On fandom and slash

After reading flaschengeist and curiousfunk's entries on fandom, I feel the need to add my two cents. To... justify myself, so to speak.

Sherlock Holmes has been all over my LJ in the last couple of weeks. Of course I've always known the character, and I must've read some of his adventures when I was in school, but I think I was too fascinated by Poe's Auguste Dupin to really pay attention at the time. :P Anyway, just when I was thinking that I'd been in the DÄ fandom for 5 year (I discovered DÄ slash in summer 2005) and that must be a record for me, I fell headfirst into a new fandom. I still love DÄ and I can't wait to see them live again, but I needed something new. And Sherlock Holmes just happens to be this "something new".

If I analyse my relationship with fandom, I can clearly see that, even though I enjoy a hot PWP, it's the relationship between the main characters the thing that fascinates me. The angstier (is that even a word?), the better. I like deep friendships, damaged characters who are apparently unable to love, USTs. All my fandoms have had those elements: The Cure (Robert/Simon), Harry Potter (Snape), Die Ärzte (Bela/Farin), Sherlock Holmes (Holmes/Watson), just to name the ones where I've been more active.

More than once I've felt ashamed of this hobby of mine. Lately I've felt ridiculous because, man, I'm thirty and I still read and write fanfiction and draw fanart. Sometimes I think of that woman I met at a comic fair 10 years ago, a 40-something nerd who claimed she only read yaoi and shonen ai manga and I remember thinking "OMG, I don't want to turn into such a loser!" Sometimes I'm afraid I'm just like her. Sometimes I think reading slash doesn't make me any better than those women who read Harlequin novels and dream of Prince Charming. Sometimes I think I should just grow up, for God's sake.

But you know what? I don't care. A friend of mine who just moved in with her boyfriend has two framed photos of Bud Spencer and Terence Hill in her sitting room. One of my friends' father, an old hippy, positively worships The Beatles and their house is full of Beatles memorabilia. Are they ashamed of that? Hell, no. Then why should I?

That's because I like an added twist to my canon. I like the relationship between "my" characters to go a step further. I mean, why add anything to a canon that has little gems like "How Watson Learned the Trick"? Better than crack!fic and 100% canon. But sometimes I need a little more.

I don't care about the speculations on Holmes and Watson and whether they were really "only good friends". Just like I don't care if the musicians I write about are straight, gay, bi or whatever they want to call themselves. Just as long as they give me enough material to build my sick little universe featuring them.

I don't like stories where characters cry uselessly, but I love when a story makes me choke down a sob and curse myself for getting so involved. Where the characters aren't even aware of their feelings until they are in so deep they can't breathe any more. I know such stories don't happen in real life, or at leat they don't happen to me, that's why I enjoy reading them.

I should just stop pretending I'm so much better than everyone else and admit I'm just a big sappy romantic.


This entry has become much more revealing than was originally planned...