of condemning these as inferior products of talentless hacks, men and women who didn’t have the imagination to come up with their own ideas, pale imitations of the originals, not Art at all.
Today, however, there is no chance of even a lesser genius publishing such a response to contemporary literature. Artistic interpretation is almost solely the province the author, at least socially. In the popular conception, as in Gabaldon’s, narrative interpretation is also the author’s legal prerogative.
In fact, derivative fiction falls under a grey area of the law. In the United States, some derivative works fall under fair use, a sort of exception to modern copyright: it includes “parody, symbolism, aesthetic declarations, and innumerable other uses” and is decided on a case-by-case basis. Thus far, there is no firm precedent for dealing with derivative fiction. It may or may not be legal, but at this juncture it is not necessarily illegal either.
However, modern obsession with copyright and trademarks – that is, with originality – has ensured that most rights lie with the original authors. Terror of loss in today’s litigation-happy atmosphere keeps most derivative authors confined to the Internet and fanzines. There they are largely ignored by the original authors, and condemned by the populace as Dungeons and Dragons-obsessed nerds living in their mothers’ basements, or middle-aged housewives with no intelligence and no life.
Certain exceptions are made. Critical works are more or less acceptable. Wicked became its own franchise, complete with sequels and a Broadway musical. Moreover, we find considerably less prejudice against derivative works when the original is out of copyright.
After all, Jean Rhys’ Wide Sargasso Sea (a subversive, post-colonialist retelling of Charlotte Brontë’s classic Jane Eyre) is a highly regarded piece of literature. While Seth Grahame-Smith’s retelling of Pride and Prejudice, which involved shoehorning zombies, ninjas and double entendres into the original text of the novel, may not be considered “literature,” it spent weeks at the top of the New York Times bestseller list. Grahame-Smith inspired a genre and received a movie deal.
On first glance, that is only rational – if there is no copyright, it’s not illegal. However, we very rarely see an argument along the lines of “derivative fiction is wrong because it’s illegal at this point in time, in this country.” Rather, it’s “derivative fiction is wrong because it’s morally wrong to use characters and stories that you didn’t invent. It’s like camping out in your neighbours’ house, and stealing their milk.”
If derivative fiction is morally wrong, why is it only wrong in particular cases? That is, if it’s immoral to write derivative fiction, shouldn’t it always be immoral? Instead, it’s only treated as wrong in a very particular modern context: namely, when it isn’t explicitly legal.
For centuries, it was both moral and legal, and we do not consider those works immoral in retrospect. Yet at the same time, our modern concepts of author’s prerogatives are treated, not as culturally and socially specific, but universal rights. Apparently American law, circa 2010, should be considered a perfect reflection of absolute morality.
The last objection is more of an assumption. An original work must be of higher quality than an original one! Why? Because – because – because it’s original! Who is to say, however, that a mediocre writer cannot have a brilliant idea, and execute it badly? What is Rosalynde to As You Like It?
However, even if the original work is unadulterated genius, that doesn’t mean the derivative one cannot have merit as easily as the original work does. Nobody could call Hamlet mediocre, but neither is Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead.
In the popular conception, derivative fiction is worthless, completely lacking in creativity, and at best, nothing more than training grounds for the real work of original, professional writing. It only ceases to be so when authors can find someone to pay them for it – and then, magically, it’s worthwhile in and of itself.
Forget Paradise Lost and The Inferno, Grendel, the collected works of Shakespeare, Virgil, and Euripides. In a world where “derivative” means inferior and “original” means better, The Sheik’s Virgin Mistress and Twilight are the future of literature.
no subject
on 2011-04-08 12:14 pm (UTC)no subject
on 2011-04-08 07:41 pm (UTC)Thanks, really! You can think My God how can you people seriously NOT GET THIS?! so many times before you have to explode in spasms of rage. And meta.
Also, your icon is eternally appropriate. :D