Abstract
Fan fiction in antiquity suffers from a lack of certainty regarding what is canon: is what is now considered fan fiction really fan fiction, or is it another contemporary version of the canon? The concept of fan fiction thus ought to be combined with the idea of transmedia storytelling, building on snowball-effect stories. This approach is used in an analysis of how the saints in late antiquity became a characteristic of Christianity. This era used fan fiction–like texts describing saints' life stories; shrines and dedicated basilicas, which allowed distinct communities to gather and celebrate; pilgrimages, which combined adventure and biographical identification with the beloved saint; and pictures, relics, and pilgrim tokens. The Christian world in late antiquity has characteristics reminiscent of the universes created by transmedia storytelling, the aim of which is complete immersion in content.
Highlights
Is what is considered fan fiction really fan fiction, or is it another contemporary version of the canon? The concept of fan fiction ought to be combined with the idea of transmedia storytelling, building on snowball-effect stories
The Christian world in late antiquity has characteristics reminiscent of the universes created by transmedia storytelling, the aim of which is complete immersion in content
Mimicking an authorized author's reasoning and literary style was, the aim of many late antique authors and makes it very difficult to distinguish between canon and fan fiction in the sense these terms are used in the fan fiction vocabulary
Summary
[1.1] One particular word, canon, links fan fiction with the Bible and suggests grounds for comparison. [1.2] In fan fiction communities, the term canon relates to the original source to which a fan story relates by using its characters, universes, plot, specific language, and so on. Fan fiction relating to The Matrix series can not be traced back to a specific canon: "There is no one single source or ur-text where one can turn to gain all of the information needed to comprehend the Matrix universe" (Jenkins 2007) It seems that the concept of transmedia storytelling may yield some answers to the question of how to access fannish text production and fan materiality without the need of an explicit base text. The story can turn from a simple plot into a universe of plots embracing multiple plots and platforms of fan activity
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