Every once in awhile, there comes a book that perfectly embodies the nuances of a generation's culture. In today's world of modern technology and Internet-driven interactions, there is one book that illustrates a unique 'species' of teenagers who spend most of their time online, digesting and processing and creating content in a community that only quite recently was made possible: Fangirl by Rainbow Rowell.
Now what comes into your mind when you hear the word fangirl? Does an image of a rabid, hormonal tween pop in your head, all crazy, wide eyes and foam at the mouth? Do you picture thirteen year old girls screaming at the top of their lungs over the latest pictures of teen heartthrobs like One Direction or 5 Seconds of Summer? Or maybe you picture a die-hard movie/TV junkie who loves Harry Potter and Doctor Who and Sherlock and who ships gay couples and sees homosexual subtext between two 'straight' characters and who starts hyperventilating whenever they share the smallest of subtly romantic moments because her heartisjustsofulloffeels? *clears throat* *takes deep breathe*
Let me give you a reality check, because those images are slightly incorrect, and at least only 85% accurate.
One, I'm pretty sure that most fangirls don't actually have rabies. Sure, we seem rabid at times, but really we are just normal people. (I seriously could not type that with a straight face lol.) What makes someone a fangirl, is this sheer, unparalleled enthusiasm for whatever fandom they are in. And you can be a fangirl of anyone or anything. You could be a fangirl of a celebrity, like a famous actor. Or you could be a fangirl of a TV series. You could be a fangirl of a book series. The list goes on and on, you get the point.
Rainbow Rowell's Fangirl revolves around the college life of Cather Avery who is a die-hard fan of the Simon Snow series, a magical fantasy saga (with clever nods to something that does exist irl, the Harry Potter series). Cath has been a fangirl for most of her life and as the back of the book says 'she's really good at it'. She has been a fangirl for as long as her twin sister Wren has, and despite having being inseparable for their entire lives, when it's time for them to go to college, Wren decides that she doesn't want to be roommates with Cath.
There's a very interesting dynamic, between Cath and Wren. It's more than just the typical 'twins-having-opposite-personalities' trope going on. Yes, Cath is more introverted and anxious when it comes to meeting to new people, which is why she gets so upset when Wren suggests they don't bunk with each other in college. Wren is more out-going and instead of being afraid of college, she sees it as an opportunity to make new friends and sneak into bars with her fake id. But despite being so different and fighting with each other a lot during most of the novel, we see that they are always watching each other's backs and love each other unconditionally. Not to mention, they are both essentially deep down, hardcore Simon Snow fangirls, which is just endearing especially when you realize pretty girl Wren is as much of a nerd as Cath is.
And this is just one example of Rainbow Rowell's beautifully written characters and the dynamics in their relationships. Besides Cath and Wren, there's the dysfunctional Dad of theirs, Arthur, who is creative and brilliant at his advertising job but who suffers from what I assume to be a manic disorder, and mental illness is actually a theme that is skillfully brought up and addressed in the book. There's their Mom, who actually left them when they were eight. Cath's surly and slightly promiscuous roommate, Reagan and her boyfriend, Levi. There's Courtney, Wren's new roommate who is at times vapid and likes to go out to parties. And a guy named Nick, who Cath partners up with in her Fiction Writing class. All these different personalities are so distinct and translate through the page so well to the reader, that you will have no difficulty at all believing that they are real, because they are pretty well written.
That brings me to another aspect of the novel, writing. Specifically, writing fanfiction. Cath actually writes slash fanfiction about Simon and Baz, the protagonist and antagonist of the Simon Snow series. At the risk of sounding a bit odd, slash is a term for fanfiction that is about a romance between two characters of the same sex. Otherwise known as gay fanfiction. (I hope that doesn't turn you away from the rest of this post, please bear with me a little while). And Cath isn't just any fanfiction writer. She is the fanfiction writer, the fan who writes Simon Snow stories so well, they almost rival the canon made by the original author, and who has amassed a following of her own.
“The whole point of fanfiction is that you get to play inside somebody else's universe. Rewrite the rules. Or bend them. The story doesn't have to end. You can stay in this world, this world you love, as long as you want, as long as you keep thinking of new stories.” -- Fangirl, by Rainbow Rowell
Fanfiction is something that is really unique to today's generation. Fanfiction are stories created by fans about the series they are fans of, and they 'borrow' the world and characters that the author has made and rewrite them into whichever way they see fit and in a way they think would make a good story. Fanfiction, may have existed longer than the internet has, but thanks to the internet, people can now share their fanfiction online and on a much wider scale, forming this community of fans who create things and share them, and like the Youtube thing I mentioned a few posts back, that is a fucking amazing thing. A whole literary circle of people who write and share fanfiction has emerged and out of this circle, there has been some fucking amazing writers and I can attest to that, because I have read some brilliant fanfiction, and they are so well-written that they are better than some of the stuff being published out there.
This is one of the reasons that Fangirl is truly a reflection of its time, and it not only illustrates what it's like to be a teenager who is raised on the internet in today's age, but it also tackles a lot of themes and issues, like being introverted, social anxiety, mental illness, abandonment issues, romantic relationships, family, friendship, the prejudice subjected towards fanfiction and its writers, and the art of writing original ideas and the risk of collaboration that comes with being a writer, and how writing is mostly a solitary profession.
Here are a few snippets from the book about certain things, which hopefully gets you interested in picking up the book for yourself.
On the trickiness of social interactions (at least to an introvert):
“In new situations, all the trickiest rules are the ones nobody bothers to explain to you. (And the ones you can't Google.)”
The pains of being a brooding texter:
“You can’t take back texts. If you come off all moody and melancholy in a text, it just sits there in your phone, reminding you of what a drag you are.”
An example of teenage optimism, the kind you get when you've finally fallen in love for the first time:
“Happily ever after, or even just together ever after, is not cheesy,” Wren said. “It’s the noblest, like, the most courageous thing two people can shoot for.”
Cath on the sensation of writing:
“Sometimes writing is running downhill, your fingers jerking behind you on the keyboard the way your legs do when they can’t quite keep up with gravity.”
“Cath felt like she was swimming in words. Drowning in them, sometimes.”
What it means to be a nerd:
“To really be a nerd, she'd decided, you had to prefer fictional worlds to the real one.”
Being a teenager who thinks they will never have their shit together:
“No," Cath said, "Seriously. Look at you. You’ve got your shit together, you’re not scared of anything. I’m scared of everything. And I’m crazy. Like maybe you think I’m a little crazy, but I only ever let people see the tip of my crazy iceberg. Underneath this veneer of slightly crazy and socially inept, I’m a complete disaster.”
Doing the classic teenager thing where you insist that you're fine when you're not:
“She was the worst kind of out of control—the kind that thinks it’s just fine, thanks.”
Cath, telling her Dad what's wrong with college:
“It’s just... everything. There are too many people. And I don’t fit in. I don’t know how to be. Nothing that I’m good at is the sort of thing that matters there. Being smart doesn't matter—and being good with words. And when those things do matter, it’s only because people want something from me. Not because they want me.”
The internet is awesome (especially to the socially inept):
“How do you not like the Internet? That’s like saying, ‘I don’t like things that are convenient. And easy. I don’t like having access to all of mankind’s recorded discoveries at my fingertips. I don’t like light. And knowledge.”
“There are other people on the Internet. It’s awesome. You get all the benefits of ‘other people’ without the body odor and the eye contact.”
The thing about Fangirl especially if you're my age, and know what it's like to be obsessed with something, is that it is so relatable that is becomes an anthem for nerds everywhere. It is an honest and true-to-life coming-of-age tale about a girl who is maturing and growing up, mostly by learning how to let go of certain things that hold her back in life.
An interesting notion, that I supposed is left a bit open-ended in the book, is the idea that in order to finally grow up and move on with her life, Cath had to get out of her own head and move on from Simon and Baz and all they stood for in her life even though it was the one thing that helped her cope and get through some of the most difficult times.
It's not that Cath abandoned and swept away any trace of her being a fangirl, it's more of her outgrowing being one. For me personally, this book got me thinking of what a fangirl really is and how much that word means to me. And it occurred to me that I too, like Cath, might have to let my fangirl self go, y'know, someday.
It's not that I would become so jaded and self-conscious that I think being a fangirl, which essentially means being passionately into something, is useless and stupid. Being a fangirl is bit different from being a nerd. As John Green put it:
"Nerds like us are allowed to be unironically enthusiastic about stuff. Nerds are allowed to love stuff -- like, jump-up-and-down-in-your-chair-can't-control-yourself love it. When people call people nerds, really what they're saying is, "You like stuff." Which is not a great insult at all. Like, "You are to enthusiastic about the miracle of human consciousness." "
And as far as I'm concerned, I am going to be a nerd for the rest of my life. I can't help it, it's a part of a who I am.
But being a fangirl for the rest of my life, is an entirely different story. Being a fangirl is more than just being a nerd. It is being so enthusiastic about someone, real or fictional, who means so much to you that you literally hold on to every little detail about that person, and love every single fiber of that person to bits.
There is a reason the term is fangirl and not fanwoman. Being a fangirl is being a nerd at the point in your life when you are a girl, a young teenage girl who is going through a lot of things, and feels that your love and obsession over your fandom is something you need to hold on to because it feels like its authentic and its yours and yours alone. It's like being a vampire -- everything is heightened. You are nerding out when you are a confused mass of hormones and, though you may love things with a passion for the rest of your adult life, you may never truly feel it in a way that is as intense as the overwhelming feels you experienced when you were a teenager.
And you're only a teenager once. And yes, being a teenager is confusing and it's messy and it's hard, but isn't it kind of sad to think that when you're older, you may have shit your together but you won't feel as intensely about things as you did when you were a teenager? Idk. Maybe it's just the hormones.
Right now, I am going to enjoy being a fangirl while I still can. Who knows, maybe I won't outgrow it. Maybe I will. Either way, being a fangirl will always be a part of me (present or past tense) that I will always cherish, because being a fangirl is what helped me pull through some pretty rough times. Because what better way is there to deal with reality than to hide yourself in a fictional world to escape it. Haha.
So yeah. Excuse me while I go play some Mariokart on my fam's new Wii U and fangirl over the brilliance of Nintendo games.
Thanks for reading :)
--Karin Novelia, Forever a Fangirl
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