podficmeta | From Roga

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From Roga

Roga would like to talk about re-editing and re-writing works for podficcing.

Would readers be interested in editing works for podficcing, whether for content (e.g. sex scenes), length, adding dialogue tags, etc.? Does "permission to record" cover a blanket "permission to adapt"?

How would authors feel about re-writing stories so they are easier to be read or to be understood orally? For instance, if your alien language just isn't pronounceable by human beings, or if you've written something in an experimental, visual structure.

And, Roga didn't ask this, but I would like to know, how would we, as listeners, react to getting a story that was changed from the text? How extensive would the changes have to be for you to want a heads up before you downloaded? Would you want the changes indicated in the metadata or also during the story reading?

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I think I already answered in the original post (sorry Zvi, I didn't realize this was only the collection post :), but I'll post here again as well. I think minimal changes should be expected in terms of silently correcting typos or contracting in dialog.

But what Roga was talking about really unsettles me a bit. They mostly described it in terms of taking out NC17 material, and i find that very problematic. If the story is good, the sex scenes ought to be central to the story and "cleaning it up" is an incisive move. If someone doesn't want to read sex scenes (and that's understandable), they might look at the vast array of non-NC17 stories.

The issue that i find more problematic for myself is language I disapprove of. So far, I think i've just avoided reading such stories out loud. But if there's ablist or misogynist or racist or homophobic language...I'm not sure I'd want to read it and i'm not sure I'd feel comfortable changing it. So I've avoided the issue at least so far.

Except that the position that every scene should contribute to the telling of a story is an aesthetic judgement, and one I agree with, but it's not a universal aesthetic value. And podfic is definitely not restricted to stories which I find aesthetically pleasing, or are formulated within the aesthetic frameworks I find relevant. (Also, there's nothing stopping someone from recording a story which is formulated according to my aesthetic standards, but badly. I mean, people make kitschy things on purpose sometimes.)

So, what if it's a story where it's clear that the sex scene was just written because "you've got to have pr0n or no one will read your fic"?

Of course :)

I still think there's an integrity of the text that i'm uncomfortable letting a reader change.

I may be kneejerking because the examples were about sex but OMG. Are we gonna bleep next?

If I like the story, I read the story. But I don't pick and choose which parts to read or not read. It's a Gesamtkunstwerk :)

I'm kinda equally respond to readerly addition of ratings etc. I'm fascinated with the fact that certain things can come across STRONGER in audio. Having a noncon scene spoken in your ear may be much more intense than reading and being able to skim it. I still would feel very uncomfortable in adding ratings or warnings if they aren't there. I guess one could have ADDITIONAL reader warnings. But...there's creative interpretation and evaluation. And adding a rape warning, for example, might5 be more the latter than the former. [I'm willing to be convinced otherwise on this one, however :) The editing the text to getting rid of the pr0n? Not so much so!]

I may be kneejerking because the examples were about sex but OMG. Are we gonna bleep next?

That's not what I was getting at, and I don't think it's a case of a slippery slope of censorship or anything at all. I just posted a comment here that explains where I was coming from in bringing it up, and why I was interested in seeing it discussed.

Thanks for the longer explanation, but I'm not sure I am seeing a real difference between what you are describing and what censorship effectively is. You want to edit out parts that the author clearly found important enough to include in their published version. That to me is censoring (or, when asking the author to do it, maybe self-censoring?).

Now, if you want to ask the author to write a PG13 version of their story because that's what you want to read/hear, then it's up to them, clearly. But except in those cases where the pr0n is added on (and I know there are writers who offer different versions, so I know that for some people the sex really is not an intricate element of the narrative and characterization but sexy lagniappe), I'm not sure writers would want to do that to their story (or have it done to them).

I wonder if you could make an analogy to translation, where someone else authors a new version of the text and yet...I've gotta check with the fanfic translators I know if they delete sections or tone down things...that might be a useful analogy?

First of all, yes, it would be self-censoring; I'd never even suggest doing it without the author's permission/approval.

I'm not sure writers would want to do that to their story (or have it done to them).

Definitely; again, author permission is necessary.

I'm not sure translation is the right analogy; it requires adaptation of a different kind, where it's still written word to written word. The difference in medium here matters, I think.

To be honest, though, the entire point is moot if it's just me who feels this way about podfic sex scenes. If the majority have no problem with it -- reading or writing -- then there's no reason to make such an adaptation anyway. Part of the reason I brought it up was also to see if there were others who felt the same way. I mean, I know that some do because I've talked to them, I just have no idea whether it's at all widespread.

And obviously, even if it is, that's not reason enough to change it; the reader has to want it too, and the author has to be okay with it. But I don't think it's out of the realm of possibility that in some circumstances, all of those things would come together.

I just want to step in here and say no, you're not the only one. It's a matter of personal taste, of course; but if a reader really, really wants to podfic something and feels uncomfortable with a few scenes, it's perfectly acceptable for them to ask the author about changing it.

I think the term we're looking for here is Bowdlerisation.

Cath, I really strongly agree with the bit about being unsettled by taking sex scenes out. And I also agree with your reason for it, that the sex scene is often an important part of the plot, the character journey, or the emotional arc of the fic. Or all three. The idea that it is so low in value that it can just be taken out without harming the fic makes me kind of instinctively defensive. There's this whole implication that the sex is just there for titillation and not actually meaningful. And I am not saying that a person who wants to take a sex scene out of a fic would mean any of those things. But my gut reaction is to see it that way. I just... can't they find a gen fic, and leave the NC-17 stories intact for those of us who enjoy reading and hearing them that way? Because the act of taking a sex scene out seems really different than the act of just not choosing to write or record one in the first place.

The language you disapprove of thing is more interesting. I think I agree about taking it out. My friend was telling me the other day about how, in this long fic she's reading, she found this line that was casually misogynistic. So casually thrown in there that she didn't notice. Here, I'll find the lines she quoted me.

"I’d probably get my head bitten off if I asked for champagne in the dressing room. I asked [female character] if she could get me a Coke Zero the other day; she handed me a Pepsi and told me to go fuck myself."

[Male character 1] laughs. “My sweet little [female character],” he says in a saccharine voice.

"No seriously. That time of the month or something, man, I don't know."

"PMS,” [Male character 1] says. “That's what you get for working with women."

What do you do when you are reading along, in a fic you've already committed to doing and have already put hours and hours of work into, and you come across something like that? If it were by an author I felt comfortable talking with, I'd definitely ask them to alter it in some way to either remove the problem or acknowledge it as problematic. In this case, she doesn't know the author well enough to do that, so she just read it but felt very uncomfortable with it.

Yes, you articulated my concerns much more clearly than I could. Thank you!!! And Zvi's right, of course, that some writers do add the sex scenes on, but I don't want to be the judge of that...

Re the other issue. I've only so far recorded fic by people i knew personally or felt comfortable asking. And I think I'd have emailed them if I came across sth that really bugged me (in fact, i just read a story where i thought there was a continuity error, and i almost emailed but Allison and I went back&forth and I decided it was ambivalent enough to leave).

So that scene. Yeah, that's a hard one! Because now it's your voice SAYING these things!!!

My biggest fear is the in character attempts. I'm just waiting for the first Jerk/Bitch or Douchebag in J2 or SPN that I come across... Maybe i'm lucky I'm not in Life on Mars fandom??? :)

And Zvi's right, of course, that some writers do add the sex scenes on, but I don't want to be the judge of that...

That's absolutely true, and I feel that way about some fics that I have read, that the sex scene has no purpose and makes the overall story weaker. And if I were the beta-reader for that fic, I would certainly say so.

But podfic reader is pretty far from beta-reader, and unless it happened to be an author I had both types of relationship with, I would not ask for that kind of change.

I'm just waiting for the first Jerk/Bitch or Douchebag in J2 or SPN that I come across...

In the podfic I'm working on right now, the word faggot is used several times. But it's not tossed off casually, it's used in a very emotionally intense scene and as an expression of hate by a clearly evil character. I wasn't thrilled while recording with having to say that word out loud, but I also didn't feel like its use in the story was gratuitous, and it wasn't a dealbreaker for me the way that, honestly, the "PMS. That's what you get for working with women," scene would probably have been.

So context matters a lot to me when it comes to things like that. I can think of at least one word I would never say, though.

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