Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- 1 Introduction: Adaptation in a Convergence Environment
- 2 Adaptation as Connection: A Network Theoretical Approach to Convergence, Participation, and Co-Production
- 3 Filing off the Serial Numbers: Fanfiction and its Adaptation to the Book Market
- 4 From Paratext to Polyprocess: The “Quirky” Mashup Novel
- 5 “You Just Got Covered”: YouTube Cover Song Videos as Examples of Para-Adaptation
- 6 Masters of the Universe? Viewers, the Media, and Sherlock's Lead Writers
- 7 Alien Adapted (Again and Again): Fictional Universes between Difference and Repetition
- 8 “Everything is Awesome:” Spreadability and The LEGO Movie
- 9 Localization as Adaptation in the Wolfenstein Franchise
- Index
3 - Filing off the Serial Numbers: Fanfiction and its Adaptation to the Book Market
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 21 November 2020
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- 1 Introduction: Adaptation in a Convergence Environment
- 2 Adaptation as Connection: A Network Theoretical Approach to Convergence, Participation, and Co-Production
- 3 Filing off the Serial Numbers: Fanfiction and its Adaptation to the Book Market
- 4 From Paratext to Polyprocess: The “Quirky” Mashup Novel
- 5 “You Just Got Covered”: YouTube Cover Song Videos as Examples of Para-Adaptation
- 6 Masters of the Universe? Viewers, the Media, and Sherlock's Lead Writers
- 7 Alien Adapted (Again and Again): Fictional Universes between Difference and Repetition
- 8 “Everything is Awesome:” Spreadability and The LEGO Movie
- 9 Localization as Adaptation in the Wolfenstein Franchise
- Index
Summary
Abstract
The novel series Fifty Shades of Grey and The Mortal Instruments originated as fanfiction adaptations of the Twilight and Harry Potter series. E.L. James and Cassandra Clare published in fanfiction archives first, before they deleted their online writing, edited and rewrote their work, and removed traces of fandom so that the narratives could be adapted to the print market. This process is called “filing off the serial numbers” or “pulled to publish” by fans. Beyond the adapted texts, and writing strategies that transitioned from the fan community to the commercial book market, established practices of fan authorship have been adapted as well. The article investigates these consecutive and simultaneous processes of transposition and appropriation as “layered forms of adaptation.”
Key words: Fanfiction; Harry Potter; Twilight; pulled to publish; adaptation
Introduction
After the Fifty Shades of Grey book series had sold more than 125 million copies worldwide, fans eagerly awaited the release of the movie adaptation in February of 2015. Building on the books’ success, the opening weekend of the movie alone grossed $248 million. The production and pre-production of the film was accompanied by media reports and PR announcements of the ways the narrative and specifically the BDSM scenes in the book were adapted to the screen, as well as which actors were cast as the central characters Christian and Ana. Throughout this renewed interest in Fifty Shades of Grey, the history of layered adaptation that the text had transitioned through before it was turned into a movie receded into the background.
An earlier version of Fifty Shades of Grey, the Twilight fanfiction Master of the Universe, had been widely read by fans online before the text was stripped of its direct references to Twilight and became a commercial success in its own right. Master of the Universe is not the only prominent text that evolved from the realms of fanfiction writing; with Sylvain Reynard’s Gabriel's Inferno and the writing duo Christina Lauren's Beautiful Bastard at least three other authors of erotic Twilight fanfiction made the New York Times bestseller list. Beyond easily adaptable “all human” fanfiction from the Twilight fandom, fanfictions from other fandoms, including texts that revel in fantastic supernatural worlds, have successfully transitioned from the communal online and free writing context to the book market.
- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- Adaptation in the Age of Media Convergence , pp. 57 - 86Publisher: Amsterdam University PressPrint publication year: 2019