The Case for Fanfiction ─ Exploring the Pleasures and Practices of a Maligned Craft

Challenging readers to rethink what they read and why, the author questions the aesthetic assumptions that have led to the devaluing of fan fiction—a genre criticized as tasteless and derivative—and other "guilty pleasure" reading (and writing) including romance and fantasy. The complicated relationship between "fanfic" and intellectual property is discussed in light of the millennia-old tradition of derivative literature, before modern copyright law established originality as the hallmark of great fiction. "Absorbed reading"—the practice of immersing oneself in the narrative versus critically "reading from a distance"—is a strong motive for fanfiction's appropriation of canon characters and worlds.

Ashley J. Barner received her PhD in literature from Ohio University and is the author of a fantasy novel. She lives in Shippensburg, PA, with her family and fourteen cats.