The fanfic the Internet dubbed “the worst fanfic ever” has more fodder for analysis than its popularity. “My Immortal” is full of eccentricities of style that make it a rich experience for an active interpreter; its text is a set of the author, Tara’s, sessions of play with her versions of the setting and characters in Harry Potter. Tara exaggerates and distorts the cliquey aspects in Harry Potter, adding the influence of Anne Rice’s Vampire Chronicles to her gothic characters, especially the vampires, and the influence of the Master from Buffy the Vampire Slayer on Voldemort. The author and her fanfic are preoccupied with belonging to a group and displaying it indiscriminately for acknowledgement and support. The drama in Tara’s life and in her story thematically parallel each other, with the author acting out her issues with an idealized version of herself in a world designed to create and support her ideal self, Ebony. This mode of and motivation for composition gives “My Immortal” an interesting take on temporality, identity, continuity, and sexuality.

“My Immortal” contains the bare minimum of formal sense to achieve intelligibility; Tara does not edit out spelling or grammatical errors or typos, and introduces even more errors through her misuse of autocorrect. The only formal rule followed consistently throughout the fanfic is the division of each chapter, which were posted one at a time, into two parts: a message from the author to the audience with extensive use of texting shortcuts and a story that uses fewer texting shortcuts and more autocorrect errors. The fanfic’s two tiers correspond to the author’s motivation of affirming her own gothic identity in front of an audience of her peers on fanfiction.net, where “My Immortal” was first published, and to the author insert character acting out Tara’s fantasies.

There are two sets of stories told in the fanfic, those surrounding Tara and those surrounding Ebony. Tara seeks approval from her readers, heaps abuse on anyone who criticizes her writing, gets in a spat with her coauthor Raven, and is hacked by another fanfiction author (possibly Raven) who concludes Ebony’s story and posts the chapter Tara had planned to release, before regaining control of her account and finishing the story herself. Ebony becomes the girlfriend of Draco Malfoy, constantly receives sexual attention, always gives rejection and never gets it, absorbs all the powers and none of the weaknesses attributed to vampires and to Harry Potter in the relevant sources, travels through time in Marty McFly’s time machine, and is always very conveniently favored by the rules of the fictional universe. The only point of consistency throughout “My Immortal” is its aggrandizement of Tara/Ebony; many things that conventionally would be kept straight and consistent are bent to further this goal.

One of these compromised aspects is temporality. In “My Immortal”, temporality tends towards collapse and conflation. There are two scopes for temporal collapse that occur: within several scene-setting introductions and descriptions, and between the two eras when Ebony starts time travelling. The first kind of conflation presents an initial description of a character or scenario like a snapshot, with the initial actions of the introduced character described out of the logical order in which they must have occurred. To clarify by example, the introduction of “My Immortal”’s Hermione in chapter 8 displays this characteristic:

My friend B’loody Mary Smith smiled at me understatedly. She flipped her long waste-length gothic black hair and opened her crimson eyes like blood that she was wearing contact lenses on.

There are two conflated order descriptions back to back in chapter 25:

We started tiling of each other’s cloves fevently. He took of my blak thong and my black leather bar. I took of his black boxers. Then……………………… he put his trobbing you-know-what in my tool sexily. “OMFG Draco Draco!” I screamed having an orgism. We stated frenching passively. Suddenly………… I fell asleep. I started having a dream. In it a black guy was shooting two goffik men with long black hair. “No! Please don’t fucking kill us!1” they pleaded but he just kept shooting them. He ran away in a red car. “No! Oh my fucking god!11” I shouted in a scared voice. “Ebony what’s wrong?” Draco asked me as I woke up opening my icy blue eyes.

In all of these examples and the other instances where a description represents a singularity in the mind of the author, and when she writes it down, the description reveals its beginning as a single thought in its lack of order.

When Ebony starts time travelling to defeat Voldemort as a student before he rises to power, the she period goes to the 1980s, when gothic subculture was in its formative stages with Anne Rice’s Interview with the Vampire (1976) as a literary influence, instead of the period he is in school in the original books, which is 1938-45, when there are no goths yet. Beyond of Tara’s inventive use of her sources, the temporality of the time travel episodes is also affected by conflation. The two time periods are not kept separate, Voldemort knows about the future of gothic subculture and who Ebony is and why she time travelled to him.

Tara frequently puts bands popular in the gothic subculture when she was writing “My Immortal” in 2006 in the 1980s, although they did not exist or had not released the relevant material yet in the earlier time. Not only is this lack of distinction between the two time periods a symptom of the lack of planning and organization found throughout the fanfic, but it also reflects the mode of composition employed by Tara Gillespie; it reads like the author learned to write time travel sequences from watching movies that cut between different time periods, such as the Harry Potter movies, and confused the two parts. Tara even admits that she has introduced anachronisms into the 80s to allow Ebony to stay completely in the gothic subculture; “He [Voldemort] was humming Welcum 2 da Blak Prade under his breth( I no dat is not 80s but pretend it is ok!!)” (ch 41).

“My Immortal” is engrossed with group identity. The characters are all identified by Ebony and/or Tara directly as being one of three things: a goth, a poseur, or a prep. The goths all gain a gothic identity as a result of emotional trauma, a change that involves their conversion to Satanism, change of name to a gothic one, move to Slytherin House and adoption of a gothic style of dress and taste in music. To wit, a goth character is identified as such like this:

Dracola used to be called Navel but it tuned out dat he was kidnapped at birth and his real family were vampires. They dyed in a car crash. Navel converted to Satanism and he went goth. He was in Slitherin now. He was wearing a black Wurped t-shirt, black jeans and shoes and black hair wif red streekz in it. We kall him Dracula now.) (ch 17)

All the aspects of a gothic identity in “My Immortal” are mentioned except the musical taste in this introduction. Neville/Dracula is traumatized by the discovery of his tragic background and becomes a goth, taking a new name, changing his appearance, converting to Satanism, and moving to Slytherin. The only goth who does not appropriate the identity as a reaction to trauma is Ebony herself (ch 1).

The poseurs are those that adopt the gothic style of dress and taste in music without having been traumatized or converting to Satanism, they are presented by the author and the author insert character as fake goths. When Dumbledore gives the Great Hall a gothic makeover at the same time he gave himself one, this is the reaction from the students: “Everyone from the poser table in Gryiffindoor started to cheer. Well we goths just looked at each other all disfusted and shook our heads. We couldn’t believe what a poser he was!1.” (ch 18). The reaction to Dumbledore’s own makeover is the same: Draco says “What a fucking poser!” (ch 18) of Dumbledore’s new look. Dumbledore also adopts gothic tastes in music, going to the same MCR concert as the gothic students, but his adoption of the identity is viewed as illegitimate by the core of goths because it was not precipitated by a trauma-induced identity crisis.

The preps are opposed to the goths, and both in the story and in the author to reader comments they are the goths’ rival clique; this rivalry is the only reason they are the target of abuse from goths. In the author comments, this rivalry is expressed by Tara’s conflation of her critics and members of the rival clique: “STOP flaming! if u flam it menz ur a prep or a posr!” (ch 5). In the story with Ebony, the rivalry is defined by Ebony herself as so prevalent that she reacts this way to the preps “A lot of preps stared at me. I put up my middle finger at them” (ch 1) with no further explanation. Even the antagonist, Voldemort, is “an ugly preppy man wif no nose and red eyes” (ch 17) according to Ebony.

“My Immortal” has an idiosyncratic sense of continuity. It is affected by Tara’s mode of composition and method of deriving characters from the material in her sources. Her mode of composition has each chapter correspond to a session of play with the characters of Harry Potter, many of which include her friend Raven, one chapter each of which (ch 35) includes suzi and (ch 42) medusa, who may or may not be the same person. This mode of composition is shown through the form of each chapter. They each begin with a message from Tara to the audience, which sometimes includes her coplayers/coauthors, then the story with Ebony begins with the setup to whatever scenario the rest of the chapter will continue.

There is frequently a rupture in continuity between the end of one chapter and the beginning of the next; usually the new chapter begins with Ebony getting dressed, like Tara is dressing her doll before playing with her, or otherwise getting ready for starting the action of the story, but sometimes the new chapter simply starts right where the last one left off, especially when the chapter cutoff lands on a natural rupture in the story. The beginning of the new chapter reestablishes continuity after the rupture at the end of the old chapter. An example of the type of chapter introduction where Ebony gets dressed is:

“Well, Good Charlotte are having a concert in Hogsmeade.” he told me. “Oh. My. Fucking. God!” I screamed. I love GC. They are my favorite band, besides MCR. “Well…. do you want to go with me?” he asked. I gasped. Chapter 3. AN: STOP FLAMMING DA STORY PREPZ OK! odderwize fangs 2 da goffik ppl 4 da good reveiws! FANGS AGEN RAVEN! oh yeah, BTW I don’t own dis or da lyrics 4 Good Chralotte. On the night of the concert I put on my black lace-up boots with high heels. Underneath them were ripped red fishnets. Then I put on a black leather minidress with all this corset stuff on the back and front. I put on matching fishnet on my arms. I straightened my hair and made it look all spiky. (ch 2-3)

The rupture here is that chapter 2 ends on an unanswered question, and the continuity between the two chapters is established when chapter 3 begins with Ebony acting in a way that both answers the question and has Ebony begin preparing for what will happen over the rest of the chapter. Most of the chapter beginnings that set up the action of the individual story that forms the chapter describe Ebony getting dressed.

An example of the second type of a restart from rupture as a chapter transition, where a situation is set up in the first chapter and the reaction is given in the beginning of the next chapter:

“Oh! Oh! Oh! ” I screamed. I was beginning to get an orgasm. We started to kiss everywhere and my pale body became all warm. And then…. “WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU DOING YOU MOTHERFUKERS!” It was…………………………………………………….Dumbledore! Chapter 5. AN: STOP flaming! if u flam it menz ur a prep or a posr! Da only reson Dumbledeor swor is coz he had a hedache ok an on tup of dat he wuz mad at dem 4 having sexx! PS im nut updating umtil I get five good revoiws! Dumbledore made and Draco and I follow him. He kept shouting at us angrily. “You ludacris fools!” he shouted. (ch 4-5)

Chapter 4 ends on Dumbledore discovering Ebony and Draco having sex, and chapter 5 begins with Dumbledore’s reaction. In this and the other chapter transitions where the first chapter ends on a twist, the next chapter continues with the surprise of the twist ending’s resolution.

Tara et aliis’ method of character adaptation forms a line of continuity from the original to each adapted character. All introductions for the characters that are derived from Harry Potter link the “My Immortal” version to the original character, explaining how they have been changed and linking the character’s gothic name and appearance to the name they had in the original series. Diabolo/Ron is introduced as “Ron (although we call him Diabolo now. He has black hair now with blue streaks in it.)” (ch 10). Hermione/B’loody Mary is introduced:

She had pale white skin that she was wearing white makeup on. Hermione was kidnapped when she was born. Her real parents are vampires and one of them is a witch but Voldemort killed her mother and her father committed suicide because he was depressed about it. She still has nightmares about it and she is very haunted and depressed. It also turns out her real last name is Smith and not Granger. (Since she has converted to Satanism she is in Slytherin now not Griffindoor. ) (ch 8)

Both these examples and the rest of the introductions not quoted here assume that the character first existed in the form that Rowling wrote them, then something happened to them to make them into the character that appears in “My Immortal”. Characters that are not made into a goth or a vampire or renamed in “My Immortal”, such as Snape and Dumbledore, are simply treated as continuations of themselves from J. K. Rowling’s books.

Sexuality is another theme that permeates the text of “My Immortal”. Ebony is the focus of sexual attention, receiving the same from all of the male characters she comes into contact with except Dumbledore, and her attractiveness is admired by several of the female characters, including Willow, B’loody Mary, and Professor Trelawney. Her universal appeal is a facet of the general superiority she possesses as the author’s ideal self. The plotlines that do not revolve around Ebony’s antagonism towards Voldemort do revolve around Ebony giving and receiving sexual attention.

Beyond the preoccupation with Ebony’s sexual attractiveness and activity, sexuality factors into “My Immortal” through what Tara does to the characters’ sexual orientations. All the characters whose sexualities are labeled in the fanfic are bisexual, and Tara vacillates between playing up same-sex relations for prurient reasons and using insinuations of nonheterosexual orientations as insults. In the author note to chapter 1, Tara says “Special fangz (get it, coz Im goffik) 2 my gf (ew not in that way) raven, bloodytearz666 4 helpin me wif da story and spelling”, and in chapter 10 “stup it u gay fags if u donot lik ma story den fukk off!”. There is a double standard in “My Immortal” about bisexuality, the only nonheterosexuality characters have in “My Immortal”; it is appealing in men but gross in women.

On the prurient side, Tara likes the idea of bisexual men, and says “I asked what it was and he got all mad me and started crying all hot and angsty (rnt sensitve bi guyz so hot)” (ch 19), “Tears of blood came down his pail face. I wuz so turned on cuz I love sensitive bi guyz. (if ur a homophone den fuk of!)” (ch 21) and “Suddeni I saw a totally sexi goffik bi guy!!!!!11” (ch 41). This contradiction in Tara’s attitude towards bisexuality is explained by the role of “My Immortal” as an expression of aspects of Tara’s desires that she does not or cannot express in her life; she is aroused by bisexual men but is also affected by some combination of her own preferences and the heteronormativity she experienced living in middle America.

Some sexual acts are part of the victimhood that distinguishes a goth from a poseur or played for black humor. Of the ones that are in the former category, some examples are: Snape raping Draco (ch 44), and Snape and Lupin peeping on Ebony “Snap was spying on me and he was taking a video tape of me! And Loopin was masticating to it! They were sitting on their broomsticks” (ch 11). Part of the Weasleys’ backstory added in “My Immortal” also belongs here:

It turns out that Darkness, Diabolo, Crab and Goyle’s dad was a vampire. He committed suicide by slitting his wrists with a razor. He had raped them and stuff before too. They all got so depressed that they became goffik and converted to Stanism. (ch 22)

In the latter category, an example is what happens to Raven’s insert character when she and Tara fall out “after she [Raven’s insert character] got expuld I murdered her and den loopin did it with her cause he’s a necphilak” (ch 16).

In conclusion, in her fanfiction “My Immortal”, Tara Gillespie indulges all of her fantasies of desirability, heroism, and status through her idealized author insert character, Ebony. Ebony is the center of the gothic clique, arbitrates who deserves to belong in the goths, and supplants Harry as the Chosen One best suited and obliged to fight Voldemort. She is the center of “My Immortal” around which all else revolves. “My Immortal” draws upon many previous works: the characters that are not insert characters and the setting are from J. K. Rowling’s Harry Potter series, the vampirism and homoerotic overtones (undertones in the source) are from Anne Rice’s Vampire Chronicles, and Voldemort’s manner of speaking in archaic English is from the Master on Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Tara derives her fanfic from these works popular in and influential on the gothic subculture and refers to still more works, including musicians and movies.

My Immortal complete text at: http://myimmortalrehost.webs.com/