I guess I'm wondering how closely you guys, as fan fiction writers, feel like you stick to imitating the show and characters you're writing about, and how much you feel like you're just doing your own thing, borrowing characters from the show.

The character voices have to be right, or it's difficult for me to enjoy a story. For shows with distinctive dialogue patterns, like Buffy, this can be difficult.

There's more flexibility with the overall aura of the show, but that depends on the show again. Some fandoms lend themselves to being twisted in all sorts of interesting ways. Some shows, like Gilmore Girls, I'd find it very difficult to read anything that deviated much from the main feeling of the show.

Does that make more sense? To me, fan fiction is a form of imitation...of the show it is written about. I guess I'm wondering how closely you guys, as fan fiction writers, feel like you stick to imitating the show and characters you're writing about, and how much you feel like you're just doing your own thing, borrowing characters from the show.

It varies wildly. Some people borrow the names and physical features of the characters, and some try to fit everything so seamlessly into canon that you cannot tell where the story begins and the show ends. In between, there is most everything else.

I try to mimic the voices and motivations, and recreate the world as best I can while adding new facets or ideas to it.

I think that filk is very close to what you're looking for, vw. Because if you don't get the rhythm and style of the original poem/song/story correct, the filk doesn't make sense.

The character voices have to be right, or it's difficult for me to enjoy a story.

This makes a lot of sense.

In between, there is most everything else.

Do you think (and I hate to make a generalization, so that's SO not what I'm trying to do here) one of the draws to fan fiction is that there is a structure to follow? Or am I talking out of my ass here, not being a fan fiction writer and all?

burnt toast

I think that filk is very close to what you're looking for, vw. Because if you don't get the rhythm and style of the original poem/song/story correct, the filk doesn't make sense.

Good point. Oh, and Elena, do you know where any of those challenges or that website is? I'd love to take a look at them.

I know that, in addition to JW, Tom Fontana, and David Simon, my current WIP owes a lot to Philip Roth too...I think writing fic can be like doing impressions.

Go to the filk site and look at the Literary category.

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You can also find pastiches in fanfic, where, say, someone writes a Smallville story in the style of a noir detective story.

I don't know. I don't write in the style of the show very much at all, really, though I try to match dialogue patterns and canon information. But the stuff I tend towards ends up being kind of froufy and amorphous (I think) and largely character-driven, internal dialogue stuff that doesn't mimic the plot-based stories of the shows I write about.

Do you think (and I hate to make a generalization, so that's SO not what I'm trying to do here) one of the draws to fan fiction is that there is a structure to follow? Or am I talking out of my ass here, not being a fan fiction writer and all?

Again, it depends on the reader.

One of the big draws for the reader/writers I know is that you have this narrow framework, with established characters, and yet you're still trying to tell a story that feels fresh and emotionally true.

In some regards, high-end fic reminds me of the French Court tradition of telling fairy tales.

For some people, it's just enough that their woobie get unslighted and get the goil.

I'm not sure, cause I mix stuff together so much.