50 Shades of Gray: The Worst Thing That Could Happen to Fanfiction

 

50 Shades of Gray

The Worst Thing That Could Happen to Fanfiction

 

Despite any issues I may have with J.K. Rowling and her politics, I have to say, living in a world where individual Harry Potter books were outsold by subpar erotica is not exactly a world I am happy to live in. Still, 50 Shades of Gray was formative for the landscape of American literature and internet culture. It led to the normalization of fanfiction, BDSM, and was a triumph for indie authors everywhere. It also did it in the worst way possible.

For those who have been waiting for the end times in an underground bunker, 50 Shades of Gray was a 2011 erotic romance novel written by E.L. James. It was based on Twilight fanfiction. Though not the first mainstream novel to be based on fanfiction, it was the work that cemented the fanfiction to novel pipeline. Popular fanfiction tends to carry a loyal audience, and when 50 Shades of Gray became a bestseller with a successful movie, publishers saw the viability of publishing fanfiction. Unfortunately, the fanfiction that is published is neither the most well-written or the most socially progressive. Though, 50 Shades of Gray was at least based on fanfiction about fictional characters and not real people (looking at you, After franchise). Still, it has faced backlash primarily from the BDSM community.

BDSM stands for bondage/discipline, dominance/submission, and sadism/masochism. It is a sexual subculture which has long been popular in fanfiction. 50 Shades of Gray led to the non-BDSM community (and people outside of fandom) learning of the practice. Now, many know about tops, bottoms, subs, doms, safe words, and the like. 50 Shades of Gray also gave people a warped perception of BDSM (and many of the scenes are actually quite tame for BDSM), but it also helped normalize the practice. It is no longer considered as taboo of a practice as it once was and women who did not explore the wild west of fanfiction were able to explore their sexualities more readily.

Though E.L. James owes much of her success to Stephenie Meyer and her own work, E.L. James does deserve praise for having initially been an indie author. It is a difficult feat and has become more common since her publication. Though her work was published traditionally within a year of her initial self-publication, she made self-publishing more acceptable and showed it was feasible for other aspiring authors.

E.L. James has not found much success since her 50 Shades of Gray series. However, the series’ influence is still prevalent in society. At least three other Twilight based stories have been published since its inception (Beautiful Bastard, Gabriel’s Inferno, and Wallbanger). Thanks to E.L. James, reading fanfiction is no longer something shameful, or to be hidden. However, also thanks to 50 Shades, it is not the best fanfiction that is being published; it is the most popular or the most similar to 50 Shades. And that is the true tragedy of the 50 Shades phenomenon.

 

About Crystal Sosa

Crystal Sosa is a PhD student at Texas Woman’s University. She is also a professor at San Jacinto College and a native to Houston. She spends her free time writing fantasy novels or talking about the queer agenda. You can contact her at csosa6@twu.edu. You can find more of her work here.