On Sad Stories
Sep. 26th, 2010 07:12 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
masterofmidgetsSo, I have this kind of love/hate relationship with a certain breed of angst fic.
It's not the regular angstfic; that I can deal with, even if it's not usually my cup of tea. I can read a story where Merlin is suicidal or John Sheppard gets killed in combat or Tony DiNozzo was part of an underage sex ring and the premise is - okay, I won't say absurd, because oftentimes these are good, realistic stories written by good writers (not always, but often enough that I don't want to generalize). But they are far enough outside of what I think of as canon that they don't really touch it, and so they don't stick with me. I may feel sad and angry reading a story where John Watson reveals that he was in an abusive relationship in college, but I don't think of that relationship every time I read Sherlock Holmes.
But every once in a while I read a story - not a big, melodramatic sobfest story but just a quiet, small, plausibly sad story - that takes hold of me and won't let go. It's so fitting, so understatedly right that I can't leave it behind, and it colors how I read the original stories for a long time after. And on the one hand, it opens up new interpretations of characters and stories to me, and a lot of times gives them more depth. I see their words and actions in a new light, give them more weight, and that's a good thing! On the other hand...it makes me sad, even when the stories themselves are happy things. And while I love shows and books that break my heart out and stomp on it a few times for good measure (hello Supernatural!), sometimes I just want to enjoy stories that are uncomplicated and cheerful.
I read a Jeeves and Wooster fic last night that I'm not going to spoil for you, but let me just say that, without doing anything to change canon at all, it gave me an entirely different way of understanding Bertie Wooster's character, and I cannot get it out of my head. I'm going through all I know about him and these stories and going yes, yes, that is perfectly, horribly plausible and it changes everything without changing anything and it's awful. Because it's a great story in itself but it's going to be a long time before there won't be this bit of sadness in the back of my mind when I think of Bertie and damnit, this was my happy place.
It's not the regular angstfic; that I can deal with, even if it's not usually my cup of tea. I can read a story where Merlin is suicidal or John Sheppard gets killed in combat or Tony DiNozzo was part of an underage sex ring and the premise is - okay, I won't say absurd, because oftentimes these are good, realistic stories written by good writers (not always, but often enough that I don't want to generalize). But they are far enough outside of what I think of as canon that they don't really touch it, and so they don't stick with me. I may feel sad and angry reading a story where John Watson reveals that he was in an abusive relationship in college, but I don't think of that relationship every time I read Sherlock Holmes.
But every once in a while I read a story - not a big, melodramatic sobfest story but just a quiet, small, plausibly sad story - that takes hold of me and won't let go. It's so fitting, so understatedly right that I can't leave it behind, and it colors how I read the original stories for a long time after. And on the one hand, it opens up new interpretations of characters and stories to me, and a lot of times gives them more depth. I see their words and actions in a new light, give them more weight, and that's a good thing! On the other hand...it makes me sad, even when the stories themselves are happy things. And while I love shows and books that break my heart out and stomp on it a few times for good measure (hello Supernatural!), sometimes I just want to enjoy stories that are uncomplicated and cheerful.
I read a Jeeves and Wooster fic last night that I'm not going to spoil for you, but let me just say that, without doing anything to change canon at all, it gave me an entirely different way of understanding Bertie Wooster's character, and I cannot get it out of my head. I'm going through all I know about him and these stories and going yes, yes, that is perfectly, horribly plausible and it changes everything without changing anything and it's awful. Because it's a great story in itself but it's going to be a long time before there won't be this bit of sadness in the back of my mind when I think of Bertie and damnit, this was my happy place.