What is the difference between writing about yourself and being "Mary Sue"?

A Mary Sue is an idealised self. Like rather than writing about me, it would be someone very like me but gorgeous, speaking eight languages, rich, reverred and with a young Rudger Hauer as my personal love slave.

Also, a Mary Sue is considered someone who comes into a story and makes it ALL better. She/he solves everyone's problems, is adored by everyone, etc., etc.

However, I would tell you not to worry about it. One person's Mary Sue is another's Scarlette O'Hara, if you will. It's more the quality of your writing that will determine if you come off as "Mary Sue" or really engaging protagonist.

Hey, Nancy Drew was a Mary Sue, but I read those books like crazy as girl.

This is the first time time I've heard of "Mary Sue." Is it basically the same as an alter-ego?

This is just one of the links available in a google search for "Mary Sue", but it's got the basics.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mary_Sue

Oh, okay. Thanks, OFG. I may have inadvertently created a Mary Sue in my WIP.

I learn something new everyday here. Never heard of this until now.

A fun Mary Sue quiz.
http://www.springhole.net/quizzes/marysue.htm

What is the term to describe a character that is modeled after myself but with nothing but FLAWS? Meaning, it's not an idealized version of me, but a "bastard" version.

Thank you all, you learn something new every day.

We should invent a name. Like a Eusy Ram. No, that's not even a name. Damn.

How about Dick Buster?

I'm writing a Dick Buster book, and the main character dies tragically at the end...

MajorDrums said:

Oh, okay. Thanks, OFG. I may have inadvertently created a Mary Sue in my WIP.

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Is it well written and your (supposed) Mary Sue character an engaging protagonist who the reader will root for? If the answers are yes, then who cares if someone calls said protag a Mary Sue?

Like a lot of terms, I heard this one first in fanfiction. Fanfiction is not going to be or going for publication.

If you take most of the Mary Sue "rules" and apply them to any story where the protagonist is a "hero" and you'll find there are a LOT of Mary Sue's out there. So what?

This is one of those issues that good writing solves. The only place where I've really seen the Mary Sue/wish fulfillment type of writing is in fanfiction. If you're not writing fanfiction, I'd say stop worrying about this "issue". There are better, far more relevant writing issues to worry about.

Never heard about this either, interesting info.

With a name like that I imagine she would.

maestrowork said:

How about Dick Buster?

I'm writing a Dick Buster book, and the main character dies tragically at the end...

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Celia Cyanide said:

Yeah, that was always my problem with it. Everyone says, If you don't write about yourself, you're not really writing,

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If I wrote about myself, I'd put my readers to sleep. I'm not that interesting. That's why I create interesting characters to write about.

*fondly remembers another alter ego: Martha the Mary Sue Slayer*

I have no problem with Mary Sue stories as long as it's well written, because seriously, I don't know the author. I wouldn't know one way or another if the character is a Mary Sue. I only care about the story and the characters.

And there are some really great Mary Sues...

Mary Sue is the name for when it *doesn't* work.

Like JeanneTCG said, Mary Suism is primarily a phenomenon in fanfiction. Like, lets say some young writer was doing a Lord of the Rings fanfiction, and they include an original character, maybe a young woman. Sounds good.

But then, this young woman turns out to secretly be a beautiful elven princess! And she's descended from a lost tribe of Spirit Elves, so she's got super special extra powers that she doesn't even know about yet, but are totally as strong as Gandalf's! And she runs into Sam and Frodo and saves them, leading the way into Mordor, and, in Frodo's moment of failure, realizes that in fact she can resist the power of the ring and control it, and defeats Sauron! And then she marries Legolas, who is madly in love with her. The end.

Basically, all too often self-insertions in fanfictions are total Mary Sues--the author is basically writing a fantasy about themselves in the set universe where they are the glorious superstar who saves the day whom everyone loves.

Alas, nobody in the audience loves them.

(Think that was bad? Try, "a new transfer student from America arrives at Hogwarts and meets Harry..." ..it all goes downhill from there).

In writing, one just needs to be careful that a self-insertion is really a self-insertion, and isn't just you writing about a cool superhero adventure you want to have. Characters need to have flaws, and sometimes they need to have stuff go wrong. I don't like reading about perfect characters; I can't relate to them.

I used to do an oline roleplaying group, but there were too many "god" characters. That is Mary Sueism.