The Beauty and Merit of Fanfiction

“And that was the day… my mom sold me to One Direction.”

A lot of us have probably seen this meme before. In the early 2010s, one (not so) innocent Wattpad user uploaded a fanfiction with the premise of being a teenaged girl sold to One Direction. It has since become a meme, a joke on the absurd and often “I’m not like other girls” vibe of some fanfiction.

Fanfiction, however, extends far beyond these premises, and actually serves a lot of purposes beyond just… Five Seconds of Summer fantasizing.

In UCSB’s College of Creative Studies, we students have a lot of discussions with our professors. The nature of our class sizes (usually 12 people or less) means that we get to know them well, and converse often. It was in these courses that I first encountered talk of fanfiction having literary merit (much to one professor’s dismay). 

For many authors, fanfiction was their entry into the writing world. And, for some, their bestselling novels once began as fanfiction (ex: Fifty Shades of Grey was originally a Twilight fanfiction). These fanfiction websites create a space for young writers to post their work with no consequences. They can receive feedback, form connections, and find a community. This community lends to a deeper relationship to their craft; not only do they enjoy writing, but it’s what their friends bond and support one another over. 

In our classes, I had professors defend websites like Wattpad or Archive of Our Own because of this fact. They were the entryway for many people’s passion, and a no-stress supportive place for people to explore this passion. This is also why, on these sites, you encounter a large number of Author’s Notes saying things like “sorry this chapter was a little late; I was finishing my dissertation!” A lot of these people have been in the writing and literature field for a while, and can serve as great examples and mentors for the young.

There’s also just some amazing writing out there with quotes and character arcs that you wouldn’t assume came from a 16-year-old girl’s fic about anime characters (or, as mentioned before, a 32-year-old PhD candidate). But more than this: being a productive and educated researcher and reader means also considering the context behind works of writing, be it social, political, or cultural happenings. It is through this lens that fanfiction grows an even more important role: it allows for an exploration of gender and sexuality that can be crucial for young (or even old) readers and writers. 

For this section, I’m going to use one particular ship as an example: Remus Lupin and Sirius Black from Harry Potter. 

J.K. Rowling is notoriously transphobic (among other things), a fact that disappointed thousands of devoted readers and fans. A prime example of a TERF (Trans-Exclusionary Radical Feminist), Rowling’s views center around the idea that trans acceptance hinders feminism and female empowerment/safety. 

In the canon of her books, Remus Lupin and Sirius Black have a deep history stemming back to their own teenaged years, and though the canon doesn’t state that they were or are gay, they remain one of the most popular ships on modern fanfiction sites. 

(They scored number TWO on the 2024 list of most-written-about ships). 

They have a huge following on Twitter and Tumblr, their relationship being called “wolfstar” as a reference to their werewolf and star-named identities. What’s so interesting about this community is that, despite Rowling’s stance on trans people, a large part of the wolfstar fanbase is trans, and uses these characters as explorations of their own gender and sexuality.

There are hundreds of fics that write Remus as trans, and so, so many posts on Twitter (X) and Tumblr that have fanart, jokes, commentary, or quotes about this. Regulus Black, Sirius’s younger brother, is another staple of this fanbase, and upon a comparison of the search results, has even more published fics about him being trans. Like wolfstar, there’s also some awesome fanart. It’s a way for people to interact with a piece of fiction that they love while also exploring their own identity, all while ignoring an author who openly disrespects and disregards their community.

Outside of Harry Potter, too, many people use fanfiction as a way to question gender and gender dynamics in really interesting ways. They write characters as transgender, they genderbend, and we’re not even going to touch on the omegaverse, a template for alternate universes where people have a gender and a subgender (and genitals hardly define anything). 

Fanfiction is an outlet for healing of all kinds, and while it’s by no means perfect (looking at you, 11-year-old reading smut on Wattpad), there’s a lot more meat on its bones than people want to acknowledge.

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