Words of Wood

To go with naye's lovely post about comfort tropes, tell me your favourite kinds of hurt for your fictional characters! Do you have ones you like to read but not write, or vice versa? Are there some you will read endlessly in any fandom you're in? Are there some h/c tropes you can bash out a 2k oneshot for at the drop of a hat?

Also, do you find you're equal-opportunity with your hurt, or do you hoard it all for one particular character or character archetype?

I'll start, and say that I'm really into hurt resulting in altered-state, as provided by many things but especially concussion/drugged/fever etc. It's something I find endlessly enjoyable to write -- the vulnerability caused by the skewed perspective, and how that plays out in character interactions, but also I... just like... the hurt bit itself *gg* And currently I have a definite Thing for Shen Wei magically exhausting himself and coughing blood and stumbling in a floppy way and having to be supported by Zhao Yunlan. (I don't suppose this is a revelation to anyone. But I'm so glad to know that I'm not alone!)

Anyway, please share your own likes! And recs!

(This is a positivity-only post. Very uninterested in hearing how h/c is OOC or a moral failing or how some people write it badly or whatever, thanks.)

I am supposed to be asleep, but instead Ellie and I have been accidentally planning out a future-fic sequel to Jill Murphy's The Worst Witch children's book series where Mildred and Maud are grown up and married. It's called The Worst Wife. They have a very loving and happy and catastrophe-filled marriage and are so cute at each other that their friends are all sickened, while being occasionally guilt-stricken and sure that they are The Worst.

Highlights include:

- They invite literally everyone from school to their wedding. Including Miss Hardbroom, whom they are still rather scared of, but obviously it is The Right Thing To Do. HB is completely baffled by being invited and continues being baffled at the Most Chaotic Wedding of the century. All the food gets mixed up, there is loud and cheerful family everywhere, both sets of grannies think they've been chosen to make the wedding cake because neither Mildred nor Maud were capable of saying no to them.

- Miss Cackle drinks sherry through the entire wedding, has a wonderful time, and keeps a framed photo of M&M on her office wall. Surrounded by decorative bats.

- M&M are very dedicated Old Girls and go to all the school events and tell all the current girls about the splendid times they had. HB continues to be confused by this remembrance of events.

- Their house is a complete chaotic mess all the time. Both M&M feel very guilty about this. They are both sure that they are dreadful and not sure at all why their wife puts up with them.

- Whenever friends come over M&M rush around trying to make it sort of habitable and desperately explaining that it doesn't usually look this bad, they've just been really busy lately and they really meant to clear away that magical accident detritus and they can actually be organised and their friends are just like ...No.

- Adventures in married life include When We Were Stuck Outside For Hours Because Our Key Turned Into A Fish. And the fish seemed happy as a fish and they feel bad about wanting to turn it back into a key, and can't bring themselves to do this, and after some convoluted method of Mildred climbing through the second-floor window they keep the fish in a tank and are forever anxious about the cats trying to eat it.

- Adventures also include Let's Make A Lovely Meal And Have A Romantic Evening Together Oh No.

- And also Maud Takes Up Knitting And Encodes Dangerous Sigils Into Her Blankets (before the day is saved by the cats ripping it all up)

- "If you were a bat you'd be the prettiest bat ever," Mildred coos to Maud, right before all their friends try and force them to drink Silencing Potions.

- Adventures In DIY Spells also feature heavily. Mildred especially has big ideas for home decoration.


...None of this is based at all on me and Ellie, why would you think that.

This is a perennial debate I've been having with a few people, especially sholio, so I thought I'd type it up for general interest/discussion. This is all highly personal and subjective, of course, and I accept that people have many different opinions on this topic which are all correct! (Unless you're Thomas Hardy. He can go jump off a cliff into a SEA OF CHARACTERS' TEARS.)

First: I find angst fun to write, as is probably blatantly obvious. I enjoy torturing, breaking, and sometimes outright murdering characters. And I enjoy reading the same — some of my favourite fics, and books, are the ones which make me sob until I'm an utter wreck.

However, I'm also a massive fan of happy endings. Or, if happy isn't quite the right word, than at least hopeful. Some of the characters can be dead, the survivors can be battered — but if the ones who are still alive are also still standing, looking forward and knowing that they'll be able to continue on, then I'll be satisfied.

I think a major part of my feelings on this topic are born of a strong belief that reading is a reciprocal act. The writer is telling the story, but the reader is giving their hand to the writer and trusting them to lead them through it, and out the other side. Some writers delight in dragging the reader over jagged rocks and then abandoning them there. (I've done it! It can be really fun! And I also enjoy reading oneshot deathfics for my favourite characters in which the character dies and that's the end!)

However, I'd never write a fic like that that was more than a few thousand words at the most. Certainly anything over ten thousand words is pretty much guaranteed a happy ending, and even more strongly if it's posted in chapters or as a series. This is because I firmly believe that, having trusted me enough to invest the time and energy in reading my stories, I at that point owe it to people reading to lead them to an emotionally satisfying ending. Especially in multi-chaptered things, if I'm dragging people through chapters of EVERYTHING IS AWFUL, it doesn't feel fair to not provide the recompense of pulling everything back together and ending on a high note. (Yes, this is why I hate Thomas Hardy. And Wuthering Heights. And the pointless character death at the end of The Tenderness of Wolves. I carry GRUDGES about these books.)

(Again, things can end satisfyingly/hopefully without being happy, or without the happiness making up for/overshadowing what's gone before. A couple of examples I can think of here are The Lions of Al-Rassan and A Thousand Splendid Suns. Both of which I am a mess by the end of, but I still looooove the endings.)

And, fundamentally, unless I end a story with a total nuclear holocaust or something, I feel that I should be able to bring out some sort of hope for the future. I know I often hide it behind my massive cynicism, but I'm actually pretty optimistic about the human ability to eventually find happiness out of most situations, given time and sometimes a little narrative nudge!

I read a formative quote, when I was a baby writer of sixteen who was just starting out on the internet, which went something like: Unhappy endings are easy, and very Sixth Form. Fixing what you broke is harder. It's very much stuck with me. To me, and this is entirely subjective, breaking everything and then not doing the harder work of fixing/rebuilding feels almost like cheating. In a short piece I can let myself "get away" with it, but in a longer thing — no. I haven't done the work the reader was expecting, and that isn't fair.

What are your thoughts?

There is a growing prevalence at the moment for Neal/Diana fic. This upsets me a lot, and I'm going to talk about why.

Disclaimer: I am not censoring anyone (since I am not a government entity, it would be literally impossible for me to do so). It is everyone's personal choice to write what they write. I am just trying to explain why this particular choice is very loaded, and problematic, and capable of hurting people. Not everyone feels like this, obviously. I don't speak on behalf of any group.

(If you're going to comment with YKINMK, or some variety of "don't read, then", please don't bother. I don't need to read the fic to have it glare in my face as I scroll down my flist.)

Diana, you see, identifies as a lesbian, at multiple points in canon. Very clearly and unambiguously. She has expressed her lack of attraction to men in general and to Neal specifically.

Writing her otherwise is erasure.

The obvious (and very tired) retort is "but what about writing straight characters as gay/bi? That happens all the time!"

Firstly, I can only think of two characters I have ever seen who have actually stated themselves to be straight (Pete from Warehouse 13 and John from BBC Sherlock, if you're curious). Because we live in a heterocentric society, characters (and people) are assumed to be straight unless and until they state otherwise. Coming out is hard, and it isn't a one-time event -- if you're lucky enough to have passing privilege you have to come out again, and again, and again, to each new group of people. It's SCARY. Even then, it can be really hard to get people to respect your identity -- think of all the "you just haven't met the right man/woman yet" bullshit.

And secondly: writing a straight or assumed-straight character as queer is an act of subversion. In our heterosexist society, our media suffers deeply from an overabundance of assumed-straight characters, and a lack of meaningful representation for queer people. Taking assumed-straight chars and writing them as queer can be powerful: it's forcing ourselves into spaces which actively try to keep us out. It's saying, We can be main characters. We can be heroes. We belong here.

Taking a gay character, one of the very few textually gay characters, and writing them into a straight relationship is a fucking kick in the teeth. No way to sugar-coat it, I'm afraid, and I don't want to.

I was talking a moment ago about the lack of respect for queer people, and queer identities, and this is a part of that. Writing a gay character in a het relationship does not happen in a vacuum -- it happens in a context where gay characters are already crumbs compared to the spread of assumed-straight characters. Where we all know that creators can and do take them away from us at any moment (Moffat's Irene Adler, I'm looking at you). Where (usually) straight people feel completely justified in continually questioning self-professed queerness, and so many media narratives glorify the gay-identified person finding that they "just happen" to fall in love with someone of the opposite gender. Where "she'd like it if she just tried it" is a meme, one that makes people feel justified into coercing or forcing gay people into sex they don't want. Where we all know that you might not really be gay -- maybe you're just confused, or immature, or waiting for the right man.

There are reasons to write a pairing like Neal/Diana. Because you find the thought of them together hot. Because you enjoy their interactions, and want to write more of them, and a relationship is an easy way of doing that. Because you just feel like it.

There are reasons not to. Because it hurts people to see that one of the few characters they can identify with, that they can count as one of them, other people feel justified in claiming for the over-represented majority instead. Because you respect representations of queer identities. Because, whether you agree with them or not, you realise that writing het ships for gay characters makes people upset and hurt.

You can choose which of those reasons you care the most about. But you ARE making a choice. And you're displaying it in public every time you write this pairing. Please, consider choosing not to.

(via friendshipper )

thingswithwings  has made a video about MANPAIN in various fandoms, and has written an awesome meta to go with it. Definitely worth reading and watching. (I read the meta before seeing the video, and think it worked best that way around, but could be just me :P)

proskynesis , I think this will be particularly relavant to your interests.

As 'borrowed' from penknife , leesa_perrie  and friendshipper 

Ask me one fandom-related question in the comments. This can be fandom specific, general, or about fandom/lj stuff/fic writing/etc. in general. 

Or more than one.  I'm not fussy.

Question can be as wacky as you want. Ask me about tv shows, characters, fanfic in general, fandom issues/meta, anything about any of my stories specifically. Whatever you want.

If it's a fandom-specific question, you can ask me about anything I'm familiar with ... SGA being my main current fandom, but also Sanctuary, NCIS, SG1, SGU, nBSG, any CSI, Firefly, Doctor Who, Torchwood, Discworld, and anything else you know I'm into that I've forgotten to put on this list.