Data
Y'all, someone on Twitter just told me that fanfiction is rarely novel length. I'm cackling. Raise your hand if you have written fanfic longer than 60k.
- Anonymous Tumblr User
Introduction
One of the most popular hobbies that fans partake on the Internet would be the consumption and/or creation of Fanfiction, a.k.a fiction written by fans featuring characters from, a particular TV series, film, band, etc. With the most integral platform of all being Archive Of Our Own (a.k.a AO3). Unlike its contemporaries like Wattpad and Fanfiction.net, AO3 is much preferred due to its robust tagging system that also allows for easy data mining.
Methodology
To better answer the query of how many Fanfictions are indeed novel lengths and/or perhaps longer, we will be focusing mainly on the site Archive Of Our Own. To ensure fairness, here is an overview of the filters used to arrive at the data gathered:
Works are to be sorted based on their word count in a descending order; The work has to be written and published in English; The status of the work has to be completed; Crossover works are to be included.
Data Visualisation
In order to get a simple overview of the overall data collected, I decided to do up a few simple charts to better understand how the data looks: Line Graph, Bar Graph and Donut Chart.
The donut chart shows a quick overview of the data collected due to the large contrast available. The line graph showcases the growing trend of fanfictions growing in word counts. As for the bar graph, it visualizes a quick comparison of how many fanfictions in the entire AO3 archive have a similar or higher word count to certain popular novels.
Findings
In order for fanfiction to be considered novel-length, it has to meet the minimum word count of 50,000. Based on the findings, it would seem that only 1.83% or a small fraction of fanfictions are novel-lengths. A large majority of the fanfictions found on the site, AO3, have a word count range of 1,000 words to less than 7,500 words (57.56%). What this means is that most of the fanfictions found in AO3 are considered short stories.
As for other categories, 8.48% of fanfictions are considered as novella, 3.21% are considered novelette, 15.76% are considered flash fiction and 13.14% are considered micro-fiction.
However as there seems to be a trend of an ever-increasing word count as time progresses, perhaps in the near future, the number of novel-length fanfictions will outnumber the other categories.
Insights
When comparing the word counts of all the fanfiction on AO3 to those of popular novels, it would seem that only 2.6% have a word count that is similar or greater than the popular children's literature, The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe, whose word count is 38,421. 0.96% of fanfiction have a word count similar or greater than the shortest Harry Potter Book; Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone (76,944 words).
When compared to other popular novels such as War and Peace, which as a word count of 587,287, only 0.01% of fanfictions have a word count similar or greater than it.
What this shows is that even when you compare novel-length fanfictions, only a minute amount are actually comparable. However, as the data is collected based on a set criteria, perhaps there are more novel-length fanfictions that can hold their own against establish novels but do not meet the premises established for this project.
Conclusion
In conclusion, after filtering out ongoing works and those that are not written in English, I can say that the long-standing debate of whether fanfictions are indeed novel lengths can be put to rest by saying that only a small fraction has a word count that is equal to or more than popular novels. Most fanfictions have a word count of 1,000 to less than 7,500 (57.56%). However, while there is a growing number of works trying to reach novel-length word counts, it is still outpaced by the number of short stories written per year.
References
- toastystats (destinationtoast). “Archive of Our Own Beta.” Archive of Our Own, 2021.
- N.A. “Word Counts of the Most Popular Books in the World.” Foster Grant UK, 2017.
