I know this seems like an oxymoron, but have you ever seen a person who actually is a decent writer, grammar and spelling wise, but has a blatant Mary Sue?

I've seen this many a time, like here: http://www.fanfiction.net/s/5369328/1/IZ_Origins_Erin

It's a sad sight. Has anyone else seen this?

I'd say it's a stretch to call that decent writing.

That's better than most of the crap I've seen.

Seconded. That's... mediocre writing, at best. A yob's comma in the very first sentence, then it goes on to say "HAY THIS PLANET IS PINK AND I WILL TELL YOU WHICH EXACT SHADES AT NIGHT AND DAY, THIS IS TOTALLY IMPORTANT INFO."

Also, unless I read wrong, there is a character called Tallest Spork.

Tallest.

Spork.

... LOLOLOLOLOLOLOL.

Ahem. That aside, I suppose it's not too uncommon to see a fairly good writer fall prey to the dreaded Mary Sue. Can't bring any particular examples to mind, though.

(That's actually the characters name. In cannon. It was a very strange show.)

What really annoys me is that people think she's good. And I repeat, that's BETTER than most of the crap I've seen.

I shall add that all of the first few sentences begin with the word 'the', it mentions the colour of the planet twice in two consecutive sentences, we have 'fort night' and 'over look', and the grammar is patchy at best. There is pointless info-dumping, clumsy exposition and frequent repetition. Sentences are unwieldy. While it isn't brain-meltingly awful, it needs a lot of help.

Well, now that I've re-read it, (it's truthfully been a few months since I read it) it's worse than I remember. But I suck hard at grammar, so it's harder for me to pick up on those mistakes.

Maybe it's just me, but this thread seems a bit harsh. It started asking a question, and is now just bashing this girl's story. If you have that many issues with it, isn't it better to leave a review so she can improve on it, rather than saying all this where she may never see it?

As the example quoted didn't link to the question, it needed to be pointed out. After that, the thread went off a tangent. I BLAME DUXATRUM. If you wish, you may copy and paste my comments into a review; I can't c&p from my phone and I cba to text it out again.

I think anon is right, I feel kind of bad. I probably should send her some advice. (Hopefully she'll listen.)

Also mention that the pink clothes Erin gets in the first chapter would clash horribly with her hair. Especially when the yellow buttons are added to the mix.

Really? There was a canon character named Spork? I thought the Tallests' names were Red and Purple...?

...And I don't think 'decent' writers are allowed to have Mary Sues...twisted characterizations and predictable plotlines maybe, but not Mary Sues...

>>9 Wha—hey! No fair blaming me!

And since that story was given as an example of 'otherwise decent stuff that has a Sue in it', it's fair game for criticism regarding how decent it really is.

Also: >>12—yeah, it seems a bit of a contradiction to use the words 'decent writer' and 'Mary Sue' together, but it's possible for someone to have a good grasp of grammar and such whilst failing utterly at character creation.

My earliest fics were technically fairly solid, but I couldn't for the life of me have told you the difference between a Sue and a well-rounded character. (Well, probably.)

@Dux- I blame you forever and ever and shall never ever forgive you, and you know what? There's a deserted plain full of tumbleweeds, and I think YOU SHOULD GO AND LIVE THERE.

Forever.

Enjoy.

PS: I also think you should wear this:

http://www.google.co.uk/m/imgres?q=pi+pink&start=55&site=images&imgid=grdYeBQb4ict8M&imgsz=58316&imgurl=http%3A%2F%2Fimages4.cafepress.com%2Fproduct%2F10684824v1_480x480_Front_Color-LightPink.jpg&imgrefurl=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.cafepress.com%2F%2Bcutie_pi_womens_pink_tshirt%2C10684824&ht=480&wd=480&tbnh=129&tbnw=129&resnum=6&ei=FhtuS4i1JejNjQft-L_cAQ&ct=res&cd=56

@Sugerpuff: The current Tallests are Red and Purple, but there were two Tallests before that named Miyuki and Spork that appeared in a canceled episode called "The Trial". Seen here: http://zim.wikia.com/wiki/Almighty_Tallest_Spork

@...: XD I'd like to see that. But I don't blame Dux! (Entirely...) It my fault for starting this thread in the first place.

The best thing about links...They tell you what the content is before clicking it.
Multiple friends have tried sending me porno pictures and failed greatly because of it....

ANYWAY BACK ON TOPIC:

I don't really think I've read one.... :/ Unless they're parodies.....I hate the fact that my ; button is right next to the l. XD I keep typing 'un;ess' and stuff.......

Ignore me if you must :)

I've officially found a well written Mary Sue, completly by accident. It is a Harry Potter fanfic, written back in 2000, called The Eliza Trilogy. Characters are OoC, and the canon character seems to usurp and is concidered a classic God Mode Sue. It probabbly has other problems, but... enjoy...

http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/FanFic/TheElizaTrilogy
http://www.scribd.com/doc/6984190/eBook-Harry-Potter-JK-Rowling-7-Harry-Potter-and-the-Story-of-Eliza

It is far from impossible for a good writer to use or make a Mary Sue, and indeed, while it is presently preferred that characters have flaws and foibles, there are also many literary classics with characters who could only be considered Mary Sues. Not to mention that at times throughout history, Sue-like protagonists have been preferred to flawed characters. There is also the fact that the term 'Mary Sue' was originally used to describe Self Inserts.

So, yeah... while modern literary theory tends to prefer rounded characters, it is nonetheless a very subjective trope.

TTFN

>>19 & >>20 - I have to agree with Marth on this one. It would be best to bring up examples of classical literature that have characterization problems.

The only one I can think of is "The Last of the Mohicans". It might be concdered one of the classics, but when I discussed it in our class for a college literature class, we couldn't help but note that it was farely badily written. And we only read half of one of the books.

• If you get annoyed with big chunky paragraphs in fanfiction, this series has it. It took up half a page if I remeber correctly.
• We discussed in our class, how Hawkeye was like a wish fullfillment character for Cooper.
• He actually gave characters multiple names, like some Sue authors do... which makes it hard to sometimes keep track of whose who in the storyline.
• He uses perfect discription to describe the characters.
• He uses a lot of ideal, and not ideal.
• Mark Twain said of him, "In one place in 'Deerslayer, and in the restricted space of two-thirds of a page, Cooper has scored 114 offenses against literary art out of a possible 115.
• His research of his source material was bad, even back then.
• Kames Russel Lowel said, "... the woman he draws from one model don't vary/ All sappy as maples and flat as prairie."

Our teacher made us read this one first, because he felt doing the hardest reading first, because we were less likely to peter out on him at the end of the semester. The rest of the work... well, in comparison of twenty to thirty classics, "The Last of the Mohicans" was the only one that could be described as a Mary Sue, and people thought it became a classic, more because it was badily written, and showed what not to do, then anything else. Almost as if that series, was the Twilight of its day.

...

If we are going to look at characterization in older novels, there is a few things that really need to be concidered.

• Hitsorical context
• How people thought people should act during the time frame. For example, there was a time when adults thought children were supposed to act all perfect, and thus children in books reflected that.
• The understanding of psychollogy. For example, back when Wesley was created, whom "The Wesley" was named after, while children were no longer seen as perfect, child genius still were.
• The age group something is geared for. I mean, we can't call Dora the Explorer a Mary Sue, because she is meant for little kids.

This would be an interesting way to continue the subject, even though it was originally started I believe, to talk about Mary Sues in fanfiction that were well written, not popular fiction.

>>19 - An no... Mary Sue was not a term originally used for a Self Insert. It was derived from a parody fanfic, about a character for Star Wars who was not believable.

>>22 - Oops. I have a way of mixing up words.

Most of the time I've seen it in reference for early years, was with the 'perfect' character. I might not be going back far enough, but then, it is hard to find decent info on earlier stuff. Most of the early stuff comes from the late 1990's, to early 2000's.

>>24 - Or, it ends up being about material that one knows little about, which can be problematic initself.

To find the self-insert that is not a Mary Sue, one has to look into the work with great depth and analysis, and sometimes, it isn't always right. I would say, for Harry Potter, Hermione, Luna and Ginny are all self-inserts of Rowling. Hermione and Luna have a lot more development then Ginny character wise, which may be why she gets labeled as a Mary Sue by some people. In some ways I agree, in some I disagree.

The articles are saved to my intertent pages for furthur reference. While I know I can read them, I also think though, they are a harder read then some people can handle. Or, for some of the newer writers, contain a lot of stuff they don't know about. I knew quite a bit, though not everything.

I think you said it the best way. "She's also a product of a time where that was desirable in a protagonist." The Boxcar Children, Nancy Drew... all of them the characters were what were concidered good writing. I think it took children's literature, a little bit longer to bridge the gap, but I could be wrong. As for TBR... from what I read on wikipedia, there is doubt that the characters weren't based in real life, which means he might have been seld inserting.

I like your way of putting it, that 'the literati haven't changed; popular taste has just become more discerning'.

And yeah... my brother pointed out an hour or two ago, that while that is sort of the case, it isn't entirily the case. I was thinking though, of comparing it that way, because The Last of the Mohicans was popular back when it wa written, and yet people like Mark Twain critisized it's literary merit. Probabbly not the mest conection.

http://pottersues.livejournal.com/tag/good

Here are some Sues that are concidered well written. So far, there are ten... the well written Sues are rare treasures indeed.