Thinkin' My Thoughts About Death Fic

[rubberbutton]

Why, oh why, do I love death fic like I do? Nothing makes me quite as happy (or sad, in a happy way) when my favorite characters bite the big one it, hopefully in as tragic and devastating a method as possible, leaving the survivors bereft and reeling.

Is it my psyche's way of dealing with my own anxiety about death? Trying to answer the big questions about why we're born, why we die and, hey, isn't this digital watch pretty neat?  Perhaps it's the catharsis? Or maybe I'm a closet sadist?

These are the questions that I'm not sure I want answers to.

Comments

[purridot.livejournal.com]

It is a perplexing problem! But an irresistible one. I am also tempted to think it is something to do with catharsis... and appreciating life while you have it. I will have to think about it some more (with chocolate). Thing is, I couldn't bear death!fics in some fandoms. I don't know if I want Ray to die, for example! (But if you have a rec I could try it out ;-)

I always remember a "Peanuts" strip where Schroeder and Lucy are discussing something like this :-)

Schroeder: That composer had a tragic life.
Lucy: But it was romantic...
Schroeder: How can you say that?
Lucy: A tragic life is romantic when it happens to somebody else.

[silja-b.livejournal.com]

Karen Blixen, who had a fondness for giving her characters a grand send-off and wrote at great length about death, had a theory on what makes for a good story, and by extension, one assumes, a good life - or rather a good death.

She believed that Fate is not a constant, written at birth, but claimed. One can claim Fate by living life as a grand gesture and being true to one's nature. Her example was that of the lion, which certainly is true to no nature but its own and is one of the grandest creatures – existing constantly in the struggle between life and death.

I suspect our occasional penchant for maiming and killing our characters stem from something similar. We get to write the last line of a life as a grand gesture. We control Fate – if only by proxy.

[rubberbutton.livejournal.com]

I am also tempted to think it is something to do with catharsis... and appreciating life while you have it.

That's the nice side of it. Sometimes I think the only reason I wrote All Good Things was to punish House for being mean to Wilson (by, of course, being even meaner to Wilson). I guess I was looking to force House to have a moment of clarity--death is a rather expedient tool.

Lucy: A tragic life is romantic when it happens to somebody else.

LOL. So true.

[rubberbutton.livejournal.com]

She believed that Fate is not a constant, written at birth, but claimed.

Oh, I like this.

We get to write the last line of a life as a grand gesture. We control Fate – if only by proxy.

Mm, yes. Death as it should be. I think also there's something in us that needs the completion. So often in series, that's what we don't really get--either we're kept hanging on from episode to episode, season to season, or the show's canceled and we're left wanting more. Or writers use death as a tool to keep a character or a relationship from changing. Romeo and Juliet is so gosh darn romantic because they never get the boring, unromantic parts of the relationship.

Or something like that...

[nightdog-barks.livejournal.com]

*smiles*

Well, and plus there's just the pleasure of making the characters live their lives in different ways. House is a Roman! Wilson's a male prostitute! Wilson has a triceratops in his office! They're both penguins!

And sometimes death is a part of that life, and we get to write that too.

[rubberbutton.livejournal.com]

Well, and plus there's just the pleasure of making the characters live their lives in different ways.

Heh. Yes, that too, definitely.

Wilson has a triceratops in his office!

Now I totally want to see that. Triceratops was always my favorite dinosaur.