Fandom Voices: Using Fanon in Fanworks by Dawn Walls-Thumma

In a recent column about fanon in the Tolkien fandom, I noted (with surprise) that, in the 2020 Tolkien Fanfiction Survey, fans assign more authority to each other where canon is concerned than they do anyone else but Tolkien, including Christopher Tolkien, scholars and experts, and filmmakers. Likewise, fanon—a slang term for fan-generated theories that achieve popularity in the fandom—appears to be gaining in acceptability. Historically, fanon was often a byword and shorthand for a misconception, often assumed to originate in a fan not doing their research or relying on the films instead of the books. While there are only two surveys spanning five years to work with, the Tolkien Fanfiction Survey suggests this is changing.

This made me want to look at fanon from a different angle. Buried in data are individual fans whose attitudes toward a phenomenon (like fanon) is generally more complicated than a Likert scale can capture. Fandom Voices is a periodic project as part of the monthly Cultus Dispatches column that poses an open-ended question on a topic and asks fans to respond. For this month's column, I asked fans the following:

"Fanon" is a term for fan-generated element or interpretation that is widely used or regarded as true in the fandom. What are your thoughts on fanon? You might think about how you regard fanon (versus canon), how you see creators using fanon in their fanworks, how you use fanon in your own fanworks, or fanons that particularly resonate (or don't resonate) with you.

Fanon is complicated. When, for example, does a headcanon shade into fanon? One participant notes the diversity of the label in the Tolkien fandom:

In an older fandom like the Tolkien fandom, fanon can include a wide variety of things, ranging from significant widespread interpretations that at least some fans are very serious about to short-lived fashions for a tiny extra detail that just tickled people's fancy at the time. The original intention does not always matter; one person's joke can potentially mutate into another fan's firmly adopted head canon.

But even more than defining fanon, the term is complicated by the many (and sometimes conflicting) emotions it engenders. "Although the fandom's attitude to fanon has changed and the term is used far less commonly to simply imply lack of canon knowledge," one participant writes, "there are still a wide variety of attitudes, from whole-hearted unironic adoption to fans who prefer a self-conscious, ironic attitude."

Community Mythmaking

Among participants who embraced fanon, a dominating perspective was how fanon can function as communal storytelling, even mythmaking. Fanfiction writers, by and large, do not fit the stereotype of the reclusive writer tapping away at a masterpiece in a lonely garrett. There is often social interaction at many (or all) stages of the writing process: prompting or challenging each other, collaborative brainstorming and research, sharing works in progress, working with betas and writers' groups, and finally interacting, via comments and communication tools, with readers of the finished product. (These interactions can, in turn, spur further rounds of revision or additional stories.) Part of this process, too, is interpreting and contextualizing Tolkien's complicated canon.

Chestnut_pod identifies Tolkien's canon as a reason why fanon plays such an important role in the Tolkien fandom:

Fanon seems inherent to all fandoms: where writers read each other's work in a setting with a strong norm of collaboration, but also strong social pressure bounding in-groups and out-groups, shared interpretations, styles, vocabularies, and thematic interests are sure to crop up. That said, I think fanon must be particularly load-bearing in Tolkien fandoms, where competing drafts stand pointing at each other like a Spiderman meme inside vast crevasses of missing information. This is doubly true for Silmarillion and HoMe [History of Middle-earth] fans, where the mythological conceit of the writing means that fans must build their characters more or less from scratch, whereas LotR [Lord of the Rings] and Hobbit fans have a little more novelistic insight into characters' emotions and dispositions.

Another respondent also flagged Tolkien's canon as the raw material of fanon, noting that the difficulty of accessing the various canon works in an international, diverse community can make fanon particularly appealing:

In an effort at understanding: I can see why fanon would get popular, especially for a book like The Silmarillion. Most people are probably used to getting offered a lot more concrete details by their fiction, so maybe the wide open space for interpretation feels intimidating to them, and fanon could help fill in those gaps. The supplementary materials like the Histories of Middle-earth could theoretically have filled that role, but they can be hard to find, expensive, and difficult to parse, whereas fanfiction is Googleable, free, and usually written in a way that is reasonably easy to understand (at least if you speak English).

Another participant sees fanon similarly but possibly limiting. "In a fandom like The Silmarillion," she writes, "I think fanon plays a particularly important role because there are so many blanks fans have to fill in. Fanon can help make that process easier, but it can also get in the way of fans coming up with other creative interpretations." This brings up the question, perennially looming over the concept of fanon, of how fanon and canon interlock with each other. Several participants addressed this. "I enjoy fanon in general and do not consider it inferior to canon," says Makamu, "(especially in Tolkien fandom, where most of the fanon I come across tends to supplement and update canon, rather than replace it)." Lyra sees fanon as one way that fans engage the many unanswered questions posed by the legendarium:

Last but not least, there are plenty of open questions where I'm open to a variety of interpretations—Maglor lives through history in Middle-earth, or Maglor returns to Valinor at some point; Caranthir had children that the chronicler just didn't bother to talk about, or Caranthir was tragically childless; Elrond and Elros feel more Fëanorian than not, or Elrond and Elros create their own distinct identity; the Númenóreans have always been problematic in their colonialism whatever their attitude, or the idealistic depiction in the Akallabêth is actually fairly accurate—there are probably more but these come to mind at once. And with these, it's fun to see different takes, and to adopt them for one fic but not another.

Chestnut_pod similarly writes: "In general, I most appreciate fanons that neatly explain logistically contradictory parts of canon or are otherwise tied to worldbuilding rather than character."

In some fandoms, fanon takes on the full strength of canon, with fans collectively agreeing on details that supplement the canon. While this is not entirely unheard of in the Tolkien fandom (remember Figwit?), given the expanse of blank spaces in the canon and the sprawling rosters of textual ghosts, there is perhaps less of this level of fanon than one might expect. Lyra continues:

Sometimes I regret that there isn't a unified fanon with regard to (especially) the missing spouses and daughters. It would be ever so useful if we had a list stating a name and bio for, say, Isildur's or Maglor's spouse, as well as perhaps a birth and marriage date. At the same time, it would take away from the freedom of each individual fan to come up with their own ideas. Even if such a list remained strictly fanon, many fans would probably expect others to follow it, and if you didn't, you'd have to justify your choices (even more than you already do, in this fandom). Let me correct: It would be useful to have a library of different fics that explore these missing characters, so if you wanted to, say, write a fic about Isildur's family life, you could look at how others filled the gaps and adopt the choices that you liked, instead of everybody starting from scratch or, at best, coming across an interpretation they like by pure chance.

Returning to the title of this section, fanon can play a role that verges on mythology or tradition. Shadow describes fanon as aligning naturally in this way with the communal nature of fanfiction:

I love the fact that fanon as a concept exists. To me it's fascinating to trace certain concepts across authors, showing how closely we are connected as a community even if we might not comment on each others fics, or kudos them. It's a natural part of storytelling that certain traditions establish themselves when stories are told again and again, and fanon is simply a part of the traditions in fandom.

Another participant begins by stating, "I’m neutral to positive towards fanon. I don’t read a lot of fanfiction, but I seek out fanart (drawings/painting, cosplay, fan adaptations e.g. the Silmarillion Film Project, etc.) and I make fanart myself (drawing, linoprints). Mostly concerning The Silmarillion. So there is a lot of room for fanon due to lack of detailed descriptions!" She goes on to say, of fanon: "But somehow I enjoy it all the same. I think that is because it shows how 'myth-like' the legendarium is. People are adding to it, modifying it, and these additions are themselves taken up and integrated into the next retelling, so to speak. They are living stories."

Reflections of Us

Other participants observed that fanon reflects on us, both individual creators and our community as a whole. Spiced Wine, for example, observes that fanon "is heavily influenced by the individual's desire for what they would like to be true."

Another participant's take on fanon illustrates why this is so important. Fanon

can bring a broader diversity to fandom by the large-scale inclusion of characters with traits not often represented: Black Fingon, Autistic Morwen, or literal Silver-footed Idril come to mind. While these characters are informed by canon, ascribing certain diverse aspects to them in such a way that they've become entrenched (if not universal) helps people both see themselves but just as importantly see others in these works.

Given the documented biases of popular culture toward straight, white cisgendered and able-bodied men as characters, "wish fulfillment" isn't always about seeing characters hook up who aren't together in the original text (though that's part of it too!) While fanworks can give voice to experiences and foreground characters with identities that are marginalized or altogether absent in the canon, fanon takes it a step further by normalizing the presence of diverse characters in the legendarium.

The (Well-Trodden) Road Goes Ever On … and On … and On …

Seen from a communal perspective, fanon can be seen as representative of the connections and communities that exist among Tolkien fans. Fanon can be seen as a tradition passed across decades, the same idea appearing in 2002 through to 2023. It can also, for fans looking for fresh takes on the legendarium, become worn out, even cliche.

Fanon is remarkably hard to trace and can slip into the fannish subconsciousness without much awareness. One participant writes:

Some [fanons] come from a single popular fic or artwork and then get so entrenched that those who take up the detail may not be aware of the source at all. (This seems to be the case for red-haired Sauron, for example, which fans seem to agree goes back to Phobs.) But I suspect some of them arise independently several times, when readers jump to the same conclusion and honestly either believe the text explicitly states something or, on the other hand, wrongly imagine that nobody has had that same take on a canon situation before. Influences can be difficult to trace. Sometimes the line of transmission is clear, sometimes not at all.

This can create confusion, and not just the typical assumption that some fans don't know their fanon from their canon. As this respondent writes, a fan who thinks they are doing something original can, in fact, be resurrecting (and therefore seemingly commenting upon and perpetuating) an older idea. Among generations of fans, this can create tension. (As the Hobbit films and the fandom adoption of Tumblr brought new writers to the Tolkien fandom, I certainly remember much grousing among my friends group about new fans who didn't know their history and thought they were inventing something that had been in existence for years.)

Other respondents identified the cookie-cutter shape fanon can take as detracting from the experience of reading fanfiction. As one participant noted, it can have the effect of cutting off new and interesting interpretations of the complexities of the legendarium. (Tolkien Fanfiction Survey data from 2020 found that 89% of readers "read fanfiction because [they] like seeing the different ways that fans view and interpret Tolkien's books," so this hesitation tracks with survey data as well.) The participant writes:

I just don't personally like fanon very much. I think one reason is that I've been reading Silmarillion fanfiction for long enough to be very thoroughly acquainted with the equivalent of the Top 40 Fanon Hits. Even if I had no particular animosity toward them when I started reading fanfiction, they now feel really cliche to me. Additionally, the thing that makes The Silmarillion appealing to me is how much space for interpretation there is! I want to see everyone's different thoughts on all the millions of ways to fill in the gaps! And yet a huge portion of fandom seems to have settled on a fairly homogeneous set of ships and characterizations to write about. And then it turns into a self-reinforcing cycle, because the fanworks that use the popular fanon get popular, reinforcing that fanon. I feel like an occasional shakeup in the popular fanon could help alleviate the boredom for a little while, and I've heard that it's happened in the past—for example, I heard there was a big swing from writing the sons of Fëanor as Creatures of Pure Evil to more heroic (often valorized or woobified) characters—but there don't seem to have been any equivalent shakeups since I got involved.

Other participants noted that fanon can dovetail with modern tropes in a way that makes them feel even more well-trodden. "I enjoy it when fans challenge or creatively interpret/re-interpret canon (or fill in blank spaces in canon)," writes one participant, "but fanon can fall back to being stereotypical or generate caricatures. Long running shows also do this to their characters (usually comedic relief, like Joey from Friends)." Another respondent, an artist, writes of why she sometimes makes choices to avoid fanon: "That’s why sometimes I want to distance my art from visual fanon elements, because they seem, for lack of a better word, too 'mainstream'—too ubiquitous. … Sometimes I roll my eyes at fanon—especially if it is 'flattening' characters into tropes (e.g., Celegorm the jock, Maglor the emo musician). Often the tropes also seem so American, and so modern."

Above, I included commentary from fans who identified the communal nature of fanon as a positive trait. This gets to the crux of the original discovery in the Tolkien Fanfiction Survey data that triggered me to begin this Fandom Voices inquiry in the first place: that fans regard their and each other's authority over the canon highly, below only Tolkien's. This corroborates a popular idea in fan studies research, captured in the term transformational fandom, where fans assume the collective mantle of responsibility over the canon rather than deferring to the authority of the original creator and those with an economic interest (such as publishers) in maintaining a particular canon. At its most idealistic, this hearkens back to an imagined past where storytelling belonged to and represented the experiences of the people, not just those in authority. In contemporary terms, it democratizes a system that requires stories to be walled off as property that can only be touched by a select few.

However, within this collective, power differentials exist, and multiple respondents brought up fanon as a force that can exacerbate that. Failure to adhere to the preferred fanon of a community can make it harder to form connections within that community, according to one participant:

I think fanon is a mixed bag. Sometimes, I think it enhances the text to include it, but often, it feels like fanon is used to limit the scope of acceptable interpretations. If a certain ship reaches broad enough fandom appeal, it turns up untagged in meta, fanart, and fics, making it virtually impossible to avoid if you don't like it for whatever reason. Having read The Silmarillion twice before engaging with the fandom writ large, I had my own interpretations of characters and events that often doesn't match up well with mainstream fanon, which can make it difficult to engage with other's works.

Another participant does not have strong feelings about fanon but dislikes the pressure toward conformity it can inspire: "I think fanon is inevitable; part of creating a fanwork is filling in the blanks left by canon with your own ideas, and some of those ideas will resonate enough with other fans to spread, creating fanon. By itself, I think fanon is a neutral thing, but I am annoyed when fans start considering using a particular piece of fanon as mandatory."

Another respondent identified fanon as perpetuating negative power dynamics between fans:

But the biggest issue I have with fanon is how closely intertwined it gets with the idea of the "Big Name Fan", which I don't like at all. Certainly there's no way to avoid some people's fanworks happening to become more popular than others; people like what they like. However, it's incredibly frustrating to me that a single person can have a hugely outsized influence on the fanon zeitgeist just by being good at networking, or correctly predicting what would trend next on Tumblr, or whatever the case may be. We're all fans of the exact same thing! Most of us don't even connect our real-life identities to our fandom life! And yet we've still ended up in a situation where a few people have "power" (petty and irrelevant though it may be in the scope of human history), most people do not, and most people don't seem to care. I guess that's why actively participating in the current state of fanon is something I do not want to do: I feel like doing so would validate and reinforce this ridiculous fandom power structure that I don't think should exist in the first place.

If anything, this reinforces fanon's social function. Anything that brings some together with a sense of connection and community can have the double edge of making others feel alienated.

Fanon vs. Canon

As noted above, historically, fanon was often presented as a counterpoint to canon: something invented by fans, often based on misconceptions or ignorance. While less common, the perception of fanon as something that often supplants canon does persist somewhat. One participant writes that fanon "can get annoying when people treat fanon as canon, or when fanon becomes so prevalent that people forget there is a canon that does not support or even directly contradicts it."

Of course, that canon itself is extremely complex, and the myriad, often contradictory, versions can be difficult to sift through to find whether a detail originates in canon or fanon. One participant offers a very specific example:

[F]anon does have a downside as well, especially in a fandom where what is canon is often confusing and contradictory. There are so many Histories of Middle-earth that it can be difficult to actually identify what is canon vs. widespread fanon. For example, the cliffs of Sirion where Elwing cast herself into the sea do not—by any evidence I've found—exist in canon. Sirion was a river delta, and while that does not preclude some kind of nearby cliffs, lacking any direct evidence of them, they are a fanon invention that has somehow become deeply ingrained in many fans' understanding of events. Other takes I've seen are a tower (again, an unsupported element) from which she jumps.

Another participant finds canon—not fanon—as the reason to enjoy a fanwork:

I do not appreciate Fanon, believing the core of a story should remain pure. That does not mean that I don't enjoy fanfiction or headcanon discussions, for I do enjoy both. I prefer to discuss and debate with those who are very familiar with canon, yet am happy to consider events not included on the canon's written page, as well as alternative outcomes, various interpretations of happenings, or the reasons behind character decisions.

Several other participants recognized that their own enjoyment of fanon and fanworks more broadly exists in tension with their understandings of the canon. At the same time, there is a live-and-let-live or don't-like-don't-read attitude that, historically, didn't exist broadly in the Tolkien fanfiction fandom but has become more prevalent in recent years. Anna_Wing writes:

Fanon is not canon, it's just another fan's interpretation. People can write whatever they like, but obviously their interpretations don't bind me, any more than mine bind them. I usually ignore fanon in writing my own fics unless it's something that I actually agree with as a matter of canon-based interpretation. I think the only fanon I've ever really integrated into my own interpretations of Tolkien is the idea that Morgoth, when he was still Melkor, was meant to be something like the power of Change, the thing that allows growth and creativity. This makes perfect sense to me, so I'm happy to go with it.

Lyra has thought about the gray, wobbly line line between canon and fanon in her own fanworks while ultimately assuming an attitude of tolerance:

I have to admit that I'm not always consistent in my attitude towards fanon. In theory, I think that all fanon is valid, but that it's important to differentiate between What Tolkien Actually Said (TM) and what is entirely made up by fans and simply very wide-spread across the fandom. In practice, I strongly dislike fanons that deviate very far from (my preferred reading of) canon, such as either Fëanor Did Nothing Wrong Ever (taken seriously), or Fëanor Is The Absolute Worst (practically on par with Melkor). Or extremely anti-Eru, anti-Valar takes. On the other hand, I know that I have my share of fanons that other fans have a strong dislike for—I feel that Russingon is virtually canon, for instance. And there are some instances where I actively decide against Tolkien's decisions—why shouldn't Númenóreans and their descendants grow beards? why shouldn't Maglor move on and interact with Elves and mortals of later ages? let Elves have offspring in times of war!—so I'm hardly in a position to judge others. At this point I try to see both canon and fanon that I personally don't like as thought experiments that I don't need to entertain and can simply avoid.

Chestnut_pod recognizes both the communal aspect of fanon, their own reaction to it, and ultimately the responsibility of the reader to engage or not with particular fanons:

Fanon often gets a bad rap for being formulaic, and it certainly can be. I'm inclined to think its development is an inevitable result of writing in a loose community, and its fashions change as the makeup of the community changes. I have particular fanons that make my teeth stand on edge, and others that I incorporate myself—and I also know that I am free to eschew fanon entirely.

Finally, the many interpretations (including fanon) to choose from parallel the legendarium itself and offers the same flexibility as Tolkien's canon does. As one participant observed: "My final thought is this: no matter what anyone thinks or how many think it—everyone is still entitled to their own version. Especially in a fandom where the author himself could not even settle on a single version, there must be room in fandom for everyone's take to exist."

The Art of Fanon

Several people who responded to the question spoke about how they personally use fanon in their own work. The range of uses matches the wide array of perspectives on fanon itself. Some creators enjoy the process of selecting from different fanons. One participant writes, "My approach to Tolkien’s writing AND to fanon is 'mix-and-match'—I tend to select elements that I like from different versions written by Tolkien, as well as some fanon, if I like it and it fits the scene that I’m setting out to depict." Shadow is another creator who acknowledges their use of fanon:

I'm not ashamed that I use fanon both consciously, and most likely also subconsciously in my own fics. Especially regarding Tolkien's female characters, I often use a blend of headcanons I picked up from the creators around me, and really, who's to say at what point it goes from headcanons I picked up from someone else to fanon? Who knows where the creator I got it from picked it up?

One fan artist described the importance of balancing the use of fanon with the inclusion of her own original ideas: "Sometimes I take that up into my own art, simply because it 'makes sense', but I try to interrogate it. My own fanart is a balancing act of creating something 'recognisable' that rings true, and yet is differentiated from other artists’ designs so not to be a mere copy or variation."

Another approach uses fanon as an element to write or create against. One creator describes using fanon in this way:

After having been somewhat active in Silmarillion fandom for a few years, I would say that my main feeling about fanon for Silmarillion fanworks ranges from finding heavy use of fanon to be a little bit boring and uninspired to actively irritating. When writing, I value communicating my own personal ideas, so I don't worry about whether anything I'm writing is fanon-compliant. In fact, when I get really fed up with fanon, I tend to intentionally write things that run directly contrary to it.

Regardless of the approach, creators describe responding to fanon in myriad ways, whether selecting among fanons they enjoy, relying on fanon to create a familiar backdrop for their works, using their works to question fanon, or writing against fanon.

Conclusion

As I noted in the original Talking among Ourselves article, I "came of age" in a fandom where fanon was rarely a complimentary term to apply to someone's fanwork. It tended to imply ignorance, misunderstanding, and transgression of the boundaries of canon. As seen in the Tolkien Fanfiction Survey and here as well, those attitudes have shifted in the past two decades, but fanon is far from a settled issue among Tolkien fanworks creators. While many now embrace fanon (at least those they like and agree with!) as an example of community myth, this is not the only perspective, and other fans see fanon as contributing to power differentials between fans, conflicting with canon, and becoming overused to the point of becoming cliche. As the fandom continues to shift in response to the internet landscape and media products about Tolkien, it is possible that fans' views on fanon may continue to change as well.

Responses

"Fanon" is a term for fan-generated element or interpretation that is widely used or regarded as true in the fandom. What are your thoughts on fanon? You might think about how you regard fanon (versus canon), how you see creators using fanon in their fanworks, how you use fanon in your own fanworks, or fanons that particularly resonate (or don't resonate) with you.

All responses we've received to the above questions are collected here without curation or commentary. Responses have been lightly edited.

If you'd like to share your views on defining and using canon in fanworks, we're still collecting responses and will update this page as new responses come in.

 

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In an older fandom like the Tolkien fandom, fanon can include a wide variety of things, ranging from significant widespread interpretations that at least some fans are very serious about to short-lived fashions for a tiny extra detail that just tickled people's fancy at the time. The original intention does not always matter; one person's joke can potentially mutate into another fan's firmly adopted head canon.

Some of them come from a single popular fic or artwork and then get so entrenched that those who take up the detail may not be aware of the source at all. (This seems to be the case for red-haired Sauron, for example, which fans seem to agree goes back to Phobs.) But I suspect some of them arise independently several times, when readers jump to the same conclusion and honestly either believe the text explicitly states something or, on the other hand, wrongly imagine that nobody has had that same take on a canon situation before. Influences can be difficult to trace. Sometimes the line of transmission is clear, sometimes not at all.

Although the fandom's attitude to fanon has changed and the term is used far less commonly to simply imply lack of canon knowledge, there are still a wide variety of attitudes, from whole-hearted unironic adoption to fans who prefer a self-conscious, ironic attitude.

And of course there are still individual fanons that come under attack, because the poster dislikes that specific fanon, and then "fanon" can still be used as a stick to beat others' preferences with, although now the attack is more often combined with other arguments.

Some fanons are pairings or ships, not necessarily the greater proportion of fanons, but pairings are among those that are more likely to draw attention and get disputed, whereas some other kinds of fanon stay comfortably under the radar and get followed just for convenience's sake (geographical fanons, for instance, in cases where canon does not give much detail).

Maedhros/Fingon has its own Fanlore page, I notice. A conversation I once had with some long-standing fans traced it back to a humorous ficlet, I recall. That ficlet was written by Mouse, I think, and featured the male Finweans in the gym; Maedhros/Fingon was only discreetly implied. (Mentioning this mainly as that little piece of lore is not referred to on the Fanlore page, although I can't trace that ficlet now. I think I read it on Henneth-Annun, back in the day.)

~ Anonymous, response collected on 14 October 2023

 

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I love the fact that fanon as a concept exists. To me it's fascinating to trace certain concepts across authors, showing how closely we are connected as a community even if we might not comment on each others fics, or kudos them. It's a natural part of storytelling that certain traditions establish themselves when stories are told again and again, and fanon is simply a part of the traditions in fandom.

I'm not ashamed that I use fanon both consciously, and most likely also subconsciously in my own fics. Especially regarding Tolkien's female characters, I often use a blend of headcanons I picked up from the creators around me, and really, who's to say at what point it goes from headcanons I picked up from someone else to fanon? Who knows where the creator I got it from picked it up?

~ Shadow, response collected 14 October 2023

 

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I find it interesting as it is heavily influenced by the individual's desire for what they would like to be true.

~ Spiced Wine, response collected 14 October 2023

 

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Fanon seems inherent to all fandoms: where writers read each other's work in a setting with a strong norm of collaboration, but also strong social pressure bounding in-groups and out-groups, shared interpretations, styles, vocabularies, and thematic interests are sure to crop up. That said, I think fanon must be particularly load-bearing in Tolkien fandoms, where competing drafts stand pointing at each other like a Spiderman meme inside vast crevasses of missing information. This is doubly true for Silmarillion and HoMe fans, where the mythological conceit of the writing means that fans must build their characters more or less from scratch, whereas LotR and Hobbit fans have a little more novelistic insight into characters' emotions and dispositions.

Fanon often gets a bad rap for being formulaic, and it certainly can be. I'm inclined to think its development is an inevitable result of writing in a loose community, and its fashions change as the makeup of the community changes. I have particular fanons that make my teeth stand on edge, and others that I incorporate myself—and I also know that I am free to eschew fanon entirely.

In general, I most appreciate fanons that neatly explain logistically contradictory parts of canon or are otherwise tied to worldbuilding rather than character.

~ Chestnut_pod, response collected 14 October 2023

 

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After having been somewhat active in Silmarillion fandom for a few years, I would say that my main feeling about fanon for Silmarillion fanworks ranges from finding heavy use of fanon to be a little bit boring and uninspired to actively irritating. When writing, I value communicating my own personal ideas, so I don't worry about whether anything I'm writing is fanon-compliant. In fact, when I get really fed up with fanon, I tend to intentionally write things that run directly contrary to it.

In an effort at understanding: I can see why fanon would get popular, especially for a book like The Silmarillion. Most people are probably used to getting offered a lot more concrete details by their fiction, so maybe the wide open space for interpretation feels intimidating to them, and fanon could help fill in those gaps. The supplementary materials like the Histories of Middle-earth could theoretically have filled that role, but they can be hard to find, expensive, and difficult to parse, whereas fanfiction is Googleable, free, and usually written in a way that is reasonably easy to understand (at least if you speak English).

Regardless, I just don't personally like fanon very much. I think one reason is that I've been reading Silmarillion fanfiction for long enough to be very thoroughly acquainted with the equivalent of the Top 40 Fanon Hits. Even if I had no particular animosity toward them when I started reading fanfiction, they now feel really cliche to me. Additionally, the thing that makes The Silmarillion appealing to me is how much space for interpretation there is! I want to see everyone's different thoughts on all the millions of ways to fill in the gaps! And yet a huge portion of fandom seems to have settled on a fairly homogeneous set of ships and characterizations to write about. And then it turns into a self-reinforcing cycle, because the fanworks that use the popular fanon get popular, reinforcing that fanon. I feel like an occasional shakeup in the popular fanon could help alleviate the boredom for a little while, and I've heard that it's happened in the past—for example, I heard there was a big swing from writing the sons of Fëanor as Creatures of Pure Evil to more heroic (often valorized or woobified) characters—but there don't seem to have been any equivalent shakeups since I got involved.

But the biggest issue I have with fanon is how closely intertwined it gets with the idea of the "Big Name Fan", which I don't like at all. Certainly there's no way to avoid some people's fanworks happening to become more popular than others; people like what they like. However, it's incredibly frustrating to me that a single person can have a hugely outsized influence on the fanon zeitgeist just by being good at networking, or correctly predicting what would trend next on Tumblr, or whatever the case may be. We're all fans of the exact same thing! Most of us don't even connect our real-life identities to our fandom life! And yet we've still ended up in a situation where a few people have "power" (petty and irrelevant though it may be in the scope of human history), most people do not, and most people don't seem to care. I guess that's why actively participating in the current state of fanon is something I do not want to do: I feel like doing so would validate and reinforce this ridiculous fandom power structure that I don't think should exist in the first place.

~ Anonymous, response collected 14 October 2023

 

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I think fanon is inevitable; part of creating a fanwork is filling in the blanks left by canon with your own ideas, and some of those ideas will resonate enough with other fans to spread, creating fanon. By itself, I think fanon is a neutral thing, but I am annoyed when fans start considering using a particular piece of fanon as mandatory.

In a fandom like The Silmarillion, I think fanon plays a particularly important role because there are so many blanks fans have to fill in. Fanon can help make that process easier, but it can also get in the way of fans coming up with other creative interpretations.

~ Anonymous, response collected 14 October 2023

 

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I enjoy fanon in general and do not consider it inferior to canon (especially in Tolkien fandom, where most of the fanon I come across tends to supplement and update canon, rather than replace it).

~ Makamu, response collected 15 October 2023

 

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Fanon is not canon, it's just another fan's interpretation. People can write whatever they like, but obviously their interpretations don't bind me, any more than mine bind them. I usually ignore fanon in writing my own fics unless it's something that I actually agree with as a matter of canon-based interpretation. I think the only fanon I've ever really integrated into my own interpretations of Tolkien is the idea that Morgoth, when he was still Melkor, was meant to be something like the power of Change, the thing that allows growth and creativity. This makes perfect sense to me, so I'm happy to go with it.

I'm not much on social media and I don't use a beta reader or discuss my fics with anyone unless they comment on AO3 …

~ Anna_Wing, response collected 18 October 2023

 

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I think fanon is a great way to have fun, whether by putting it in fanworks, sharing it with friends, or keeping it in your own head. Having said that, it can get annoying when people treat fanon as canon, or when fanon becomes so prevalent that people forget there is a canon that does not support or even directly contradicts it.

~ Anonymous, response collected 19 October 2023

 

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I enjoy it when fans challenge or creatively interpret/re-interpret canon (or fill in blank spaces in canon), but fanon can fall back to being stereotypical or generate caricatures. Long running shows also do this to their characters (usually comedic relief, like Joey from Friends).

~ Anonymous, response collected 25 October 2023

 

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I’m neutral to positive towards fanon. I don’t read a lot of fanfiction, but I seek out fanart (drawings/painting, cosplay, fan adaptations e.g. the Silmarillion Film Project, etc.) and I make fanart myself (drawing, linoprints).

Mostly concerning The Silmarillion. So there is a lot of room for fanon due to lack of detailed descriptions!

At this point, I’m quite familiar with The Silmarillion and reasonably familiar with parts of the History of Middle-earth, so I tend to recognise fanon once I’ve come across the same “visual element” in multiple works and can be reasonably sure that it doesn’t come from canon, so to speak.

I find it fascinating how some fanon elements propagate and seem to become ubiquitous (e.g. Annatar as a slim, androgynous, white-blonde young-looking Elf, or Nerdanel as a “true” redhead, or the depiction of Manwë with white hair and Melkor with black hair). Or size difference between male Valar (quite tall) and Maiar (only slightly taller than Men/Elves, if at all).

Sometimes I take that up into my own art, simply because it “makes sense”, but I try to interrogate it. My own fanart is a balancing act of creating something “recognisable” that rings true, and yet is differentiated from other artists’ designs so not to be a mere copy or variation.

That’s why sometimes I want to distance my art from visual fanon elements, because they seem, for lack of a better word, too “mainstream”—too ubiquitous.

My approach to Tolkien’s writing AND to fanon is “mix-and-match”—I tend to select elements that I like from different versions written by Tolkien, as well as some fanon, if I like it and it fits the scene that I’m setting out to depict.

Sometimes I roll my eyes at fanon—especially if it is “flattening” characters into tropes (e.g., Celegorm the jock, Maglor the emo musician). Often the tropes also seem so American, and so modern. But somehow I enjoy it all the same. I think that is because it shows how “myth-like” the legendarium is. People are adding to it, modifying it, and these additions are themselves taken up and integrated into the next retelling, so to speak. They are living stories.

~ Anonymous, response collected 2 November 2023

 

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I have to admit that I'm not always consistent in my attitude towards fanon. In theory, I think that all fanon is valid, but that it's important to differentiate between What Tolkien Actually Said (TM) and what is entirely made up by fans and simply very wide-spread across the fandom. In practice, I strongly dislike fanons that deviate very far from (my preferred reading of) canon, such as either Fëanor Did Nothing Wrong Ever (taken seriously), or Fëanor Is The Absolute Worst (practically on par with Melkor). Or extremely anti-Eru, anti-Valar takes. On the other hand, I know that I have my share of fanons that other fans have a strong dislike for—I feel that Russingon is virtually canon, for instance. And there are some instances where I actively decide against Tolkien's decisions—why shouldn't Númenóreans and their descendants grow beards? why shouldn't Maglor move on and interact with Elves and mortals of later ages? let Elves have offspring in times of war!—so I'm hardly in a position to judge others. At this point I try to see both canon and fanon that I personally don't like as thought experiments that I don't need to entertain and can simply avoid.

Last but not least, there are plenty of open questions where I'm open to a variety of interpretations—Maglor lives through history in Middle-earth, or Maglor returns to Valinor at some point; Caranthir had children that the chronicler just didn't bother to talk about, or Caranthir was tragically childless; Elrond and Elros feel more Fëanorian than not, or Elrond and Elros create their own distinct identity; the Númenóreans have always been problematic in their colonialism whatever their attitude, or the idealistic depiction in the Akallabêth is actually fairly accurate—there are probably more but these come to mind at once. And with these, it's fun to see different takes, and to adopt them for one fic but not another.

Actually, that wasn't my last thought after all—my last thought is: Sometimes I regret that there isn't a unified fanon with regard to (especially) the missing spouses and daughters. It would be ever so useful if we had a list stating a name and bio for, say, Isildur's or Maglor's spouse, as well as perhaps a birth and marriage date. At the same time, it would take away from the freedom of each individual fan to come up with their own ideas. Even if such a list remained strictly fanon, many fans would probably expect others to follow it, and if you didn't, you'd have to justify your choices (even more than you already do, in this fandom). Let me correct: It would be useful to have a library of different fics that explore these missing characters, so if you wanted to, say, write a fic about Isildur's family life, you could look at how others filled the gaps and adopt the choices that you liked, instead of everybody starting from scratch or, at best, coming across an interpretation they like by pure chance.

~ Lyra, responses collected 2 November 2023

 

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I do not appreciate Fanon, believing the core of a story should remain pure. That does not mean that I don't enjoy fanfiction or headcanon discussions, for I do enjoy both. I prefer to discuss and debate with those who are very familiar with canon, yet am happy to consider events not included on the canon's written page, as well as alternative outcomes, various interpretations of happenings, or the reasons behind character decisions.

~ Anonymous, response collected 2 November 2023

 

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I think fanon is a mixed bag. Sometimes, I think it enhances the text to include it, but often, it feels like fanon is used to limit the scope of acceptable interpretations. If a certain ship reaches broad enough fandom appeal, it turns up untagged in meta, fanart, and fics, making it virtually impossible to avoid if you don't like it for whatever reason. Having read The Silmarillion twice before engaging with the fandom writ large, I had my own interpretations of characters and events that often doesn't match up well with mainstream fanon, which can make it difficult to engage with other's works.

~ Anonymous, response collected 2 November 2023

 

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To echo the advice of Elves and say "both yes and no"—fanon can be a fantastic addition to canon, giving a common framework by which many fans might more easily interact with and understand an idea which builds upon or fills gaps in canon. Sometimes it can bring a broader diversity to fandom by the large-scale inclusion of characters with traits not often represented: Black Fingon, Autistic Morwen, or literal Silver-footed Idril come to mind. While these characters are informed by canon, ascribing certain diverse aspects to them in such a way that they've become entrenched (if not universal) helps people both see themselves but just as importantly see others in these works.

However, fanon does have a downside as well, especially in a fandom where what is canon is often confusing and contradictory. There are so many Histories of Middle-earth that it can be difficult to actually identify what is canon vs widespread fanon. For example, the cliffs of Sirion where Elwing cast herself into the sea do not—by any evidence I've found—exist in canon. Sirion was a river delta, and while that does not preclude some kind of nearby cliffs, lacking any direct evidence of them, they are a fanon invention that has somehow become deeply ingrained in many fans' understanding of events. Other takes I've seen are a tower (again, an unsupported element) from which she jumps.

Fanon can add depth and nuance to fandom or less-developed canon, but when certain takes become too common, it can strip that depth and nuance out as well. Evil Thingol, himbo Celegorm, vain or vapid Finrod, "bad mother" Elwing: the frustrating part is that even if these takes are not even shared by the majority of fans, somehow they seem to permeate fandom.

There can also be frustrations when a person's take on canon precludes a popular fanon take. Sometimes this is merely the lack of creations that do not include or specifically excludes that piece of fanon (to be clear, no one is obligated to create anything to someone else's taste, but the frustration is understandable). This can also include having certain creations fail to resonate because it does not include a popular element (again, this is not to say people must accept all takes equally, but it does not lessen the frustration of those who feel their creations are not embraced due to these differences).

Sometimes it can be as detrimental as arguments over whether the fanon "is basically canon" or not, when people ascribe moral value to whether someone accepts a certain fanon take or not.

I think fanon is ultimately inescapable—there will always be things which fandom has broadly decided is true, no matter what any individual feels, and there will be takes that add nuance and diversity, and takes that scrub nuance and diversity right out. But people will continue to make their additions or substitutions or gap-fillers, and the fandom at large will continue to embrace, accept, or reject on a large scale those individual takes.

My final thought is this: no matter what anyone thinks or how many think it—everyone is still entitled to their own version. Especially in a fandom where the author himself could not even settle on a single version, there must be room in fandom for everyone's take to exist.

~ Anonymous, response collected 15 November 2023