VoyForums
[ Show ]
Support VoyForums
[ Shrink ]
VoyForums Announcement: Programming and providing support for this service has been a labor of love since 1997. We are one of the few services online who values our users' privacy, and have never sold your information. We have even fought hard to defend your privacy in legal cases; however, we've done it with almost no financial support -- paying out of pocket to continue providing the service. Due to the issues imposed on us by advertisers, we also stopped hosting most ads on the forums many years ago. We hope you appreciate our efforts.

Show your support by donating any amount. (Note: We are still technically a for-profit company, so your contribution is not tax-deductible.) PayPal Acct: Feedback:

Donate to VoyForums (PayPal):

[ Login ] [ Main index ] [ Search | Check update time | Archives: 1, [2], 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8 ]

[ Next Thread | Previous Thread | Next Message | Previous Message ]

Date Posted: Sun, Apr 18 2004, 21:42:05
Author: Catseye
Subject: Re: This all sounds frighteningly like
In reply to: Stinkerbelle 's message, "Re: This all sounds frighteningly like" on Sat, Apr 17 2004, 16:33:03

>How then would one know if a character is a Mary Sue
>if one does not know the author?

I think it's the same reason you don't need to quiz the author on whether Mary Sue does or doesn't resemble them (or who they'd like to be) in any way. When she's perfect in every way, warps canon to suit her purposes, gets incredibly unrealistic jobs and skills, is loved by all the good characters (and hated by the bad), and so on, then she's a Sue.

Yes, it would be possible for the author to say "But that's _not_ an idealised version of me! I don't want to be an incredibly intelligent psychic teenager who saves the world!", but the character makes it plain that at some level they do. There comes a point when you don't need any lengthy debates on authorial intention to just _know_ this is an idealised self-insert.

So, I think it works the same way for calling 'Sue!' when you don't know the author. The character says "I would love to have the following qualities/skills/eye colours/occupations/friends - so here's me, the way I'd want to be!", and when the character's saying that so loudly, you don't need the author's voice to confirm it.

[ Next Thread | Previous Thread | Next Message | Previous Message ]


Forum timezone: GMT-3
VF Version: 3.00b, ConfDB:
Before posting please read our privacy policy.
VoyForums(tm) is a Free Service from Voyager Info-Systems.
Copyright © 1998-2019 Voyager Info-Systems. All Rights Reserved.