‘You should write stories from your own culture.’ 

This was a message sent to me by someone on Wattpad, presumably taking umbrage at some of my AU ideas and hybrid use of elements.  To that person, I have to say: You’ve no idea what my cultural background is. You’ve never met me, And if you did, how would you tell?  By my physical appearance?  Be careful.  Or maybe it would be my language? I speak more than one, by the way.  What happens then?  But let me pose a question that gets straight to the heart of the issue I feel bothers you:  If I am not of Chinese background, I have no business writing 3310 fanfiction, is that it?  

What if I were Chinese, would the way I write my fanfics still be “wrong”?

I consider the fanfiction stories I’ve written to be “Chinese fantasy-inspired works”.  Inspired is the key term because I’m basing fantasy upon fantasy.  I am not writing academic papers or scholarly cultural studies. I am writing fantasy fiction.  F.i.c.t.i.o.n.  It’s not real.  The characters and situations are not real. You get that, right?

‘You should write stories from your own culture.’ What does that mean?  I can’t write a story about firefly vampires unless I’m Ghanaian? The Loch Ness monster unless I’m Scottish? A spirit of the Corn unless I’m Mohawk?   Or a story about Egyptian gods unless I’m from Egypt? I’m pretty sure most stories about werewolves these days aren’t being written by European authors.  

While we’re at it, does this apply only to story writing or does it apply to reading them too?  Where do translated works from different cultures fit in this? Does it mean I wasn’t supposed to read an English version of Cervantes’ Don Quixote unless it was translated by a Spaniard? I must dismiss Dumas’ The Three Musketeers that I loved back in high school because it wasn’t a Frenchman who’d translated it to modern day English?  Let’s use an example from China, Journey to the West. I’m pretty sure the version I read had not been translated by a Chinese.  As for 3310, forget having read To the Sky Kingdom, the English translation of Tang Qi’s novel. The translator, Poppy Toland, is British –having “only” studied Chinese in the UK.  

Ah hell, maybe I’m not supposed to watch foreign dramas and movies with subtitles either then, only in their original language. Goodbye Eternal Love; Ten Miles of Peach Blossoms.  Gee, that would cut quite a few fans out of the equation, wouldn’t it.

But I digress…

Mixing elements and combining genres is nothing new in story writing. How else would the likes of  paranormal mystery, comedy horror, urban fantasy, supernatural drama, sci-fi western to name a few have ever come about if this were never done? 

There is a term, xuanhuan. It translates to “mysterious fantasy”.  It’s a term used to describe Chinese fantasy mixed with foreign elements. Hmm… I’ve also seen it explained as a mishmash of different elements with Chinese flavouring, or fictional stories that contain Chinese mythology with “peculiar” elements.  My point is that stories of mixed mythologies and fairy tales exist. What I do is nothing new. And it is nothing wrong.

If my stories give offense to some, then don’t read my stories.  It seems in these times, no matter what, someone is going to be offended by something. Anyone is welcome to write a story.  Just as anyone may choose to read one, or not.

I’ll conclude by stating that if writing elements, translating stories, or reading/watching works  that don’t belong to “your” culture is taboo, the world would be all the poorer.