Subject: [FFML] Re: [Essay] Major Trends in FFML Criticism
From: "LSMcGill" <lsmcgill@hotmail.com>
Date: 1/30/2004, 4:19 PM
To: "John Hitchens" <makofan@yahoo.com>
CC: <ffml@anifics.com>


Writing is a hobby.  Most of us write (I belive) because we are under a
compulsion to write; writing is painful but "not writing" can be even
more so.  Sometimes writing is easy and enjoyable also.  Either way, to
dismiss writing fanfiction as a not worthy goal is missing the whole
point of recreation and enjoyment.

Okay, let me see if I explain why I have my point of view, and maybe it will
explain it.

I am a native Floridian, and I have been struggling to get out of this
hellhole for my entire life.

I am an artist, I write, I'm good with computers, and I am above average
intellegence.

And you know what?  It means jacks**t.  I came from a lower middle class
family who's money mainly went to my older sister and her goals to become a
cheerleader and a housewife, so when it came my time to go to college, there
was nothing left.  They made too much for me to get aid, and I kept losing
grants and scholorships to people who would turn around and decide they
wanted to open a surf shop instead of go to college.

I'm not kidding.  I have been second place for four seperate scholorships.
Two for art, one for computers, and one for creative writing.  After
attempting to make my own way, and not being able to afford a third
semester, I had to quit.

So here I am with a whole load of what everyone around me is calling talent,
and it amounts to nothing.  I can't sell my art because all anyone wants in
florida is pelicans and seashores.  I can't get a really good paying job
working with computers because despite how good I am with them, I don't have
a degree or certificate.  And writing?  That's a laugh.  Without a masters
in english and journalism, there's not a single newspaper or magazine that
will touch you.

In the meantime, I am being bombarded, constantly, by friends and family and
even complete strangers who see my work, and compare it that being done by
others, and they tell me I'm better, so why don't I have the successful life
these other people have?

Gee, it's a shame I'm wasting my talent so.

For 30 effing years, I have heard over and over how it's a shame my talent
is going to waste.  And I see all around me people who are at least as
talented, if not more so, also being big fish in tiny little ponds.

And I pay $6 a book for dreck that I could write a better story than with
both hands tied behind my back and high on morphine. (and if you'd seen how
incoherent I am on morphine, you'd understand how bad that is.
Appendectomies are not fun.)  Or I pay $8 a movie to see a plot so full of
holes you can drive a fleet of mac trucks through them.

And these no talent hack jobs are making millions while I make nothing,  and
the people who do have the talent are too busy living day to day to share
that talent with the world.

So yes, it makes me angry.  Yes, it makes me sad.  Yes, I find it
frustrating that people with talent, with a gift, with an ability that not
everyone has, are hidden in obscurity, while the hacks rule the world.

Pardon me for wanting to change that.

And if this be arrogance and ego on my part, at least I'm still trying,
rather than giving up and saying this is all there is.

LSMcGill

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