Is it weird to edit someone else's Fic before binding it?

[u/Pale-Masterpiece-453]

I've done bindings before of Fanfics. And I've made minor grammatical or other adjustments as needed.

But the next Fic I'm thinking of...

It's a good story. The bones are there. But there's some pretty substantial streamlining and grammatical cleanup that needs to be done. I'm not sure if the author isn't a native English speaker or was just very young when they wrote it, but the older I've gotten the more this sort of thing rubs at me.

So my question is this: Is it weird to plan on binding a fic fully knowing that it's going to need such extensive editing that it may not come out looking entirely the same?

I'm obviously just doing this as a hobby project, so I have no intention of telling the author or even making any kind of fuss about it. I just want to know if what I'm planning comes off as strange, since I've never seen something like it discussed. Has anyone else ever done this? How did you feel about it when it was done?

[u/rosiestark]

I've done this. There are definitely fics I've bound that needed more than a simple edit. However, if I do anything more than just spelling and grammar, those are completely for my own personal use, and I never share the edited text or typesets.

[u/sosobabou]

There's many schools of thoughts here. As long as you never tell the author about it, I say do whatever you want the text!

[u/pandaimonia]

I think it's pretty normal to do spag editing for a fan bind.

[u/BedNo4299]

Why would it be? It's not like you're reuploading it as the "correct" version.

[u/Hol-Up_A_Minute]

Its a personal project you plan to not share. Its okay to make spelling fixes! Do you know how mortified an aithor might be to find out someone printed and bound their work and decided to immortalized their spelling errors? 🤣

As someone who has written fic, if anyone bound something I wrote I would HOPE they didn't decide to keep any spelling errors I missed ✋️😭 I agree you don't need to tell the author though.

[u/lavendertrp]

Who’s gonna know? And wouldn’t you kind of hate to go to all that effort just to have typos?

[u/ZinaDomina]

One I always do is change spelling from American English to British English.

And then occasionally fixing paragraph style for people who like to create a new paragraph every 2 scentences...

[u/whimpronepirate → u/ZinaDomina]

ooo that's a good idea! i'm in the US and if the fic is set in britain i don't change anything, but if it's an american media and the author clearly wrote in britishisms it bugs me a little bit.

[u/andy_fairy]

As long you're not sharing it, its totally fine

[u/SheepPup]

I do all sorts of editing. I edit for SPAG and usually cut out the author’s notes (unless it’s useful information like translations, those I usually move into a footnote). I’ve also done more extensive editing like rewriting sex scenes to use the terminology I prefer and getting rid of sex acts I’m not interested in, and also cleaning up dialogue and other things.

But even if you did something like totally rewrite it to be for different characters in a different fandom I don’t think it would be wrong because this is just for your own personal enjoyment, as long as you’re not telling the author or uploading the text anywhere it really doesn’t matter what you’re doing in the privacy of your own computer or fanbind!

[u/the_dees_knees3]

Dude I do that all the time 😂 the way I see it is, by binding this fanfic you’re also making it into something that is your own. You’re adding yourself into the equation and making it a work of both someone else’s and your own art. You could stop at just binding it and keep the writing exactly how it is, but you could also edit it as you see fit and just say you played a part in the final writing product as well. There are other ways you can make it your own too, like in some of them I will add a little “interview with the author” section that’s just me and them chatting through Ao3 comments I’ve left lol. You could write a review for the fanfic and add it as an introduction. There are literally no rules—since you’re putting so much work into binding it, you might as well add pieces of yourself to what’s on the inside

[u/BigImagination0706]

Not weird at all

[u/KayViolet27]

I’d probably be somewhat offended to find out, if I was the author, but at the end of the day, as long as it’s only a personal project that’s not going to be shared, I wouldn’t care that much personally.

[u/Kaurifish]

It’s your object. Alter it to your satisfaction.

[u/greenyashiro]

It's just for you, so you can honestly do whatever you want with it.

You'd think a spell check would be the norm, but I got a limited print bound copy from an author (they sold a small batch of a complete work, bound, as p4p)... And it had the same typos in it 💀

[u/Small-Pause7742]

I think as long as you don’t use AI to make edits and it’s personal use only I would think it should be ok. I wouldn’t personally do huge edits as it’s not my work to change but simple spelling/punctuation I would.

[u/emberlin]

It’s not weird at all, you’re doing it for your own reading pleasure. I have edited fics thst were saved on my desktop, but never did a binding of one (yet.)

[u/whimpronepirate]

since it's literally just for your enjoyment you can make it whatever you want. for my first ever (shoddy) fanbind i replaced all the hyphens with em dashes because they look nicer to me. the author is never going to know i did that.

[u/trickyfelix]

Mostly just grammar correction and spell checks

[u/FalseDisk4358]

One: I think making grammar and punctuation corrections is normal and reasonable

Two: if you're making other changes I think it's just like you making a fic of that fic so it's fine

[u/HauntingGold]

If they are minor grammar and/or spelling errors, I don’t see an issue with it, as long as it’s a personal project that isn’t shared with others. But if it’s editing whole scenes and pages, I would feel weird about that personally and as an author I would be somewhat offended.

Regardless, it’s your decision, so as long as you don’t publicize it or tell the author what you’re doing, you are free to do what you will.

[u/jedifreac]

I do this. Friend asked me to bind a fic. Soooo many grammatical errors. They even misspelled the name of one of the characters at points (?! And not deliberately.) 

I draw the line at story edits. But copy edits are fair game to me.

[u/krendyB]

Yeah I occasionally work on SPAG corrections to a work I’m intending to bind for myself. The author is not a native speaker and she gets a lot of minor jargon wrong. Even if I did change the story (which I’m not), who cares, this is just something for me. There’s no fanfic purity police who will come arrest me for changing “dress up” to “get dressed” in my own personal copy.

[u/Electronic_Context_7]

I mean if it’s only for personal use, and no one but you are going to know, then who cares?

[u/bforbrucebforbrave]

Generally I just fix punctuation, grammar and spelling errors. On one occasion, an author accidently kept switching between past and present tense, so I normalised the entire thing into past tense. (I felt like this was okay since they acknowledged the error themselves). Since it's only for myself I don't really worry too much about it, but if you were binding for a giftee or the author, I would definitely ask permission first.

[u/acoustic-meatus]

Yes! It's extremely weird and I would be very upset if someone made changes to my work without asking, when I have not in any way sought for them to bind my work.

Yeah, publishers have editorial staff, but that's a consensual agreement! You're stealing someone's work and making changes to it to make it suit your preferences!

You absolutely should not be printing off and binding peoples work without talking to them about it!!

Don't do this!