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GLASSWORKS

Don't Stop Writing Fanfiction

12/1/2024

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by Bethaney Randazzo
“Stop writing fanfiction, and go get published.”
​
I often wonder where I would be if a twenty-three-year-old me had listened to that creative writing professor. Would I currently be in a masters in writing program, while teaching first-year college writing, on my way to transforming some of nearly eighty stories I’ve written over the decade since that comment was made into publishable works? Probably not.
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via Canva

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Queerbaiting: Victim or Villain?

6/1/2024

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by Emily Langford
PicturePhoto by Sincerely Media on Unsplash
As a queer, “elder millennial” who watched as personal computers suddenly took root in our homes, I experienced the rise of online fandom firsthand. Prior to the internet, my experience with fandom was a solo one, I didn’t know anyone who had the same obsessive passion for stories and characters like I had. I was the annoying kid who would, unprompted, spew out tidbits and theories about books and movies, the weirdo who was off in her own little world where all her characters existed at my day-dreamy little whims. I was tolerated at best and I eventually learned to keep my fervor to myself. I remember the first time I entered the titles of my favorite obsessions into the search bar. Suddenly, I was very much not alone. Each of my hyperfixations had a dedicated chat room or message board with other people who understood, who shared my passions. I finally found a place of acceptance. ​


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Stop Sleeping on Fanfiction

12/1/2023

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by Cat Reed
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Photo by Laura Kapfer on Unsplash
Many of us are familiar with the fact that Fifty Shades of Grey began as fanfiction of the Twilight series. A few of us might have also been there for the controversy of Cassandra Clare’s Mortal Instruments series being called a fanfiction of Harry Potter. As discussed in “Publishing in the Age of Fanfiction” by Mikaela Langdon, Clare deleted her original fanfiction, “as if her fanfiction past is something she considers shameful.” Both of these book series (Fifty Shades and Mortal Instruments) were hugely successful, hot off the shelves, money-making ventures; so why all of the stigma, shame, and downplaying the validity of fanfiction?
Those were the roots that the newly created stories ventured forth from, but it would seem that instead of embracing that part of the history, authors would rather avoid the fanfiction they used to write as one would avoid a dog in desperate need of a bath.

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On Promoting Contemporary Literature

7/1/2023

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by Lesley George
PicturePhoto by Shelby Miller on Unsplash
I’ll admit—I have spent hours skimming through fanfiction, picking the perfect tag to fit into the hyper-specific story I wanted to read: friends to lovers, fluff, slice of life, alternate universe (AU). There is something euphoric about being able to find a story so acutely tailored to my tastes; the only thing that could ruin the experience for me would be a misuse of a story tag [“Please use story tags correctly!” I cried]. Tropes and tags are a staple within the fandom realm and exist to satisfy the fans desire for curated content, made by other fans, involving their favorite characters. But can these markers exist outside fandom culture?


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It's Not Talent, It's Just Hard Work

7/1/2022

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by Amanda Smera

​Few things make me angrier than when people read something I’ve written and point out my talent. The intentions, of course, always come from a good place and they mean no harm. And yet the bitter taste in my mouth never fails to feel discrediting. I want to scream from the top of my lungs:
“I’VE BEEN WORKING ON THIS FOR A MONTH STRAIGHT, FOR YOU TO DARE AND ASSUME IT WAS JUST ‘MY TALENT’?!” 


​It feels like an outdated myth that talent is a bigger force, that either you’ve got it, or you don’t. I have hundreds of thousands of school essays, Harry Potter fan fictions, and journal entries that prove that I was no Jane Austen at the age of five or fifteen. 



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