But that's kind of the thing, fanfic is about exploring the characters but it doesn't have to do it by creating them in situ. So the characters in a fic can afford to be flatly written compared with those in an original novel, the art is in being able to convey the character in just a few brushstrokes enough to make the reader want to do the rest of the work. Characters like Mrs Micawber are walk on parts but still vivid. David Brent and Miss Jean Brodie are subjected to lots of different circumstances and we see how they react but only from the outside, they're all surface but something about the writing makes it feel as if you get under their skin.
Some of it I think is that Wood is making the point that fiction is more complicated than the idea that you can judge how well written a character is by his/her roundness, flat characters can have just as much life. Also being a literary critic he's as interested in how we perceive characters as the characters themselves and the fact that a flatly written character can work speaks to that. So I think the point I was reaching for with fanfic had to do with him praising Muriel Sharp for very deliberately writing Jean Brodie as she did because she was interested in that same question as Wood is. Whereas fanfic writers might use similar techniques but for different reasons and are not trying to sketch universal types like Brent but very specific individuals ( or at least as each fan perceives them). I wondered if he (Wood) would be able to tell the difference just based on the texts.
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branchandroot
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Date: 2008-01-28 09:13 am (UTC)Some of it I think is that Wood is making the point that fiction is more complicated than the idea that you can judge how well written a character is by his/her roundness, flat characters can have just as much life. Also being a literary critic he's as interested in how we perceive characters as the characters themselves and the fact that a flatly written character can work speaks to that. So I think the point I was reaching for with fanfic had to do with him praising Muriel Sharp for very deliberately writing Jean Brodie as she did because she was interested in that same question as Wood is. Whereas fanfic writers might use similar techniques but for different reasons and are not trying to sketch universal types like Brent but very specific individuals ( or at least as each fan perceives them). I wondered if he (Wood) would be able to tell the difference just based on the texts.