I think it's true that in literary fandoms, the general feeling that one must write in the style of the original text is much stronger than for video fandoms (and certainly real-people fandoms, whose original texts certainly don't have a comparable intrinsic style!), because you're faced not with translating video to words, as it were, but with actual sentences.

A notable exception would be Harry Potter, since most people in the fandom don't exactly seem to, y'know, revere the literary style of the series.

Overall I think that fan writers would say they don't write things that are imitative so much as derivative.

fwiw, VW, I wrote two different thigns using the Raymond Chandler style, both fannish: one was a summary of Angel canon, and the other a short scene set in The Lord of the Rings. It was hella fun, juxtaposing Chandler's baroque-but-fun prose into situations that (a) don't comprehend comedy and (b) are a completely different setting -- magic, elves, etc.

I think the nice idea behind a lot of fanfic based on TV/movies is the fredom of transformative use: you're doing something the source can't do, because you're working in a different medium. You've got a lot of freedom, if you want it.

Then again, sometimes I think the whole enterprise of fanfic is based on the joys of making characters fuck like bunnies, and any phraseology like "transformative use" is like wearing a top hat during a sex scene.

There was a Batman comic quite a while ago, one of the annuals, where Azrael, the new superhero on the block who had grown up in very isolated surroundings, had just discovered Chandler and Hammett and the entire pulp fiction detective genre. The entire Batman-esque adventure--featuring Catwoman!--was done in glorious hard-bitten private-eye speak.

some try to fit everything so seamlessly into canon that you cannot tell where the story begins and the show ends

This is what I write, more than anything else. I'm usually hit by a look or a moment when the scene changes and we don't really know what happened there, and I fit my idea in those cracks. I think that fits into your requirement of imitation, whether all does or not.

(Not trying to blow my own horn, just using me to illustrate because, if you want to point and laugh, I'd rather it be at something I've said about me than something I've said about someone else) I have two stories that illustrate that attempt to fit things into canon, and you can borrow them, or any of my others, if you like.

The first is the Smallville what if Clark were really crazy? story wherein all the actions are exactly what happens on the screen, but, at the same time, Clark is carrying on an internal dialogue that illustrates the actions differently than what can be extrapolated from the show. In my version, he's a seriously disturbed creature acting "normally" by the show's lights--but not doing it well--to cover up his evil plotting or to get revenge. For this story, it was very important to me to describe what the viewer sees exactly as it's seen, and to use the same kind of language.

The second is the most recent, What if Lilah brought Faith to the meeting where W&H hire her to kill Angel and they get stuck in the elevator? tale. That was written because a friend asked for Lilah/Faith smut for her birthday. It fits pretty seamlessly into canon, despite the fact that canon never gives us a hint of Lilah and Faith sleeping together. I tried to use language they would use (though more swearing because it seemed appropriate for the characters without television guidelines to follow). It connects to things that happen in story future. in particular, Lilah dressing up like Fred when she sleeps with Wes.

I also wrote a Spike and Dru story, where I attempted to recreate their particular characters in New Orleans, but also inserted some real people who'd been living there at the time, and used a sort of self-help book written by one of those people to help me construct his speech. That one might be of use to you as well.

For me, fanfic is:

• a puzzle. How do I make tab A, happening on camera, fit into the slot A2 I've created before the camera starts rolling on Slot B, which is likely directly connected to tab A by the story that's been filmed?
• a learning tool. How do I make distinctly different characters act in ways I haven't seen, that fit within the framework of their characters as I have seen? How do I keep those characters from becoming caricatures? How do I keep them distinctive from the other characters?
• a framework to hang a story on. It provides some of the work already accomplished--a world, a name, a focus, a goal--so that I can focus on one or two particular things that intrigue me.
• an opportunity to practice writing, in particular, sex. Eventually one of my sex scenes will be believable and hot at the same time, I hope (and I think believability increases the hottitude where wondering where that prehensile penis comes from, for example, severely decreases the hottitude).

I don't think I'm an average ficcer. I haven't been doing it long and I haven't seen many stories like mine. I'm in awe of the stuff Plei does, and others like her, who write really brilliant long stories in whole new directions and yet their characters are still the ones I love from the show(s), or like Erika's, introduce me to characters I've never seen before and make me care about them.

I've seen some really bad fic, and most of the bad fic seems to be an excuse to write poorly staged, histrionic sex, so the writer can pretend to be her favorite character and/or pretend she gets to have sex with her favorite character. I'm sure there are plenty of other reasons to write bad fic, and I'm not sure some of mine that's porn with (barely a) plot, couldn't be considered badfic as well.

I'm sorry to go on so long and I hope some of this is helpful to you. I think your idea is a good one--unique and intriguing--which is always helpful when your professor has to read 30 papers about the same basic subject.

How do I make tab A, happening on camera, fit into the slot A2 I've created before the camera starts rolling on Slot B, which is likely directly connected to tab A by the story that's been filmed?

This just screams porn. And, having read your Lilah/Faith, I believe that's how you meant it to read.

Fanfic-- IMHO-- can be imitation, but at its best it is a form of transformation: sometimes obviously, transformation from one media to another or transformation of canon pairings or characterisations to new ones, but more subtly as well, transformation from one author's voice and world-view to another, without changing the voices of the characters.

Plain imitation can be part of that, depending what the author wishes to transform. If you want to transform Draco Malfoy in Sherlock Holmes or for that matter Philip Marlowe, it works best to take the characters as they are and change the tone and style of your writing. If, on the other hand, you want to transform J.K. Rowling's view of Draco-son-of-Eeevil into your own Draco-fluffy-bunny, it works best to use J.K. Rowling's style and tell a new story-- or it can. There are as many variations as there are voices.

Wow. Thank you everyone for your thoughts. If you have more, please feel free to share them. I've bookmarked the beginning of this conversation, and will come back to it, and read it even more carefully, when I start writing my paper. I'll probably have more questions as I go too...but I've got to get into the actual writing first.

actual writing

pfft, the actual writing is over-rated, it's much more fun to discuss it endlessly.

Hey, it's been a long week, and I'm trying to trick my Muse into cooperating this weekend instead of be-bopping off to Bimini.

Pfft, Elena. You have a naughty mind. Which, now that I think about it, is a good thing. I didn't intend that to sound porny, but considering that I was thinking of the Lilah/Faith at the time, I guess it might have been my smutty subconscious (rather than my smutty conscious mind) taking over.

eta: Okay, and I didn't mean to pfft. Obviously I'm a big sponge, soaking up anything I see.

Ok...new question...

This is just for survey sake...

What's the highest level of education you've had? (this doesn't really matter...and I don't think I'm going to use it...it's more curiosity...)

Did you do any *formal* (and by that I mean did you have assignments in school at any level) that required you to imitate a writer? Actually, I think I'm going to ask this question in Natter too. I'm interested in how wide-spread this kind of assignment is.