New Podcast Episode on the New Books Network: Christine Schott

Medieval Institute Publications partners with the New Books Network, a consortium of author-interview podcast channels dedicated to introducing scholars to a wide public via new media, to produce podcast episodes featuring interviews with MIP authors.

In this episode on the New Books Network, we talk to Christine Schott about "canon fanfiction": what is it? How did Schott develop the term? We also discuss what to do with the traditional literary canon and how to use fanfiction as a powerful pedagogical tool. Schott also gives some examples of case studies in the book, example assignments, and published pieces of canon fanfiction. As always, we end with a fascinating discussion based around what the book can tell us about what it has meant to be human throughout the ages.

Several scholarly fields investigate the reuse of source texts, most relevantly adaptation studies and fanfiction studies. The limitation of these two fields is that adaptation studies focuses narrowly on retelling, usually in the form of film adaptations, but is not as well equipped to treat other uses of source material like prequels, sequels and spinoffs. On the other hand, fanfiction studies has the broad reach adaptation studies lacks but is generally interested in "underground" production rather than material that goes through the official publication process and thus enters the literary canon. This book sits in the gap between these fields, discussing published novels and their contribution to the scholarly engagement with their pre- and early modern source material as well as applying that creative framework to the teaching of literature in the college classroom.

ISBN 978-1-50152-337-3 (hardback), ISBN 978-1-50151-597-2 (PDF), ISBN 978-1-50151-598-9 (EPUB) © 2022