Now I feel like you're trying to change my mind. I already said, at least once, that I've written fic. I know how it works. I know the drill. You couldn't pay me to write it now, but that's me. Your MFA experience didn't affect you the way mine did--fabulous! You don't find solving the puzzle exhilarating--fine! That doesn't make my experience any less valid, though, or change my perspective in any way. For me, writing fic was the stepping stone to writing my own things, and I know deep in my gut that I would regress, even if only temporarily, if I went back there. It's not like that for you, which is great, but that's my experience. I "can't go home again," and I'm okay with that.
And I am not saying, nor have I actually said at all during this conversation, that one type of writing is better than another. (One of the things I adored about my grad program is that you could write whatever you wanted, including supernatural gay porn, which a friend did for his thesis. I think it's tragic when programs take, say, SF writers and make them pretend to be literary to get a diploma and give them a complex about SF for the rest of their lives, like one Penn State grad I know).
I've said that I don't like fic, yes. I've also said that I just don't enjoy it and it's my personal preference. I have not said that it's inferior or that people shouldn't write it. I'm not sure exactly how we ended up here, because I said this way upthread and all was well, but just to be clear I will say one last time that I do not care what anyone else writes as long as nobody gets hurt and they leave it up to me to decide to read it or not. Write RPF. Write slash. Write literary fiction. Write video games. I don't care--do what you want (and frankly, why should someone else's opinion stop anyone in the first place?). But I do think that it's a shame not to at least take a field trip from the world of fic to try something else and see if it suits you. If not, no harm no foul. But if it does, what an awesome new world has just opened up to you.
And now that my forehead is even more sufficiently bloodied than it was when I got home from work tonight, I am going to bed.
no subject
And I am not saying, nor have I actually said at all during this conversation, that one type of writing is better than another. (One of the things I adored about my grad program is that you could write whatever you wanted, including supernatural gay porn, which a friend did for his thesis. I think it's tragic when programs take, say, SF writers and make them pretend to be literary to get a diploma and give them a complex about SF for the rest of their lives, like one Penn State grad I know).
I've said that I don't like fic, yes. I've also said that I just don't enjoy it and it's my personal preference. I have not said that it's inferior or that people shouldn't write it. I'm not sure exactly how we ended up here, because I said this way upthread and all was well, but just to be clear I will say one last time that I do not care what anyone else writes as long as nobody gets hurt and they leave it up to me to decide to read it or not. Write RPF. Write slash. Write literary fiction. Write video games. I don't care--do what you want (and frankly, why should someone else's opinion stop anyone in the first place?). But I do think that it's a shame not to at least take a field trip from the world of fic to try something else and see if it suits you. If not, no harm no foul. But if it does, what an awesome new world has just opened up to you.
And now that my forehead is even more sufficiently bloodied than it was when I got home from work tonight, I am going to bed.