ratcreature | What is it with fanfic and weird eye descriptions?

Sometimes my mind really boggles at the way eyes are described in fanfic. It actually throws me out of stories every so often, because the description seems just so ridiculous to me. Unfortunately that also happens in stories I quite enjoy otherwise, not just badfic. It's not even just the purple prose like color names that some writers love to use for eyes, like "cerulean" or whatever. Though actually at the top of my list is "seafoam green", because to me that evokes singularly unpleasant associations of grayish green algae-like slime residue. But then that's probably just me and the majority of readers has attractive associations with "seafoam green".

No, what gets to me is when character A gazes into character B's eyes and notices that somehow the color of those eyes changes with B's emotions. I admit, there are probably people with much more extensive eye gazing experience than me, but I actually have never seen human eyes to spontaneously change color, much less change color based on the owner's mood. I can sort of buy that eye colors look slightly different depending on the light and maybe the surroundings, like if I squint, my own murky grayish blue irises might sometimes look a little bit closer to actual blue, but it's extremely unlikely that they would suddenly appear to be a clear blue, or an actual gray regardless of any mood swings I have. Likewise, I if it isn't an alien with chameleon abilities it's dubious that a character's eyes would suddenly change from "sea green" to "storm gray" and then to "deep blue" -- btw this is an actual example from the a SW story I just read that jarred me into ranting in my blog. The poor character with a lot mutually exclusive eye colors was Obi-Wan, he seems to be popular for that kind of thing.

I really don't get it. Do other people actually perceive eye colors as changing to such a degree? Do authors think it's poetic license, like the phrases that eyes "harden", "darken", "sparkle" or whatever? But then the latter I tend to interpret as a shorthand for the whole facial expressions to change, just centered around a change in the expression of the eyes, It's not like I visualize the actual eyes to get darker literally. Not like when an author tries to tell me that Obi-Wan's eyes were gray then green then blue, and that somehow that also communicates his mood more or less clearly to whoever gazes at him, instead of telling the other that he's wearing some new color-changing contact lenses...

Threaded | Top-Level Comments Only

Well, my eyes appear to change colour depending what colour I'm wearing. The key word there is 'appear', though.

Changing with mood? I'd have said it was biologically impossible.

I don't really have a problem when the description is something like that their clothes, or the light, or whatever bring out the eye color differently, as long as it's within reason. Say from "blue" to "deep blue" or from "light brown" to "amber", anything really that can be seen as a change in degrees. It's really the mood thing that gets me. Well that and extreme changes like from gray-green to deep blue and the like. Also I'm pretty sure poor Obi-Wan wore Jedi beige and brown throughout. In that particular story he didn't even get to undress or have sex for his eye color to change all the time. *g*

My eyes go green when I'm upset. But only because when I'm upset, I've generally been crying, and my eyes are red-lined and so make green in my eyes stand out more.

It is, however, unlike the Mary-Sue sparkle-green-when-angry look, fairly unattractive due to said redness.

Normally my eyes look grey-y/blue-y.

(Icon text taken from a PotC Mary Sue fic)

Heh, cool icon, very fitting. Probably whoever that described would have been better off if he hadn't had to make due with chocolate orbs instead of proper eyes... *g*

If memory serves, the Mary Sue was laying eyes on Captain Jack Sparrow for the first time. I think she had emerald orbs. (I really do hate orbs for eyes. 'Cos you only see that they're orbs when they've been removed from your skull. Not attractive or romantic)

Most people with 'hazel' eyes do have eyes that change colour. Most often it's a matter of greenish to brownish, occasionally including amberish or greyish shades. I have also been acquainted with one woman with blue hazel eyes -- sometimes they were quite blue, sometimes greenish, sometimes grey.

Light conditions, and colours near the person's eyes, do seem to be the main factors in what colour changing-hazel eyes appear. But then it's typical for various emotions to cause someine's eyes and/or pupils to narrow or widen, all of which tends to affect the play of light around the iris; and a variety of emotions can cause someone's skin to flush or pale, which could, conceivably, make the colour of their eyes appear to shift as well.

I'm not saying that those godawful badfic conventions aren't godawful, mind -- I'm just saying that there's (sometimes, plausibly) a reality buried under all that lurid prose.

What Jack said, but really.... *oy*

See, the thing is? What *does* happen a lot is that people *perceive* a change in the color of someone's eyes when *their* mood changes. Like in that moment where the vaguely-cute-but-forgettable person you've been interacting with says or does something so heart-stoppingly wonderful that you wonder how you ever failed to notice... etc.

Nothing has actually *changed*, and we know that, but... we're seeing them differently.

The stuff you describe is one of the things fanfic picked up from romance novel conventions, and I can't help but think the romance novelists picked it up from, well, *that*. And it's a shorthand which has been useful, I suppose, but it means that we, as readers, miss out on a lot of perfectly good schmoopiness.

And all we get in return is "wait, wtf? Weren't his eyes BROWN a second ago?"

Okay, explained like that the mood-color correlation sounds somewhat possible. I mean, I have never noticed it myself, but then I usually don't pay a lot of attention towards eye colors in the first place. I think part of my crankiness with this eye thing is the places it appears in the narratives. If it is the POV of a lovesick teenager I can buy the purple prose descriptions of changing eye colors, or maybe in a first time scene with a besotted character, then I don't mind so much as long as it isn't too repetitive throughout the story. However for example the SW story that annoyed me with its eye fixation was a gen action-adventure story, and I found it really jarring that a number of different characters would notice Obi-Wan's eyes in excruciating detail, sometimes during fight scenes no less.

I'm actually more tolerant when it's a romance story, though I also think that this kind of shorthand cheats the reader sometimes out of more engaging and original descriptions. In that way it kind of reminds me of a lot common fanfic shortcut conventions, like it drove me nuts that in Sentinel fanfic the senses were far too often just "dialed up/down" like a tv set instead of an actual *sensual* description of the enhanced senses and their effects. The thing is, the story I was thinking about was a gen action-adventure, and poor Obi-Wan never even got to have any romance, and still both Qui-Gon and Xanatos had this... *thing* about his eyes.

...and as far as Obi-Wan goes, I can't believe people were pulling that with him. But for me? Everyone that knows me in rl--knows me, knows me, not just would recognize me on the street--uses my eye color as a freaking mood ring. It's really rather frustrating, becuase it's impossible for me to hide anything, cause they'll just take hold of my chin, stare a minute, and say, "Allright, what's wrong, why are you depressed/angry/hurt?"
The base color is hazel, and they turn to green, gold-brown, chocolate, or even almost-blue, according to the people that use them as a barometer.
I may just be weird, but that's reality for me, not poetic licence.
Another thing specifically with comic characters, we have all these pictures of them with different colored eyes, and when the color-shifts within a single issue look mood-related, it's easy to take that as _canon_ and run with it.

Wow. From chocolate to almost-blue? Now I'm really curious how this works with your eyes/irises. Also, not related to eyes, I can't believe someone would just take hold of your chin uninvited like that... that's kind of rude, isn't it? Even if they know you well. At least outside of intimate situations or something like that. I mean, maybe it's a cultural thing, but not even my closest friends and family members would just touch my face like that, and haven't since my early adolescence.

I would love to know how my eyes work. I don't think they've ever shifted directly from chocolate to blue, because the emotions are so far apart, but i suppose if I got flip-flopped between joy and despair quickly enough, it could happen.

*shrugs* It may be a little rude, but I guess I'm used to it. Mother doesn't so much anymore, she'll just get to where she can see, but my Dom--who I can't exactly tell no--and my two best female friends pretty much have carte blanche. We're a very touch-oriented bunch, so it doesn't shock or bother me. Which culture? I'm curious. Me, I'm a very odd midwesterner.

I'm from Hamburg, in Northern Germany.

What is it with fanfic and weird eye descriptions?

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

I don't know about other people....

Re: I don't know about other people....

Re: I don't know about other people....

Re: I don't know about other people....