I Adore The Way Fan Fiction Writers Engage With And Critique Source Texts, By Manipulating Them And Breaking

““I adore the way fan fiction writers engage with and critique source texts, by manipulating them and breaking their rules. Some of it is straight-up homage, but a lot of [fan fiction] is really aggressive towards the source text. One tends to think of it as written by total fanboys and fangirls as a kind of worshipful act, but a lot of times you’ll read these stories and it’ll be like ‘What if Star Trek had an openly gay character on the bridge?’ And of course the point is that they don’t, and they wouldn’t, because they don’t have the balls, or they are beholden to their advertisers, or whatever. There’s a powerful critique, almost punk-like anger, being expressed there—which I find fascinating and interesting and cool.””

—

Lev Grossman

more context w/r/t museum guards, living wages, and essential but often overlooked arts workers

“An Artist an Met Museum Guard Whose New Work Is About Pay: Her Own,” (Emilie Lemakis) | 2022,  New York Times (paywall; I’ll try to get screengrabs up soon)

“Invisible Man: At the Whitney, Fred Wilson Comments on the Status of Museum Guards,” (Fred Wilson) | 2012, Art Observer (open access article; the Whitney has information about the works here)

“Visiting Hours,” a poem by Essex Hemphill (1957-1995), who worked as a museum guard in Washington, D.C. | 1992, Ceremonies: Prose and Poetry, Plume: 1992, screen capture from archive.org)

i don’t remember you

Death Takes a Holiday (1934), dir. by Mitchell Leisen

"What could terror mean to me, who have nothing to fear?"

the majesty of these renders me speechless

may i present you

penguin pingu classics

I think all political jobs all the way up to the president should only be allowed to earn their country’s minimum wage the entire time they work in politics. Also they should get only 1 week’s vacation per year and have to pay for their own food and gas. The white house should charge them rent.