A request for the Hurt/comfort and fan history people

[wickedwords]

Hiya!

As many of you know, I am helping with Fanlore, and one of the things we talked about at our last meeting was how we wanted to bring in more fandom-related history. And personally, I can't think of anything more 'fandom' related than the history of Hurt/comfort fandom.

Unfortunately, since it's a panfandom metafandom that has existed since the dawn of time (i.e., back when media fandom first broke off from science fiction fandom), it's way the heck too much for any single person to do. Seriously, if I were the type of person to work on a phd in media studies? This could be my dissertation.

So I'd like to get some people to work on the History of Hurt/comfort fandom. Things I'd like to know would be: What were the big Hurt/comfort stories in your fandom? Did any of them have huge impact? Can someone talk about 'brain damage' stories, and 'illness hurt/comfort'. The Teddy Bear stories in Highlander, "Gentle on my Mind" in Sentinel and it's follow-up by a different author. What was Hurt/hurt called back in the early days? Was it really 'get 'em'?

All I have is oral history, man. And y'all know my memory is crap.

Comments

[wickedwords.livejournal.com]

Thank you! That would be awesome. I think it was that H/C was a replay of our woman-pain, and the absolute secret, guarded core of fandom. It was the real reason we had gatekeepers.

Or something like that. Like I said, memory. Huh.

[cesperanza.livejournal.com]

It's funny, but I hated that book the first time I read it-I was offended. And rereading it recently, it didn't bother me at all!

[wickedwords.livejournal.com]

I haven't reread the book lately. but I had been talking about her with someone--probably you--and I feel much more mellow about it as well. Weird, huh.

[klangley56.livejournal.com]

I've read ENTERPRISING WOMEN multiple times since it was published, along with Henry's book, as those two were the major analyses of fandom up to that point. I read through Henry's book nodding my head in agreement all the way and read through Camille's book shaking my head in disagreement. Didn't like it then, still don't like it. She did not write about fandom as I knew it; Henry did.

Frankly, I would not source her writing as an authority on h/c.