Fans of Vicomte Raoul de Chagny

AO3 has been running a meta-essay compilation by writers in the "Phantom of the Opera" fandom where they are given the chance to 'expound' on writing POTO fan-fiction. Some of the questions... reveal quite a lot about the assumptions being made :-D

I sent in a submission last week, but as I haven't received any acknowledgement and the compilation hasn't been updated since the 29th of October, it looks as if it either wasn't deemed suitable or wasn't received -- I rather suspect that this work is based around a Tumblr-centric group expecting submissions via that route, and that the alternative email contact given simply isn't being monitored.

Anyway, I spent several days writing it and then editing it down (and toning down some of my views for Erik-fans' benefit), so here it is my essay, for what it's worth.