Quote:
Originally Posted by Elfwreck
And it's an excellent starting point for that.
I'm oblivious to what "literature" is, aside from short-stories-and-novels.
1) Don't knock it if you haven't tried it
2) The current "shared world - Poe-inspired stories" project is fanfiction. League of Extraordinary Gentlemen is fanfiction. The Wind Done Gone is fanfiction. Niven's story, "Man of Steel; Woman of Kleenex" fits in the range of fanfiction.
3) Fanfiction hits a wide range of purposes. Personal fantasy & wish-fulfillment is one that catches the most media attention, but it's not the most interesting to fanfic writers & most fanfic readers. It's often a way to retell stories from a different perspective--instead of "Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone," it's "Draco Malfoy and that brat who stole all the attention that should have been mine." Sometimes it's just a character study, a sort of review & analysis in story format. Sometimes it's a way to consider how two different fictional worlds are portrayed--what would happen if Fox Mulder discovered the Twilight vampires? Who's a better detective, Bruce Wayne or Sherlock Holmes? Sometimes fanfic fills in the gaps in the original story--either describing a missing scene, or giving a hypothetical explanation for an apparent loophole. A lot of fanfic is commentary done in story form.
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I'm only teasing ya.

I know, for instance, that a hell of a lot of really good writers started off writing stories set within the Lovecraftian mythos. And I think I might be getting fanfic and slashfic confused here. Is slashfic the one where they have everyone screwing each other?
I would consider 'literature' to be anything that does not fit easily into any category. Jeffrey Eugenides' Virgin Suicides is literature, Mickey Spillaine's I, the Jury is fiction. Salinger's Catcher in the Rye is literature, James Patterson's Along Came a Spider is fiction.
Me? I write pulp.