Words: Grace Hussey (she/her)
literature is no longer static, it has gained the potential to become a living, breathing thing.
I remember long nights of guiltily reading Wattpad underneath the covers of my bed – we all remember that era of fanfics, of “Y/N” being sold to One Direction, of falling in love with your brother’s best friend, tropes we now poke fun at. But online publishing has evolved far beyond this; literature is no longer static, it has gained the potential to become a living, breathing thing.
Uniquely, AO3 and Wattpad are often published chapter by chapter, as opposed to publishing the entire work at once with physical books. This is not entirely unheard of. Bleak House by Charles Dickens was published in monthly installments over 20 months. It wasn’t the first book to be published this way, it’s simply the most famous. However, unlike many AO3 and Wattpad stories, it was written with the knowledge that it would be completed, as Dickens was commissioned. This work never held the possibility that it might never be completed.
The stories found on AO3 and Wattpad are a labour of love; the authors have invested their time and effort into their writing for the enjoyment of sharing it with the online community. Recently, there has been an increase in fanfictions being adapted into movies, based on books that were picked up from online sources, like Wattpad. Anna Todd’s After was originally published on Wattpad as a Harry Styles fanfic, subsequently published in 2014. In 2019, it was adapted into a film distributed by Amazon Prime and grossed $70 million. Now, it has been expanded into a five-film franchise.
While films like After prove that this is a possibility for stories published on AO3 and Wattpad, it is an anomaly. Wattpad is estimated to hold over 17 million works, while AO3 holds over 665 million story uploads; of which very few might gain such mass success. In fact, many of these works remain unfinished forever.
When writing has no monetary gain or official obligations, works can be abandoned, authors will continue writing until they’re not able anymore. Due to this, Wattpad and AO3 have become graveyards to unfinished stories. If a story can fill a graveyard and cease to be “alive”, then we accept that the internet has allowed stories to gain life. They are living, breathing beings; alive in the buzzing comment sections, the anticipated next chapters, and the ability for the author to directly interact with their readers. This makes the experience of writing and consuming literature so vastly different to traditional, physical publishing that it is difficult to articulate.
However many stories may remain unfinished, filling a metaphorical “graveyard”, they persist in the database. It is an anomaly that stories are deleted, due to which the original feelings and excitement for each fanbase is revisitable forever; the nostalgia is never truly lost. For some works though, this isn’t true, like Manacled, which was set to be deleted from AO3 after its conversion to physical print. Manacled by SenYinLiu is possibly the most famous fanfiction of all time, published gradually between 2018 and 2019; a frankenstein blend of Harry Potter and The Handmaid’s Tale. It stretches over more than a 1000 pages – courtesy of the author’s ability to publish the novel gradually. Now, Manacled has been traditionally published as Alchemised, as an entirely new, debut novel, despite its original publication, and significant fanbase, online.
Despite the revolutionary changes made through this form of publishing, it is clear that traditional publishing in physical, complete copies is still favoured. In fact, the original stories published online are losing their defining features in the conversion to print; as Manacled became Alchemised and lost the links to the novels it was originally based upon. It seems obvious that an online, animate story cannot truly survive its transformation to a static story upon paper.
The comment sections of online stories have helped many writers hone their skills; the constructive criticism gained directly from the audience being something traditional writers can’t access. The readers are directly involved in the process of creation. But this is a symbiotic relationship, the author may also provide their commentary to readers. This renders the “Death of the Author” ineffectual. While the power of the reader is greater than ever online due to how quickly opinions can be posted directly underneath a story, the author has a unique opportunity to respond directly to the reader. It is through this synergic process of online literature, a story continues, subsequent chapters are published.
Ultimately, the world of online publishing has unleashed another era of technological possibilities. It has changed the way that books are written and published forever; most notably because online there are no rules to writing stories, the possibilities are endless. As technology advances even further, I wonder how the battle between traditional and online publishing will end.
