So, there's a bunch of pretty bad Python code that encodes the screen-scraped index of a very nice fanfic archive. I wish to fix as many things in the prototype stage. So, while I can fix the Ridiculously Redundant Recording of URLs by myself, I need some help with defining some of the metadata.
- What is the Correct Way of writing a ship name? Is it Harry/Hermione or Hermione/Harry? Are both ok? Are they the same? What is The Rule? Is it ordered by gender, or focus? What if the entire story is written from an OFC's point of view, should it be Harry/Mary or Mary/Harry? Would Harry marry Mary? I would be very merry should Harry marry Mary! Some people seem to care about such things.
- How do I map whatever some sites list as a fic's "genre" into something resembling literary genres (obviously, a story may fit more than one)? Because we know that despite being based on Contemporary Fantasy, the fan fiction varies greatly, from (teen-)melodrama to comic, heroic, romantic, erotic and even high fantasy. Some of what is specified in the archives just means mood (fluff, angst) rather than theme and convention (chick lit, legal thriller), which is confusing. All you people with degrees in English and whatever, have any lecture notes about genre studies? Epistemology geeks? (that's you, Ben!)
Edit: I completely forgot all non-prose (though I personally doubt the artistic merit of so called song fics, I am but a plebe and am willing to let history decide), and the vast amounts of farce (intended or not) as well as the token bit of genuine irony. Also, the fandom is an introspective (or just plain antagonistic) bunch and thus we have fan fiction about fan fiction, which lacking a better name, I'll call "arsficia". *snort*
Edit #2: from the findings of a depraved perv:
“This is really a wonderful thing, Harry,” I said, utterly sincerely. I slid my thumb across the tip.
He gave a breathless laugh. “Thanks,” he said. “I like it.”
I don't know why, but I find it very funny.
2 comments:
RE: database project.
Of course I'm building a new system! Had I been aware of the existence of a satisfactory system, I would have just used it instead of wracking my brains trying to create one of my own. I'm not doing it for glory, I assure you.
BTW, it is not normalized specifically because I'm a certified Oracle DBA and OR/M coder in my day job, and I intend to do something un-enterprisy at home.
RE: Ship names.
Would it be OMC/Hermione, or Hermione/OMC? What if OMC is a very developed round focus characters, and Hermione is a dull Americanized Hermione Sue? What if it's the other way around? Are the two the same ship?
RE: genres.
We have word count to measure length so if I choose to have named categories by length, it will be a read only value derived from word count (e.g. "if wc > 500K then uber, elseif wc > 50K then novel, elseif wc > 5K then fic, elseif wc > 200 then ficlet else drabble").
I wish to have a separate property for mood (dubbed the "fluff-o-meter" in the spec).
I don't know if slash has some canon, plot devices, stock characters or whatever to say it's a genre. I believe it's just a tag-like warning to let people who are squicked by slash to filer it out of their search results.
Slash is important, and yet I don't know anything about it. Help?
What I mean by genre is the distinction between a mystery novel, a war story, a spy story, a growing-up story as written in a diary of a teen-aged girl, a courtship story between two young professionals, a story describing a sports event, a situational comedy, and an American patriotic story singing the praises of Coca-Cola, native American shamans and north-American wildlife.
It being Harry Potter fan fiction, it is bound to have some fantasy element (though it can be minimal), and the boilerplate year-n story has some mystery, action, adventure, romance, Quidditch, drama, comedy, etc. But we can still say story A is like story B but unlike story C, can't we? And some fan fiction is written in a style not resembling the canon at all! I believe it is useful to have it specified, recorded, and indexed.
Any ideas?
Canon characters take precedence, so it would be Hermione/OMC and not OMC/Hermione. Similarly, major characters take precedence over minor or secondary ones, so it would be Snape/Luna and not Luna/Snape. If two characters of more or less equal canonical significance are paired, then it's older/younger, male/female, or failing that in alphabetical order. I think.
Post a Comment