The Boy Who Lived Forever

[LadyBrooke]

Well, legally it's wrong if the author doesn't give permission, but personally authors who act like that annoy me. For the most part, I read fanfic in fandoms where the author is already dead or has given their blessing, so it's not a huge problem (aside from M-E fanfic, I read lots of Sherlock Holmes, Harry Potter, and Shakespeare.) The reason it annoys me is, unless an author somehow manages to avoid any mentions or borrowings from mythology, older works, history, ect. they are writing a form of fanfic. The only difference is the time that has elapsed. Anyone redoing Romeo and Juliet, King Arthur, or a fairy tale is writing fanfic in way. The difference is, those authors can legally make money off it because of the time elapsed.

As mentioned in the article, it has only been in the past couple hundred years that copy right has become important. Nobody made a fuss about Shakespeare rewriting other authors' works for the stage, something that could get you fined if you did it today.

As a writer, if I ever get published, I hope people write fanfiction for it. What better praise could there be then to know that your work spiked the imagination of other people?