This actually contradicts standard myth about the phrase, which is that the first Mary Sue story wasn't intended jokily (as this one clearly is), and that the author of the first Mary Sue story was really named Mary Sue. So, make of it what you will.
That interests me. I wonder if maybe it was already a slang term for that kind of story (possibly after a speciic author, possibly because it's such a Gee Whiz-y kind of name), and 1974 was just the first time someone wrote it down for the ages. A lot of slang takes a while to migrate into written form.
Right, Lyra. The story cited (the 1974 one) is schematic and brief, and seems to me to be a collection of existing cliches. (The story begins with Mary Sue saying something like, "Gosh, golly, Gee wilikers!", so I think that the author did intend it to be seen as a goof on something existing.) I sort of suspect that the term "Mary Sue" already existed, in gossip and letters and things, but maybe hadn't been put into a widely-published story until 1974.
Which is to say, somewhere, languishing in a moldy attic, there may be an obscure fanzine with an earlier story, also involving Mary Sue, that got passed over in the official history of the Mary Sue. Maybe it was a sucky story, or maybe it didn't hit all of the cliches, so there was no galvanizing movement around it so much as sparks for others to galvanize later.
Funniest author note I've seen in a long time. For an LOTR slash story that features Haldir and Legolas getting it on in a bathtub, the author adds a note warning about possible anachronisms - she's not a historian and doesn't know whether or not baths had been invented yet, so just go with it please. Heh.
She's writing slash and she hasn't even read the books. . . uh, no, can't really get upset by that.
Bathtubs date back to Roman times. At least.
And in medieval times, it was common to turn bathing into an event. I've seen several paintings of the time that show round wooden tubs with curtains around them and a shelf ont he edge holding wine and food while minstrels are playing nearby. And often the tub is shared, often with someone of hte opposite gender. Funny thing is, the people in the tub are generally wearing hats.
All very true. Also, of course, although Cassandra Clare's tale of Sam bathing Mr Frodo with strawberry bubble bath six times a day are mere wishful thinking, canonically the first thing Frodo, Sam, Merry and Pippin do when they get to Frodo's supposed new house in Buckland in the book is to have baths. There's even a bath song about how fabulous hot water is. And Pippin splashes water everywhere.
Oh, if
only
this had made it into the movie....
t /shallow and obvious
Doesn't matter- - -it's Middle Earth not Earth!
And the hobbits have baths at Frodo's new house in Bywater (I think). Pippin sings a rousing bath song.
Ah, the missing scenes, the bathing scenes...
Poly Recs has been updated.
70 stories, 17 fandoms, and the eternal question, "Is it actually possible to rot your brain by reading too much fanfic?"
