The big difference

[larryhammer]

For kate_nepveu:

"The essential difference between porn and erotica is that porn has Mary Sues and erotica doesn't." Discuss.

It would explain the similarities between certain types of amateur porn and fantasy: the sort that starts with the stats (measurements and race/class, respectively). On another paw, can one meaningfully distinguish between a wish-fulfillment character and a Mary Sue? I'd argue the other is a subset of the one, with certain identifying characteristics mostly relating to how other characters react to her/him, but others disagree. Or even argue a Mary Sue by definition cannot appear outside of fanfic.

---L.

Comments

[kate_nepveu]

My cold has gotten exponentially worse, but I think I agree with your definition of Mary Sue--distorts the landscape by being unreasonably adored by the author and because her wonderfulness is supposed to be self-evident to the audience. The audience is nothing more than an author stand-in (I don't actually think Mary Sues necessarily are), and so there's no effort to engage anyone who doesn't have the same buttons being pushed in the same way. If you don't buy her wonderfulness, there's nothing else in the story for you--and as a reader, you often feel actively pushed away.

When I said that porn is a Mary Sue story, I was thinking that you could replace the "wonderful" with "sexually arousing"--it's not so much the characters as the exclusion of the audience if its tastes don't precisely match what's being offered up. Of course, I'm basing this off a really small sample set (and I'm not just saying that because my real name is on this comment), so I could be making all this up.

[larryhammer]

More or less, that's what I was thinking.

---L.

[oracne.livejournal.com]

Hmm, possibly. But definitional arguments don't usually go well, so I'll stop there.

[larryhammer]

Hmm -- which definitions seem weak to you?

---L.

[oracne.livejournal.com]

None of them...but I always spend all day discussing, and then having to get vaguer and vaguer as I find more exceptions.

I think I will just accept your defs and move on!

[larryhammer]

I know what you mean -- I usually get that way about litcrit discussions outside of close readings.

---L.

[http://users.livejournal.com/_twilight_/]

Heroes in comic books could be argued to be Mary Sues, but if the plot isn't about wish fulfillment, then it's something slightly different.

[larryhammer]

Hmm. I don't actually know enough of superhero comics to comment meaningfully. Though you can have, I'd argue, Mary Sues in stories that are not ostesibly wish-fulfillment. For example, if a writer was a better storyteller than character creator.

---L.

[http://users.livejournal.com/_twilight_/]

True for collaborative efforts like that...

[larryhammer]

BTW, I'm not so much startled and bemused to realize we have a previous connection. How well did you know kathlaw? If you don't mind my asking.

---L.

[http://users.livejournal.com/_twilight_/]

I don't really.

[larryhammer]

Just wondering. She was a close friend.

---L.

[http://users.livejournal.com/_twilight_/]

Was?

[larryhammer]

Um, yeah. She killed herself just over two years ago.

---L.

[http://users.livejournal.com/_twilight_/]

Oh shit. That explains a conversation.

I'll email you later, it's too personal to post.

[larryhammer]

Understood.

Sorry about the sudden springing -- I thought you knew.

---L.

[http://users.livejournal.com/_twilight_/]

Nope, thought she got bored with lj.

[larryhammer]

Nope -- she posted the night before she died. Partial story is here. janni and I were part of the clean-up crew, or as I sometimes think of it, at ground zero.

---L.