A fanfiction format in which 'you,' the reader, are written directly into the story as a character, often paired romantically with a canon character.
REAL-WORLD EXAMPLE
"The Tumblr blog posted a reader-insert imagine where 'you' end up stranded on tour with the whole band."
LORE & ORIGIN
Earlier than commonly assumed: an archived reader-insert/self-insert fic community on FanFiction.net dates to April 1999 (Star Trek fandom). The format was common enough on Quizilla by the mid-2000s that it got banned from FanFiction.net in 2005, then was popularized to mass scale via Tumblr 'imagines' starting around 2010, notably boosted by the One Direction/bandom fandom. Japanese fandom has a parallel tradition known as 'yume' (dream fiction).
EQUIVALENT CONCEPTS IN OTHER LANGUAGES
MENTIONS OVER TIME
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