On deleting fics, going pro, and poetry and dreams
I admit that this is a very self-centered post, but the whole point of it is to tell you to not delete your fics unless you absolutely must.
The rest of us of course have no say over this. As writers you (and I) should be able to scrub our writing off of the earth, for whatever reason we wish. But I beg you, for the good of all of us, and no matter how terrible, regressive, atrociously written you think your fic is, please don’t delete it.
Just today, I have spent an upward of 2 hours looking for the remnants of Adelaide’s Freudian Slip, a rare novel-length Harry/Ron fic, trolling the Internet Archive, ffnet, livejournal, etc., etc., etc. I had chapters 1-5 and 10, 11, 14, but not the rest, which are tantalizingly out of reach. It’s not only frustration on my part, though that is there, but also this sense of loss that I can’t help but feel, this sense that try as we might, try as we must, the message in the bottle never made it to land. You may not want anyone to read your story now, but you may no longer be the person who first set the message to sea. The fifteen-year-old you, the twenty-two-year-old you, she was trying to reach someone, was she not?
A lot of us was half raised by fandom, leaving pieces of ourselves scattered across the net. There is something poetic in letting the raw fits and starts of our teenage-hood stay for someone else to find, someone in the midst of their own fits and starts. Though there is poetry–and sadness–in ephemera too, so who am I to say. I just thought, there is enough uncertainty in the world, so let this be something that lasts.
Of course, I don’t begrudge anyone filing off the serial number and going pro, because for one, part of the story is still out there for us to find, and for two, if it was me about to be able to reach a whole new group of people, I would take the chance in a heartbeat. And writers do have to live.
But beyond living, sometimes we dream. Fandom is nothing but fantasies, the best of which being the fantasy that we can exist communally, on the margins, outside the market. The worst thing that can happen to that fantasy and shatter the dream is professional publishing, which though necessary, is a necessary evil. Someday the communal dream can come true, and like stories, that dream will live longer than you and I, but that dream can’t reconcile with this world.
Also, don’t delete your fics.