Die Wachen

Ah Mublbu

2010-05-15T20:43:00.000-06:00

by J.E. Remy

You’re sleeping soundly as the first rays of the day start to crawl across the sheets. (Soft curves and tantalizing shadows.) Your breath is too soft to hear as the light runs its fingers through auburn hair. (Your fingers tucked neatly under pillows.) I kiss your cheek and whisper, “I love you.” You shift lightly and whisper back. (Quiet words meant only for me.) “Ah muvlbu,” you mumble incoherently.

I want a TARDIS. I want a dimensionally transcendental space/time vehicle with a library the size of a small city, and a broken chameleon circuit. I want a place to call our own, with plenty of room, that still fits tidily in the corner. I want to take you to places you’ve never been, to re-remember the past, check in on the future, and get lost along the way.

Things move so fast when you don’t quite know where you’re headed. It’s as if having a destination provides a timeline... or an escape plan. I don’t know where we’ll end up. I don’t know if we’ll run out of gas getting there. But you keep holding my hand, and promising it’ll turn out just fine. So, I’ll just keep hoping you can read the map better than me.

Three Steps

2009-09-22T00:00:00.000-06:00

by J.E. Remy

Three steps was all it took to realize she wouldn't be going in her apartment, the dog wouldn't be going out, and there would inevitably be a puddle waiting for her when she got inside. In those three steps, she knew she wouldn't be answering the phone ringing in the bedroom, and going to get coffee would have to wait for another day. In three little steps, she would finally be forced to introduce herself to the neighbors, and suffer the embarrassment of depending on strangers. Three steps from her car--and she knew she'd locked the keys inside.

An Open Letter to Planned Parenthood Federation of America

2009-05-27T15:21:00.005-06:00

I recently received a letter from Cecile Richards, President of the Planned Parenthood Federation of America. This letter appeared to endorse President Obama’s nomination of Judge Sonia Sotomayor. I appreciate the precedent such a nomination has the possibility of creating, nevertheless Planned Parenthood is blatantly disregarding its goal of leading the reproductive rights movement by endorsing Judge Sotomayor.

Judge Sotomayor made it clear she does not support the reproductive rights of women in her 2002 decision of Center for Reproductive Law and Policy v. Bush. In this decision, Sotomayor supported the Bush administration policy of denying family planning funds to foreign organizations that perform or promote abortions. Sotomayor stated, “the government is free to favor the anti-abortion position over the pro-choice position, and can do so with public funds.”

Planned Parenthood claims to believe in the fundamental right of each individual, throughout the world, to manage his or her fertility, regardless of the individual's income, marital status, race, ethnicity, sexual orientation, age, national origin, or residence. As such, Planned Parenthood should be ethically opposed to Sotomayor’s nomination.

If Planned Parenthood intends to continue advocating public policies and endorsing public figures which guarantee reproductive rights and ensure access to such services, I would encourage Cecile Richards to reverse her endorsement of Judge Sonia Sotomayor. Now is the time to apply pressure to Congress and President Obama, to provide a nomination that will achieve the historic qualities of his current nominee, without taking a step back in promoting human rights.

(Submit your concerns and ask Cecile Richards and Planned Parenthood to reverse their endorsement of Judge Sonia Sotomayor by emailing Planned Parenthood at pponline@ppfa.org or calling 212-541-7800 or 202-973-4800)

5 Questions for President-Elect Obama's Transition Team

2008-12-10T17:40:00.006-07:00

by J.E. Remy

The Bush Administration misled congress regarding Iraq, condoned torture of prisoners, spied on Americans, and refused to comply with subpoenas. Will an investigation into potential war crimes be held? Will Bush be given amnesty for his actions?
Civil unions may provide rights similar to marriage, but segregation ensures differences between hetero- & homosexual partnerships--assigning same sex-couples second-class status. Will President Obama end separate-but-equal treatment of same-sex couples?
While it's critical to promote policies that help prevent unintended pregnancies and make abortion less necessary, how will the Obama administration ensure the right to a safe, legal abortion is made more accessible and unrestricted?
The past several months have made it clear that religious ceremony and tradition is marginalizing and repressing civil marriage for many citizens. How can church and state be separated in civil marriages--both opposite and same-sex?
President-Elect Obama opposed the Protect America Act, but voted for retroactive amnesty to telecoms providing warrantless wiretapping. Will other organizations that assisted Bush in illegal activities receive amnesty to restore stability and ensure intelligence?

(Vote on these and other questions, or submit your own and be part of solving our country's challenges at the Change.gov "Open Government: Open for Questions" feature)

(Update 12/12/08: This edition of Open for Questions has come to a close, but all the submitted questions and votes are archived here.)

Preface to sine cera: What I Think People Think About

2008-12-09T12:01:00.003-07:00

by J.E. Remy

Published in:
sine cera: What I Think People Think About

This year a star 40 times bigger than our sun appeared in the night sky. Billions of years ago, the star exploded in a gamma ray burst powerful enough to vaporize any planet nearby. Only now is its light reaching us--the most distant object visible to the naked eye. And, as our eyes are able to see across the universe, creations built by our hands stretch across the solar system: the MESSENGER space probe reached Mercury, the Phoenix spacecraft landed on Mars, and the first privately developed space vehicle went into Earth orbit.

Over the past year we've heard messages of hope and change, and we've experienced building feelings of dread and frustration. The unknown effects of the Large Hadron Collider created a sense of unease, but tests ultimately failed to work. Benazir Bhutto was assassinated in Pakistan. Hurricanes Gustav, Hanna and Ike threatened coastlines, and a series of tornadoes struck the Southern United States as primary elections began. The wars in Iraq and Afghanistan continue. And the U.S. has plunged into recession, beginning a world economic crisis where Americans worry about stock and gas prices, while cost and unavailability of food are triggering riots and unrest in many third world nations.

Even so, we are unwilling to accept the dark clouds hovering over us--and we shouldn’t. The world’s largest high-energy particle accelerator is being repaired and promises to answer questions about the birth of our universe. The first operations using bionic eyes took place in London. The Kivu war ended in the Congo. Bhutan held its first ever general elections. Bill Gates left his day-to-day position at Microsoft to focus on philanthropic efforts. We’ve seen and participated in protests for equal rights, marching through the streets of Salt Lake City. And we’ve elected the first African-American President of the United States, based on his economic platform, and his promise to refocus our efforts in Iraq and Afghanistan. We’re living in a paradoxical world--one frustrated by the past and present, but tenaciously hopeful for the future.

This edition of sine cera is marked by that paradox. The DiverseCity Writing Series anthology has always been a collection of writing from people living in the Salt Lake community, but now these people are speaking their minds in an attempt to change their world. Frustrations are being aired, sometimes with angry words and strong language. And dreams are beginning to surface through the clouds of memory and imagination. A dialogue has started, with no end in sight.

Included are stories of reflection and regret, fear and hostility, aliens and the alienated, desire and disenchantment. You’ll find tales of heartache, manipulation and loneliness, but you’ll also find fond memories, achievements and magic. I invite you to join this community, and welcome you to share the thoughts in this collection: sine cera: What I Think People Think About.

The preceding essay is the preface to the eleventh DiverseCity Writing Series anthology, sine cera: What I Think People Think About. The DiverseCity Writing Series is a community writing program offered through the SLCC Community Writing Center. This program offers multiple, on-going writing groups throughout the Salt Lake metropolitan area. These open-interest and specialized groups offer inspiration through feedback and writing prompts. And, twice a year, they offer their writers the opportunity to achieve publication through the sine cera anthology, with selections from the publication read at a public reading.

To listen to a KCPW podcast of the December 2008 reading, visit www.kcpw.org/article/7087.

For more information about the SLCC Community Writing Center, visit www.slcc.edu/cwc.

For more information about the DiverseCity Writing Series and sine cera, visit www.slcc.edu/cwc/dws.

Another Open Letter to President-Elect Obama and Vice President-Elect Biden

2008-11-20T17:10:00.003-07:00

by J.E. Remy

On November 6th, I wrote to express my appreciation for President-Elect Obama and Vice President-Elect Biden’s plan to bring about change. I am pleased to see the civil rights agenda has been expanded to include support for the LGBT community. It is exciting to see your support for full civil unions and the welfare of all citizens, while opposing unfair policies and the constitutional ban on same-sex marriage.

Providing such rights for couples is a welcome start, and can begin to turn around many of the discriminatory laws and practices currently plaguing the LGBT community. However, even if this goal is met, there will continue to be separate-but-equal treatment of same-sex couples. Full civil unions may provide legal rights and privileges equal to marriage, but a system segregated to ensure noted differences between heterosexual and homosexual partnerships will continue to assign same sex-couples to a second-class status.

Equal marriage for all citizens, no matter their sexual orientation, is the only way to ensure complete equality. As I mentioned in my previous letter, there is no reason a civil agreement needs to suffer from the marginalizing repression of religious ceremony. Separate church and state, and legalize same-sex marriage.

(Submit your ideas and be part of solving our country's challenges at Change.gov)

The Tiresomely Offensive Martyr Stance of the Mormon Church

2008-11-16T22:15:00.009-07:00

by J.E. Remy

I recently finished reading an article published by the Deseret News entitled “Heroes and Victims in the Prop. 8 Struggle.” In it, Orson Scott Card adamantly argues a subject on which he readily admits to not having done any research. If that isn’t enough, he irresponsibly tries to pass email spam as factual news. All this while presenting the now tiresomely offensive martyr stance being taken by members of the Mormon church. In case it isn’t clear for any LDS church members: you are not being targeted, you are being asked to answer for your support of sexual segregation through a modern version of anti-miscegenation law.

The fact that Mormons are a small percentage of the voters in California is a large part of the concern regarding the LDS church’s involvement with Proposition 8. Despite a small population, Mormons were 80% to 90% of the early canvassers in election precincts. Funds for the Proposition 8 campaign are now estimated at $40 million, with Mormons from around the nation providing as much as $22 million in support of a California proposition—over half of the funds used in the campaign. By a narrow margin of 52%, Proposition 8 succeeded, now citizens are using their democratic rights of free speech and peaceful assembly to finally let their voices be heard.

Contributions of individual members were used to drown out those voices during the vote, but it is becoming clear that the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints directly donated a significant amount to the Proposition 8 campaign. The LDS Church only reported a single contribution of between $2000 and $5000, while actively encouraging church members to donate and support. However, the church also organized phone banks, news releases, direct mailers, door-to-door canvassing, speakers, distribution of campaign materials, and transportation of leaders and representatives, in addition to producing at least 9 commercials, 4 broadcasts and 2 satellite simulcasts over 5 western states in support of Proposition 8. If any of this was used to contact non-members, it is considered a campaign contribution and must be reported under the Political Reform Act of 2007. A complaint regarding this has already been sent to the California Fair Political Practices Commission.

As I mentioned in my open letter to the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, it’s true, the church is not alone in their support for this bill, there’s a long list of contributors to the campaign from a variety of religions and cultural backgrounds. Still, the Mormon church was the leading contributor in ensuring voters were manipulated into supporting a law with no secular purpose, to advance the position of their religion and foster excessive government entanglement with Christian beliefs. In doing so, they ignored their own religious tenants by interfering with the functions of state and manipulating law rather than obeying, honoring and sustaining it. For this, they should be ashamed. Nevertheless, distracting ourselves with why Proposition 8 passed ignores the heart of why so many individuals across the nation are now fighting for equal marriage rights.

Marriage is one of the basic civil rights of our society. To deny this fundamental freedom on so unsupportable a basis as religious tradition and the advancement of hetero-normative practices embodied in laws denying equal marriage--classifications directly subversive of the principle of equality--is surely to ignore citizens of liberty and due process of law. The freedom of choice to marry must not be restricted by invidious discrimination against particular sexual orientations. The freedom to marry, or not to marry, another person should reside with the individual and not be infringed upon by the State.

(Leave your feedback regarding Orson Scott Card’s article at http://www.nauvoo.com/contact_desnews.html or by writing Card directly at http://www.hatrack.com/contact.shtml. Submit your concerns regarding the inaccuracy and offensive nature of this article to the Deseret News at http://mormontimes.com/contact/? or by writing Mormon Times Editor David Schneider at daves@desnews.com.)

(11/23: Since writing this letter, it has been revealed that the LDS Church not only had a leading role in Proposition 8's success, but has been instrumental in fighting against women's rights world-wide. I also discovered a 1992 article by Dallen H. Oaks warning Mormons to "expect the same broad latitude of discussion of their views that conventionally applies to everyone else’s participation in public policy debates... opinions on the application of moral questions to specific legislation will inevitably be challenged by and measured against secular-based legislative or political judgments.")

An Open Letter to the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints

2008-11-08T18:20:00.012-07:00

by J.E. Remy

I would like to acknowledge your claim that the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is being singled out for speaking up as part of its democratic right in a free election. You seem to suggest that--because many others from outside your faith supported Proposition 8--it is erroneous to point out that the LDS church was a leader in treating a marginalized group as second-class citizens, as you pushed to have their rights stripped from them. Now, since your financing and lobbying for discriminatory laws has been revealed, you seem surprised by those using their democratic rights of free speech and peaceful assembly to express their frustration.

Primarily, I find it concerning that the LDS church believes it has any right to support a religiously-biased proposition through free election. Mormon citizens may have the right to vote in such an election, but a church does not. According to the Supreme Court, a law which has no secular purpose, advances religion, or fosters excessive government entanglement with religion, is unconstitutional. Further, your own religious texts claim there should be “no church interference with the functions of state.” Your religious laws make you subject to “presidents, rulers and magistrates, in obeying, honouring, and sustaining law.” How could the LDS church find it in any way appropriate to support the removal of civil rights from a people, let alone encourage and pressure church members to do so?

It’s true, the LDS church is not alone in their support for this bill, there’s a long list of contributors to the campaign. However, Mormon leadership has blatantly stated same-sex partnerships are unnatural and contrary to the will of God, and actively encouraged church members to support Proposition 8. Despite the minimal "official" financial contribution from the Church itself, it is now estimated that Mormons provided $22 million in support of Proposition 8--77% of the funds used in the campaign. Church leaders also asked congregations and students attending church-owned universities to commit to volunteering in support of the proposition, and when asking didn’t work, threats were used.

You are not being singled out--your actions were clear, you are now being asked to defend them. Your efforts succeeded in purchasing a vote which will promote economic hardship for families during a world-wide recession. Your efforts ensured the manipulation of well-meaning voters into promoting further sexual discrimination and religious intolerance. Your efforts will prevent loving and monogamous families from a legal union in an equal marriage, all in the name of God.

Stop acting like a targeted group, and start answering to the group you targeted.

(Submit your concerns and ask the LDS Church to defend their actions by emailing their Los Angeles Public Affairs department at AtkinsonKJ@ldschurch.org)

(11/16: Since writing this letter, funds for the Proposition 8 campaign are now estimated at $40 million--with Mormons contributing over half of campaign funds; the LDS church appears to have dramatically under-reported their contribution; an internal memo from the LDS church demonstrates a Mormon agenda to fight GLBT rights going back as far as 1997; and the Mormon victim stance continues.)

An Open Letter to President-Elect Obama and Vice President-Elect Biden

2008-11-06T23:07:00.005-07:00

by J.E. Remy

I would like to express my appreciation for President-Elect Obama and Vice President-Elect Biden’s decision to challenge the status quo in Washington, and bring about the kind of change America needs. However, I am certainly not alone in my concern that while this agenda has a comprehensive range of issues, it is notably light regarding those related to sexuality and gender identity. Civil rights protecting the safety of citizens (through the expansion of the Matthew Shepard Act) and combating unfair employment practices (through the Employment Non-Discrimination Act) is a welcome start, but it simply isn’t enough.

In the wake of an exciting and historical election, same-sex partnerships have experienced an even greater level of sexual discrimination. Among the rights refused or stripped from such partnerships is that of an equal marriage. Beyond the emotional impact of such inequality, the refusal to provide the right of marriage to all consenting adult partners creates an economic hardship for these families. Yet, medical expenses, the cost of multiple familial units, higher taxes and insurance cost, and estate taxes are only the beginning.

The separate-but-equal policies disallowing the union of a loving and monogamous family assigns same sex-couples to a second-class status. By ignoring the fact that sexuality is genetic and unchangeable (in favor for an argument of tradition and religious intolerance), our government is suggesting same-sex partnerships are unnatural and contrary to the will of God. No anti-discrimination act or legal protection can ensure the welfare of a people dismissed as less-than-human.

It is time for our government to clearly establish equality in civil marriage. There is no reason a civil agreement needs to suffer from the marginalizing repression of religious ceremony. Separate church and state, and legalize same-sex marriage.

(Submit your ideas and be part of solving our country's challenges at Change.gov)

(11/20: Since writing this letter, President-Elect Obama and Vice President-Elect Biden have expanded the Civil Rights section of Change.gov to include support for the LGBT community!)

In the Mood For Love

2008-09-01T12:00:00.000-06:00

by J.E. Remy

"Don't go." His voice was shaky. She paused just outside the door. She wouldn't look at him--at the tears welling, the broken slump of shoulders, the jaw gripped behind quivering lips.

"Please, don't go." A sharp intake of breath, barely holding him together. She wanted to turn around.

"Please." She wanted to turn, but she'd heard the words before. And she wouldn't stay if he wasn't willing to go.

A Little Loud

2008-07-19T01:47:00.009-06:00

by J.E. Remy

They’re the same magazines I always pick up—Fangoria, Rue Morgue, Sci Fi and Doctor Who Magazines—and, as I close the last one, I’ve realized three things:

1) There is nothing new in horror or science fiction, and only minute amounts of anything that could be considered “good.”

2) Call me a dork, but I can’t wait for Russell Davies to give up the reigns and let Steven Moffat bring Doctor Who back to the quality it deserves. And…

3) I’m going to kill that kid.

The kid screaming at the top of his lungs, as if there’s some jungle gym in the children’s book section. The kid cackling like a madman at something that cannot possibly be that funny. The kid who paces these interruptions to my reading in such a way that, every two minutes or so, a maddening wail causes the base of my skull to vibrate and the non-violent part of my brain to go a little numb.

I stand up sharply, and head toward the latest shriek. I immediately find the brat, playing with one of the randomly placed temporary-childcare-while-you-shop toy sets scattered about the children’s section. Currently he’s invading his brother’s stack of blocks with a toy train and, for a minute, I doubt myself.

These can’t be the kids, I think, their mother’s right there. Alright, whatever. If they’re gonna shut up… And I head over to the graphic novels, hoping there’s a copy of the final installment of Y: The Last Man. As I get a little giddy from the sight of “Volume 10,” a flying locomotive roars, crashing into the alphabet-block bunker of a screaming banshee. The cover squeaks a little in my hand.

“Excuse me,” I’m trying oh-so-hard to remain polite and calm, “they’re being a little loud.”

The six-month pregnant mother of two doesn’t even turn to face me as she replies, “Well, they’re kids.”

I bite my cheek and try again, “And you can hear them on the opposite side of the bookstore.” I turn to leave.

“Are you a parent?” She replies with a tone that suggests being a parent at twenty-three reveals all manner of mysteries, and I am obviously a lesser being for not ignoring the misbehavior of children roughhousing in a late-night bookstore.

“That doesn’t really matter. They’re being too loud.”

“Well, maybe you shouldn’t go to a bookstore with a children’s section.” She spits it at me, with a visceral spite for having the audacity to tell her a bookstore isn’t a playground.

“Well, I live in fucking Utah, so that isn’t really an option.” I say “fucking” just loud enough to be sure the kids hear me. She sticks around just long enough to keep from looking as if it was me who caused them to leave. And the next squeal I hear is the last of the night.

Here’s the thing—when I approach you and let you know your kids are being “a little loud,” I’m giving you a polite hint. It’s a hint that really says, “You seem to lack any sort of discipline with your children, and it’s starting to piss me off. Provide them with a reasonable boundary, shut them up, or return to a location where the rest of civilization doesn’t have to hear the little bastards.” Don’t think their inappropriate behavior is excusable because, well, they're kids. And don’t even consider the thought that your inaction is excusable because I’m not a parent.

The fact is, “parent” is a verb as well as a noun. And just because you pulled out late or squeezed out that screaming spawn, it doesn’t mean you’ve taken the actions of a parent. It doesn’t take a lot of effort to procreate. It happens by accident all the time, and a lot of those folks are better parents than you.

Why? Because they act like parents. And I’m not talking about the constantly pregnant housewife who thinks being a mommy is the greatest gift God could ever give her. I’m not talking about the man who thinks being a daddy means getting a real job and toughening up his boys. I’m not even talking about the nuclear family living in their overpriced, but oh-so-cute, home with their two point five children calling their aristocratic lifestyle “upper-middle class.”

You want to see someone act like a parent? Take a look at the friends, but long-separated parents who work to ensure their child understands she can embrace her dreams. Watch the single father who uses a stern voice and well-defined boundary to end his child’s temper tantrum. Glance at the child-free couple who require better discipline from their cats and dog than you do from your seven-year-old. Turn to the pre-teen forced to grow up too fast, raising her siblings as fast as she can raise herself.

You want to be a mommy? You want to be a daddy? It’s more than just fertilization and feeding. Stop calling yourself a parent, and start acting like it. And, when I politely tell you your kids are being “a little loud,” take the hint.

False Authority

2008-07-09T02:30:00.002-06:00

by J.E. Remy

I hate false authority. I hate that--simply because of a position, a piece of paper or a pompous title--some jackass can take advantage of people without recourse. I hate that the people I would least trust to protect me are the very people who are expected to be leaders in the community. And, most of all, I hate that there’s nothing that can be done about it.

***

“That would be impossible, since I haven’t done anything illegal.”

He stares, equal parts accusatory and annoyed.

“Why would your employer accuse you of something you didn’t do?”

I don’t know. He’s trying to get rid of the last remaining employee who isn’t directly related to him? I’ve been on the job longer than him, and customers prefer to work with me? You wouldn’t believe me anyway, would you?

***

“The court will not provide you with legal representation…”

Can she do that? If I can’t afford it…

“I will, however, allow you 30 days to locate representation…”

How? Didn’t I tell you I don’t have a job. How can I pay them?

“Do you have any questions?”

What did I do to deserve this? How do I make it all go away? Why is no one listening?

“No.”

The Truth of the Matter

2008-07-08T18:11:00.003-06:00

by J.E. Remy

I love teaching writing workshops… Having the chance to learn all I can about a subject, only to find the most concise way to share that knowledge. Finding and creating examples of text to intrigue and inspire. Coming up with a variety of ways to experiment with and practice forms of writing. Helping a group warm-up to each other and the writing process. And then… there's the lying.

My favorite warm-up is asking writers to create three "facts"--two true, one false. Then they share with each other, asking questions and guessing at the truth. As each writer participates, I ask the group to tell the writer what they did well, and what gave the untruth away. Then I give each writer hints on how to better present the "facts." I teach them to be better liars.

Despite mild ethical dilemmas this may cause a few individuals, it's an important lesson. Good writing is a reinterpretation of the "facts." Fiction is storytelling--lies temporarily accepted as truth. Poetry is really a manipulation of audiences, through emotion and sound. Memoirs are published that turn out to be fake, but no autobiographical or biographical work tells the whole truth. Two people with the same work history and experience can have dramatically different resumes, and the one who presents the facts better gets the job. Likewise, the same news story can change as told by NPR, CNN or FOX. And they're all telling the truth. Mostly.

The point is this: when you write, you present the world with your words and experiences only you can see or create. But, to get others to see through your eyes, you have to focus on elements others miss, leave out some details so we can see the forest for the trees, and tell the truth a little slant. You have to bend the facts so others can hear what you're saying. Be honest, but recognize honesty isn't always true. Be true, but know that truth isn't always accurate. Lie a little--it's good for you.

Ghost Calls

2008-07-04T23:11:00.001-06:00

by J.E. Remy

My friends give me a hard time about my seeming inability to answer my cell phone. I figure, there's a chance I might answer, and I almost always call back. I can't be alone in this habit.

Buzzing in pockets--
crowds of people with cell phones.
Many unanswered?

I just prefer to talk on the phone when I know I have a moment to speak, and when I'm not going to be overwhelmed with socialization.

It isn't as if I don't notice my phone ringing. The damn thing goes off all the time. I've started to develop these odd ghost-rings in my leg—right next to where the phone sits in my pocket. Little muscle spasms that feel like the vibrations of my phone. Sometimes my phone isn't even on me, and I instinctively reach for... nothing.

Nothing but spirits.
Calling. Wanting attention.
Leave them unanswered.

The Edge

2008-07-03T23:20:00.001-06:00

by J.E. Remy

Sometimes I make the mistake of looking over the edge.
A cliff, bridge, building or, hell, even a plane.
And, as my eyes glance over the edge,
all I want to do is jump—
let my body step into nothing.
No, that isn't quite right.
It isn't a desire.
My body just...
wants to
fall.

Flash Fiction

2008-07-01T19:50:00.006-06:00

The term “flash fiction” originated in the anthology Flash Fiction (1992) edited by James Thomas, Denise Thomas and Tom Hazuka. When creating the book, the editors looked for stories that would fit on one or two digest magazine-sized pages—making the stories 250 to 750 words in length. These stories contained all the elements of a traditional short story—character, plot, setting, etc.—but were distinctly shorter in word count.

Before and after the publication Flash Fiction, there are several written works shorter than the 3,000 to 17,500 word count of the standard short story. Such short-short stories are now almost universally referred to as “flash fiction,” but they are not exclusively fictional and don’t necessarily follow a strict set of guidelines.

Short-short story. A short-short story is the smallest size a short story can reach before falling into flash fiction territory. These stories are typically between 1,250 and 3,000 words.
Sudden fiction. Sudden fiction fills the gap between the flash fiction limit of 750 words and the short-short starting point of 1,250 words.
Flash fiction. By the strictest, and most traditional standards, a piece of flash fiction has a word count between 250 and 750 words.
Microfiction. Microfiction is a term used to cover anything shorter than traditional flash fiction. By the strictest standards, a piece of microfiction should have a word count below 100 words.
Drabble. A drabble is a piece of microfiction which is exactly 100 words long. The term originated in Monty Python’s Big Red Book (1971), where 2 to 4 players participate in the word game “Drabble.” The players sit from left to right, and the first to write a novel wins. To make it a reasonable game, it was agreed that 100 words would suffice. Since Monty Python’s book, several science fiction organizations have had drabble contests of their own, and variations on the theme have popped up. A double drabble (200 words) is a droubble. Half a drabble (50 words) is a dribble.
69er. 69ers are pieces of microfiction which are exactly 69 words long. Often these pieces are written in threes, with each 69er taking on a similar theme.
Nanofiction. Nanofiction is a piece of microfiction which is exactly 55 words long. The term was coined to refer to the style of microfiction included in Steve Moss’ The World’s Shortest Stories (1998). Like most flash fiction styles, the title of these stories doesn’t include the word count, but it can be no more than 7 words long.
55er. 55ers are pieces of microfiction which are exactly 55 words long. The format for this type of microfiction, however, is very specific. The first line is 10 words long, and each following line should have one fewer words—ending in a one-word line.
Postcard fiction. While often synonymous with “flash fiction,” postcard fiction has been used to describe microfiction of 50 words or less—enough to fit on a postcard. Postcard fiction has also been referred to as thumbnail fiction.
Baby shoes. Baby shoes are a form of microfiction which are exactly 6 words long. The name was coined as a nod toward a piece of flash fiction credited to Ernest Hemmingway: “For sale. Baby shoes. Never worn.”
Vignette. A vignette is a short, impressionistic scene similar to a piece of flash fiction. A vignette, however, requires little or no character development or plot. Rather, it provides a glimpse into a scene or emotion without care for story arc.
Prose poetry. Prose poetry is poetry written without line breaks and in a language closer to speech, but outside of prose literature through the use of heightened imagery, fragmentation, rhyme, as well as metaphorical and emotional language. While not necessarily brief in form, prose poetry is often shorter than a short story, and similar to a piece of flash fiction. In a 1999 Writer’s Chronicle interview, Prose poet Russell Edson addresses the style as such, “The term prose poem at first glance may seem an oxymoron, until one remembers that the opposite of prose is verse. And the opposite of poetry is fiction; that verse itself does not a poem make, nor does prose alone a fiction make. [Pure poetry] is silence. It was fiction that taught poetry how to speak.”
Haibun. Haibun is a Japanese style of prose poetry, typically written in two autobiographical paragraphs followed by a haiku. This, however, isn't a strict rule. The haibun should be written with a blend of haiku poetry and prose written in the spirit of haiku. The length of a haibun is unimportant, so long as it retains the brevity of haiku, with the focus on complimentary enhancement of text through an interaction of poetry and prose.

The word count and style of each type of flash fiction is by no means strict. Various writers and publications have chosen to draw the line for their own preferred type of flash fiction at different counts for different reasons.

In “The Philosophy of Composition,” Edgar Allen Poe described the length of a short story to be “the limit of one sitting… if two sittings be required, the affairs of the world interfere, and everything like totality is at once destroyed.” To him, a sitting could be upwards of an hour. Perhaps the length of a flash story can be described similarly by its Chinese name “smoke-long,” or a story that can be finished in the time it takes to smoke a cigarette.

More Six Word Memoirs

2008-06-24T19:57:00.004-06:00

Yesterday, I took on Alex's 6-word memoir challenge. I'm quite pleased with the result, but had a few other ideas run through my mind before coming to the final decision. So, I figured I'd break down a chronological order of my life in a series of thirty six-word memoirs. They don't necessarily match up on a year-to-year basis, but each one could have been my six-word memoir at some point in my life . . .

Two birds. Both named Pina Colada.

Pirates of the Caribbean. First concussion.

We took him to a farm.

Dad said I was fat. Bastard.

So many moves. So few friends.

Sat on him. Only during Thundercats.

Now scarfs make people look smarter.

The only punch I ever threw.

She was drunk. I was naive.

The river is five feet deep.

She didn't care. Neither did I.

Wheaties and bacon. Radio announcer voice.

It was his heart. Just stopped.

Lifetime of friendship, built through gaming.

Stubborn, almost blind, drill in hand.

Kid in a car. Hit him.

Pasta. Beer. Bought with stolen money.

But the train never reached us.

So, I once killed a man.

Comics to Los Angeles. Wrong turn.

She always thought I was wrong.

Writing life partners, bound by secrets.

Lamb curry, burritos, bad horror movies.

Gave up on love. Then her...

You don't have to stop permanently.

Left the wedding. Then left them.

I'm suffering from burnout. Fuck school.

The first date? It never ended.

And I've never been so happy.

Big dreams. Small budget. Amor fati.

Six Word Memoir

2008-06-23T18:56:00.003-06:00

Big dreams. Small budget. Amor fati.

I'm finally taking on Alex's 6-word memoir challenge. The rules:

Write your own six word memoir.
Post it on your blog and include a visual illustration if you’d like.
Link to the person that tagged you in your post and to this original post if possible so we can track it as it travels across the blogosphere.
Tag five more blogs with links.
And don’t forget to leave a comment on the tagged blogs with an invitation to play!

Now to find five unsuspecting victims... hmm....

I challenge Loren, Justin, Christina, Chanel, and Carrie.

The Room

2008-06-01T09:33:00.004-06:00

by J.E. Remy

A door slams, and a man enters the stage having just left a room. Rubbing his face in frustration, he walks briskly to center stage. He glances back toward the room, ready to burst in yelling, but stops himself. Beat.

MAN: I won’t go back in there. I don’t care if . . .

He catches his breath, taking a moment to calm himself down before continuing.

MAN: You know the first memory I have of him?

We’re at this amusement park or carnival or something. We’d spent the day eating junk food and laughing ‘til our sides hurt. Pizza and cotton candy, those--what’re they called? (spins his finger around for a moment) Funnelcakes? Ring-toss and rollercoasters, those squirt guns where you shoot at the clown’s nose until something buzzes and you win a prize worth less than you paid to play the game. A lot of this is a blur now, but I can still taste the cotton candy on my lips.

So the night’s getting close to an end, and he’s all sorts of excited to take me on this ride. I don’t really know what it is, but it’s important to him--something he went on when he was a kid.

Anyway, I’m on his shoulders--can’t be more than four--and we’re running to get on this ride before it closes. The line has this wooden covering, I dunno why. But we fit perfectly beneath it. We’re twisting back and forth through this thing like nobody’s business. Not a soul ahead of us. He isn’t paying attention to anything but getting there. So, he doesn’t notice as my hands grip his ears just a bit tighter. ‘Cause, ya’ see, the entrance to the ride is lower than the passage. And he doesn’t notice. And I grip his ears to warn him, but my little voice doesn’t even squeak. And he rushes through the doorway.

And I blackout.

Three stitches and a nasty scrape across my cheek. Look, right here. (Points to his forehead.) There’s still a bit of a scar.

Looking toward the room, he continues.

MAN: Later that night, we sat in that room. I was holding a bag of ice to my forehead, hand over my eyes, just waiting for it to stop hurting. And he kept asking me to let him see it. Like he cared more about how bad it looked than . . .

He again glances at the room, angrily pointing at it.

MAN: I won’t go back in there. He can stay in there and rot. Isn’t as if he was ever there for me.

(A memory visibly strikes him.) Ah! So, fresh out of Junior High, awkward as can be, but damn can I write. Get awarded this “English Honors Society” thing. I don’t really know what it is, but it sounds big, and smart, and I don’t really care if nobody else thinks it’s as important as I do. It makes me feel just a little . . . more. For just a minute, I’m gonna be up on stage. For just a minute, what I’m doing’s gonna matter.

Anyway, the day comes for my award. Names are being called, certificates handed out. He’s nowhere in sight.

And I’m okay with that.

They’re going alphabetically, so I know it’s getting close. And the tension is building in my gut--but it’s a good sort of feeling, ya’ know? And just when I’m sure my name is going to be next, a door opens at the end of the auditorium. Loud enough to echo a bit. And he comes strollin’ in, laughing and whispering with his buddy. They sit in the back, and just keep talking. I don’t even know if they saw me accept the certificate . . .

(Beat.)

I just wanted to disappear.

(Beat.)

He kept that certificate. Said he was proud of me and stuck it on the wall with a thumbtack. Proud of me. Like he had any . . . .

For a moment, he looks ready to cry, but he breathes deep, gives the world a broken smile, and continues.

MAN: It was like when he forced me to play baseball. I’d stand in the outfield and cover my face with the glove.

(He lifts his hand to his face.)

Stare through the cracks between the leather fingers, pretend the world had gone away.

(He lowers his hand, and the façade has left.)

Of course he hated it when I did that. Supposed to “keep my head in the game” or some shit.

Pausing, he listens to the silence.

MAN: He’s stopped wheezing. That’s good.

(Beat.)

I burned the certificate. Guess where?

(He points to the room accusingly.)

He was telling me he’s sorry. Saying something about how he knew he hadn’t been the best of fathers, and tearing up just a little for effect. The whole time that damned certificate’s staring at me. Has this awful stain on its side. Faded so much I can’t even recognize my name. And he says it again--says he’s proud of me.

So I burn it.

I tear it off the wall, and light it on fire. And for just a minute, he shuts up. For just a minute, what I’m doing matters.

But then he’s yelling, turning red, reaching for the thing like I took his favorite toy away. And then he just . . . stops, grabs his arm and looks up at me--helpless. He’s whispering something, trying to ask me . . .

I just cover my face with my hand.

(Lifts his hand to his face.)

Stare through the cracks between my fingers.

And watch him fade away.

(Beat.)

I won’t go back in there.

Preface to sine cera: Saturday

2008-05-31T16:41:00.003-06:00

by J.E. Remy

Published in:
sine cera: Saturday

The DiverseCity Writing Series bridges the Salt Lake community’s diverse social, economic and educational backgrounds through writing, collaboration and dialogue.
—DiverseCity Writing Series Mission Statement

This year, the SLCC Community Writing Center re-worked the DiverseCity Writing Series (DWS) mission statement. We wanted to better define the purpose of the DWS, and provide a framework for current and future DWS programs. With that in mind, I took a look at our publication, sine cera.

The book you’re currently holding has an unusual name—one often mispronounced and inevitably begging the question, “What does that mean?”

The phrase, sine cera (pronounced “sin-ah care-ah”) is Latin for “without wax.” The story goes that dishonest or untalented sculptors in ancient Rome or Greece covered flaws in marble and pottery with wax. To demonstrate a quality product, honest sculptors labeled their creations “sine cera”—indicating a piece with flaws left uncovered. The term, sine cera, became synonymous with such honest presentation, that it eventually became the root of the word “sincere.”

It’s a fantastic story. And also a false one. More likely, the word “sincere” is derived from the Latin sincerus, meaning “pure.” If that isn’t enough, the Oxford English Dictionary says “there is no probability” in the “without wax” story being true.

The purpose of this anthology is to provide a public space for people that might otherwise not be heard. We chose sine cera to demonstrate the sincerity of their words and honestly present them. And now we find this meaning to be a myth. But what better way to bridge social, economic and educational backgrounds? Myths, such as the one created here, present universal meaning through their perception and misperceptions, through narrative and symbolism. In some ways, myth can bring us closer to truth.

This DiverseCity Writing Series anthology is a collection of writing from people living in the Salt Lake community. In the spirit of the sine cera myth, we choose to print the words with limited edits. The title and the words included in the anthology, are labeled “sine cera” to indicate how these flaws have been left uncovered. You’ll find mistakes in this book, if only in the title itself. But you’ll also find sincerity in the words and an honest presentation of each writer’s ideas, memories, dreams and experiences. They aren’t always factual, but they are always sincere. They might be true, but they aren’t always accurate.

Included are stories of families and familiars, veterans and missionaries, students and customers, heroes and saviors. You’ll find tales of drinking, prayer, sex, love, nature, nightmares, offense and inspiration. I invite you to join this community, and welcome you to share the sincere expression in this collection: sine cera: Saturday.

The preceding essay is the preface to the tenth DiverseCity Writing Series anthology, sine cera: Saturday. The DiverseCity Writing Series is a community writing program offered through the SLCC Community Writing Center. This program offers multiple, on-going writing groups throughout the Salt Lake metropolitan area. These open-interest and specialized groups offer inspiration through feedback and writing prompts. And, twice a year, they offer their writers the opportunity to achieve publication through the sine cera anthology.

View the cover art for this edition of sine cera at http://alexremy.com/2008/05/recently-finished-saturday.html.

For more information about the SLCC Community Writing Center, visit www.slcc.edu/cwc.

For more information about the DiverseCity Writing Series and sine cera, visit www.slcc.edu/cwc/dws.

Preface to sine cera: Two Old Guys From Brooklyn

2008-05-30T16:37:00.004-06:00

by J.E. Remy

Published in:
sine cera: Two Old Guys From Brooklyn

There’s something about writing that draws people together. Sure, it may sound romantic to find a little pond in Massachusetts, hide from the world for a couple of years, and write a series of short stories... or a manifesto. But, the truth of the matter is, nobody writes alone—and tax collectors will inevitably find you.

Writing is an expression of ideas, memories, dreams and experiences. And what are we if not a collection of these things? So we express ourselves, for whatever reason, and present the world with a piece from our collection. Different people get the chance to see these pieces at different times: some help along the way, some experience them along with us, and some must wait until the work is complete. In time, communities are built around our words—intentionally or not.

Over the past six months, writers in the DiverseCity Writing Series have composed many pieces that might have otherwise been left unheard. In this volume, you will find selections of their completed work: letters to those we love and those we struggle to understand, stories of our children (both human and the furrier variety), tales to enlighten and entertain, snapshots of life (some more unusual than others), and thoughts on aging, our bodies and ourselves.

I invite you to join this community, and welcome you to share the experiences in this collection: sine cera: Two Old Guys From Brooklyn.

The preceding essay is the preface to the ninth DiverseCity Writing Series anthology, sine cera: Two Old Guys From Brooklyn. The DiverseCity Writing Series is a community writing program offered through the SLCC Community Writing Center. This program offers multiple, on-going writing groups throughout the Salt Lake metropolitan area. These open-interest and specialized groups offer inspiration through feedback and writing prompts. And, twice a year, they offer their writers the opportunity to achieve publication through the sine cera anthology.

View the cover art for this edition of sine cera at http://alexremy.com/2007/11/recently-finished-two-old-guys-from.html.

For more information about the SLCC Community Writing Center, visit www.slcc.edu/cwc.

For more information about the DiverseCity Writing Series and sine cera, visit www.slcc.edu/cwc/dws.

She Stopped

2008-04-07T12:21:00.008-06:00

by J.E. Remy

Published in:
Nothing But Red

In the time of creation, seven angels came forth from the body of God. Melek Ta'us, the first of these angels, was also the first to fall from God’s grace. But Melek repented for his sin, crying for seven thousand years. His tears flooded hell, dampening the flames, and the greatest of the angels was forgiven.

It was Melek who gave the breath of life to Adam, pulling him to his feet and pointing him toward the sun. “There is something far greater than you,” he whispered in the first man’s ear. “Pray each day to the sun, as a symbol of your creator—Nivêja berîspêdê, Nivêja rojhilatinê, Nivêja nîvro, Nivêja êvarî, Nivêja rojavabûnê. Do this for our god, and he will bless you with many children.”

And so, Shehid ben Jer was born, the first of Adam’s line. From him came the Yazidi—followers of the path, those descended from God, and the carriers of Melek Ta'us’ divine wisdom. Their line was pure, a line that should never break.

But Du'aa fell in love with Muhannad. And Muhannad was not a descendent of Shehid. His people were Sunni—people of the example, the community of Islam. They claimed Melek was a devil.

Yesterday, Du'aa and Muhannad sat in the olive grove together, where they talked of marriage. Today, Muhannad sat in prison, and Du'aa could hear Uncle Salim outside the sheikh’s home, yelling amidst the sound of gunfire. She was sent to the sheikh’s home for protection. As rocks cracked against the door and shattered window frames, she wondered if he could protect her. Her uncle wanted her dead—cleansed for the family’s honor—even if he had to kill the sheikh to reach her.

Du'aa pushed herself closer to the wall, clutching her knees. The sheikh glanced at her from across the room. The greatest of the angels could be forgiven, but not this girl.

“Your father should have taken care of this,” the sheikh shifted to look out the window just as a stone crashed through the frame. A sliver of glass stung his cheek and reddened his face. He rushed to Du'aa’s side, and grabbed her by the hair. “When a father kills his daughter, it breaks his heart,” he pulled her to the door, her legs slipping out from beneath her as she cried out—more in fear than pain. He cracked the door open, barely wide enough to shove her through, and locked it behind her. “But it is your family’s obligation. Not mine.”

Outside, the mob seemed to be made of thousands. Du'aa could see her uncle, her cousins, people she worshipped alongside. Hamko was the first to reach her. Yanking her from the doorway, he nearly crushed her neck beneath his arm. She gasped for breath as he pulled her into the crowd and toward the marketplace.

Police and armed Peshmerga soldiers stood by, doing nothing.

They reached the market and his grip loosened enough for her to let out a scream. When she breathed in again, there was blood.

A stone cut across her lip, another splintered the bones in her foot. She felt her shirt tear as they stripped her of her dignity, leaving her almost naked. Another stone struck mid-torso, knocking the breath from her. And one of the attackers tossed her a loose covering to hide her shame, before kicking her side with steel-tipped boots.

For thirty minutes it continued, blood stinging her eyes as she cried for help—receiving taunts in return. Stones bruised flesh, tore skin, and shattered bone. And, as Du'aa struggled to stand, Cousin Araas placed all of his hatred in a final blow. Her skull cracked. Her spine broke. She stopped trying to stand. She stopped crying out. She stopped breathing.

She stopped.

They continued.

They dragged her limp form to the rubbish pit at the edge of Basshiqa, her body shredded against the ground. The flames took a minute to grow. A dog yelped as they snapped its neck, adding the filth to her glowing corpse. Everyone needed to see her worthlessness. Everyone needed to know of her love.

The greatest of the angels was forgiven. But not Du'aa Khalil.

A year ago today, the events described in the above story took place. Today, this story was published in Nothing But Red, an anthology created in response to the death of Du'aa Khalil Aswad and issues raised by Joss Whedon in his essay "Let's Watch a Girl Get Beaten To Death." Nothing But Red is available through Lulu.com at www.lulu.com/nothingbutred. If you enjoyed this story and would like to see others like it, or if you would simply like to support a good cause, I would encourage you to purchase Nothing But Red. All profits obtained for the book will be donated to Equality Now, an organization founded in 1992 to work for the protection and promotion of the human rights of women around the world. You can also donate directly to Equality Now at www.equalitynow.org/english/support/support_en.html.

For more information about Equality Now, visit www.equalitynow.org.

For more information about Nothing But Red, visit nothingbutred.wordpress.com.

Sexist, Degrading, Bullshit IV: "Child-Men"

2008-01-29T22:05:00.000-07:00

It’s not uncommon for Neil Conan to be an ass, or for Talk of the Nation to feature someone with reprehensible scruples. But Kay Hymowitz, a guest on the January 28, 2008 episode, came across as a particularly intolerant individual.

Hymowitz recently wrote the article, “Child-Man in the Promised Land,” for the Manhattan Institute’s City Journal, which was also reproduced for the Dallas Morning News and the New York Post. In her article, she seems to suggest marriage and childbearing are more important than being able to financially and emotionally support such commitments, renting an apartment in your parent’s house is better than self reliance, the enjoyment of music and technology is best left to pre-pubescence, and all men are grotesque creatures that use women for their own enjoyment. Her strongest support of such arguments: less men are married now than in the 60s, Maxim magazine is being published, there’s Comedy Central, and movies exist with “sophomoric fun and macho action.”

So what makes an adult? Her adult milestones include a high school degree, financial independence, marriage and children. Since the men she calls “Single Young Males” or “child-men” are often in, or graduated from, college (she seems live in a world of well-off white people) and are not living with their parents, it appears the only problems she has calling these men “adults” are: their acceptance of modern technology, the lack of a massive mortgage payment, and the fact that they are unwed or childless. She makes this clear when she claims, “it is marriage and children that turn boys into men.”

Apparently, according to Hymowitz, somehow impregnating a young woman and legally binding yourself to her makes you an adult. It also helps if you only play board games, read and watch only non-fiction, accept only a particular type of humor, live in your parent’s basement until you’re ready to take on a mortgage beyond your means and only listen to music on a record player.

Hymowitz seems unable to recognize the vast differences between housing prices and options, educational requirements, job security, entertainment choices, and technological advances between 1965 and 2008. Irresponsible choices, as well as misogynistic and low-brow entertainment, have always existed. The author’s technophobic and sexist methods of blaming all such woes on a particular segment of society simply show a bigoted, under-researched level of intolerance. Where do child-free couples and non-heterosexual individuals land in her oh-so-perfect “adult” society? (Guess this article and this article answer my question.)

I could speak toward the blatantly racist and misogynistic statements of such comments such as “it’s off to bars and parties, where you meet, and often bed, girls of widely varied hues and sizes.” But that may be kicking an already dead and blatantly unsupported horse.

While it isn’t surprising to see the right-wing think tank Manhattan Institute flaunt their “scholar’s” work, it is embarrassing to continue hearing NPR programming fail to live up to the quality standards we have grown to expect. Granting a feature story to someone looking only to stand on a soapbox against men who don’t live the restrictive life she expects them to live… I hoped for better, but am quickly learning I shouldn’t.

Sexist, Degrading, Bullshit III: Have a Drink, Get Raped (Part 2)

2008-01-28T18:28:00.000-07:00

(Go to Part I)

The UK Home Office and NHS Direct are sponsoring a UK Department of Health campaign against binge drinking called “Alcohol—Know Your Limits.” The campaign is a scare campaign, threatening rape as a punishment for risky behavior. Don’t believe me, take a look at one of their ads (pdf), or give their game a shot (playing as a woman makes it nearly impossible to avoid sexual or physical assaulted).

I wrote the Department of Health, and received a fairly standardized response in reply:

Dear Mr Remy,

Thank you for your email of 28 January to the Department of Health about the Alcohol – Know your Limits (KYL) campaign.

I was sorry to read of your concerns and can understand why you feel strongly about this matter. The KYL campaign tested a number of different creative ideas and a hard hitting approach with ‘shock factor’ and was found to be highly effective with the age 18-24 target audience of young binge drinkers. Young men and women claim that they need graphic and compelling reasons to reappraise their behaviour. The KYL campaign is designed to encourage young people to drink more responsibly by communicating alcohol-related harms, and this includes the risk of sexual assault.

I would like to assure you that the Department recognises that alcohol is not always involved in rape cases and regrets any offence that may have been caused in the communication of its messages.

I hope this information has been of help.

Yours sincerely,

Alistair Davie
Department of Health

I am not satisfied with this answer, and have written back:

Alistair Davie,

Thank you for your prompt response to my concerns regarding the "Alcohol—Know Your Limits" (KYL) campaign. However, I was discouraged by your attempts to disregard my concern as a simple personal offense, rather than recognizing KYL as a flawed and harmful disservice.

I understand this campaign may be highly effective in its attempts to promote a level of fear in the general populous. Nevertheless, as I mentioned in my previous email, using rape as a threat to prevent binge drinking shows a blatant disregard for the public you claim to protect. By doing so, you are not encouraging responsible drinking. Rather, you are claiming rape is a punishment for risky behavior.

For those who have been sexually victimized, the KYL campaign removes the blame from the rapist while placing it on the individual who experienced the trauma of rape. Alcohol may assist a criminal, but is no more the cause of rape than having a wallet is the cause of a mugging. Further, despite a variety of health concerns and reasonably common consequences to binge drinking, this campaign concentrates on the behavior of women in bars and pubs while presenting them with unrealistic scenarios of physical and sexual abuse. The Department of Health recognizes alcohol is not always involved in rape cases, but still presents such victimization as the inevitable consequence of using alcohol.

If the Department truly wishes to create a more responsible culture of drinking, communicating half truths and inflated "harms" is not the answer. The true resolution to this problem includes providing factual information—rather than scare-tactic propaganda—along with research into the root causes of motivation for binge drinking and changes to pub opening hours.

Again, I encourage you to reconsider KYL's position of enabling a system that blames the victim of sexual assault, and stop this campaign.

I also received an dodging response from NHS Direct:

Thank you for your feedback to NHS Direct which we received through our Contact Us service.

We are sorry about your experience but we are unable to help you as the organisation about which you have concerns is not part of NHS Direct. Although organisations are part of the NHS or work for the NHS each organisation is separate and we are unable to pass your personal data to a different part of the NHS organisation without your consent to do so.

As your concerns are about policy relating to the provision of the Health Service your concerns should be expressed to the Department of Health.

You can contact the Department of Health using the following link;
http://www.dh.gov.uk/en/ContactUs/ComplaintProcedures/index.htm

Alternatively we would be willing to forward your complaint to the Department should you give us your consent to pass on your concerns.

I hope you find this information helpful and if there is anything further we can assist with please contact us.

The NHS Direct Contact Us Team.

Obviously I'm not satisfied with this answer, and have no desire to see them pawn off their affiliation with "Know Your Limits" on the Department of Health:

I am concerned by the fact that you claim the “Alcohol—Know Your Limits” (KYL) campaign is not part of NHS Direct, as the website (www.knowyourlimits.gov.uk) has a sponsor link to NHS Direct on the bottom of their front page. I have forwarded my concerns to the Department of Health, but would request that you also provide an alternative email address and forward my concerns regarding KYL to the appropriate organization or individual within NHS.

Thank you to everyone who has been keeping track of this ongoing issue. I again encourage you to be vocal with your own concerns regarding the victim-blaming nature of this campaign, by calling or writing to Know Your Limits. Their phone number is 0800.917.8282. The Department of Health can be reached by phone at 020.7210.4850, via email at dhmail@dh.gsi.gov.uk, and via snail mail at:

The Department of Health
Richmond House
79 Whitehall
London SW1A 2NS
United Kingdom

If you are in the UK, you can also contact your local MP.

You can also reach the other organizations funding this program...

The UK Home Office can be reached by phone at 020.7035.4848, via email at public.enquiries@homeoffice.gsi.gov.uk, and via snail mail at:

Direct Communications Unit
2 Marsham Street
London SW1P 4DF
United Kingdom

NHS Direct can be reached by phone at 020.7599.4200, via their contact page at http://www.nhsdirect.nhs.uk/contact/, and via snail mail at:

Chief Executive
NHS Direct
7th Floor
207 Old Street
London EC1V 9NR
United Kingdom

NHS Direct will claim they are not responsible for Know Your Limits, despite being a sponsor. Let them know you want your concerns forwarded to someone in NHS Direct who can address your concerns.

Sexist, Degrading, Bullshit III: Have a Drink, Get Raped

2008-01-28T00:03:00.000-07:00

The UK Home Office and NHS Direct are sponsoring a campaign against drinking called “Know Your Limits.” The campaign is fairly straightforward—if you drink, bad things will happen to you: you’ll break your back, shatter your teeth, burn your stomach lining, find yourself passed out in a pool of your own vomit, fall into a coma after nine beers, and ruin Christmas. Sadly, I’m not being facetious, these are all examples from their website. It’s a scare campaign, pure and simple. No real basis in reality, no actual facts, just an attempt to scare the shit out of you before you even consider having that next drink.

Here’s the worst part. You’ll also get your drink spiked, and be raped by random strangers. Don’t believe me, take a look at this ad (pdf). Better yet, give their game a shot, play as a woman and feel free to try a few scenarios. See how many times you get out of the pub without being sexually assaulted or beaten.

I have written this site, and those sponsoring the campaign, regarding my concerns:

I am writing out of concern and anger regarding a specific theme present in the advertising campaign for the “Know Your Limits” program. In one of your ads, you claim: “One in three reported rapes happens when the victim has been drinking.” Additionally, when playing as the female character in the “A Night Out” online game, most “choices” easily led to sexual or physical assault, despite how little the character drinks. There are several consequences to binge drinking, your choice to concentrate on the behavior of women in bars and pubs while threatening them with physical and sexual abuse is disgusting, unnecessary and harmful.

Amnesty International has presented numbers which suggest a “blame culture” in the UK, where over a quarter of individuals polled believe a woman has some part of the blame for being raped. Additionally, 30% claim a woman is responsible for being raped if she was drunk. Your “Know Your Limits” campaign is assisting in the promotion of such public ignorance—ignorance that allows over 80% of rapes in the UK to never get beyond the stage of a police investigation.

The fact is, 80% of women are raped by someone they know, most commonly husbands or partners, not the strangers you present in your online game. And while some of rapes occur while the victim is intoxicated, these victims are targeted by perpetrators. Insinuating a woman will allow herself to get raped because of poor choices is simply ignoring the facts. Using rape as a fear tactic to prevent binge drinking shows a blatant disregard for the public you are claiming to protect.

I encourage you to stop this campaign immediately.

As always, I encourage you to be vocal with your own concerns regarding the victim-blaming nature of this campaign, by calling or writing to Know Your Limits. Their phone number is 0800.917.8282. They can be reached via email at dhmail@dh.gsi.gov.uk. You can also reach the organizations funding this program.

The UK Home Office can be reached by phone at 020.7035.4848, via email at public.enquiries@homeoffice.gsi.gov.uk, and via snail mail at:

Direct Communications Unit
2 Marsham Street
London SW1P 4DF
United Kingdom

NHS Direct can be reached by phone at 020.7599.4200, via their contact page at http://www.nhsdirect.nhs.uk/contact/, and via snail mail at:

Chief Executive
NHS Direct
7th Floor
207 Old Street
London EC1V 9NR
United Kingdom

(Go to Part 2)

In Abaetetuba

2007-12-27T02:09:00.001-07:00

by J.E. Remy

In Abaetetuba, there’s no juvenile detention. In Abaetetuba, there’s no women's prison. But Lucia never expected to find herself here. They said she was a suspect—she knew something about a theft, she was part of a robbery, she took a cell phone, or she was being held for questioning. That was weeks ago, they still wouldn't tell her for sure.

There was only the one cell, dimly lit by whatever outside light could find its way through the oily, black bars. The stone walls radiated heat, enhancing the smells of sweat and waste filling the cramped quarters, but Lucia couldn't stop shaking.

There was so much pain. The sting of the scratches on her scalp—little cuts from the knife they used to shave her head. The pulsing ache of her fingertips and feet, where they lit papers between her toes and the cigarette burns were still fresh. The tense throb of her stomach, empty of food. The soreness of her wrists and shoulders—bruises from being pinned down. The sharp waves that struck from each entrance they’d made of her body.

Thursdays used be the day things calmed down a bit—the day the prisoners were allowed visits from girlfriends and wives. It was the one day she dared to use the shower. This time, they were waiting. She didn't want to do it, but they didn't give her a choice. How many were there? Twenty? Thirty? Forty men?

Her screams were heard from the road outside, but no one answered. Easier to close your ears from the screams of a child, than question the ways of Abaetetuba.

Read more here and here.

Burnout

2007-12-22T16:08:00.001-07:00

by J.E. Remy

I’m suffering from burnout.

Every ounce of creativity has been sucked from me. It isn’t that I don’t care about writing anymore. Rather, it’s as if I’ve forgotten how. The words that once flowed through my mind have turned gray and trivial. Simple sentences take hours to compose (case in point, it just took me a full minute to think of that last word), and ideas are clouded by an ever-present feeling of dread.

It doesn’t stop with my writing. I have no desire to get out of bed in the morning. I mean, at least my dreams are imaginative. And why would I want to wake up into a world where my imagination is set on standby? My job, which once felt challenging, has become a difficult chore—and I’m falling behind in finishing things I wanted to accomplish. I feel like nothing I can do is enough—nothing I do is right. I have pent up anger with little or no form of release, and the simplest of tasks makes me frustrated.

The good thing is, I know where the burnout is coming from and I’m taking steps to end it. The bad thing is, it’s taking longer than expected to pick up the pieces.

***

Summer break was one of immense stress. My wife and I had a family wedding in Colorado, which was less than tranquil. A lot of people wanted to create something stunning, but seemed unable to recognize or care about what we considered beautiful. My family (those members of it who decided to show up) snuck my estranged father into town with them, despite direct conversations with each of them (including my father) regarding his not being invited. When attempting to resolve this affront and carry on with the day—as broken as it may be—my mother called me “immature” and “unreasonable” for being angry. My sisters and their friends sent nasty text messages. And, to top it off, they aggressively approached my wife’s family as if to start a fight. In the end, I couldn’t take anymore and asked them to go home. Ultimately I needed distance between myself and my entire family.

When we returned, I tried to take the easiest route through the semester. Reset myself. Gain my bearings. I changed my major from philosophy to creative writing/philosophy (it sounds like adding work, but the stagnant writing of other classes was getting to me). I once again blew off my second year math and science credits in favor for creative writing classes. And I took the opportunity of a promotion to gain internship credit for work I would be doing anyway (I mean how hard would it be to write a reflective paper to wrap up several credits? —No snickering).

Then we were hit with all the other stresses. Our apartment complex almost doubled rent, and we were forced to find a new place to live. We moved into a lovely home, but getting it there required months of plastering, painting, cleaning, repairing, and general hard work. As birthdays approached, a family that had ignored me since the wedding attempted passive contact without accepting blame or hinting at apology. The classes meant to provide me a creative outlet were proving to be nothing more than busy work—overloading on assignments meant to stimulate creativity while never allowing the creativity to reach fruition.

Eventually we were moved into the new home, but surrounded with boxes and the inevitable need to unpack. I started to dread classes, and found myself simply avoiding attendance. What was the point? To gain that little piece of paper that says I know shit? I’m competent, intelligent, well-informed, happy to research a subject when I feel I need more information. I don’t need a piece of paper to prove these things. To get a better job? Sure the financial situation right now isn’t exactly hunky-dory, but I’m doing what I want to do. I’m writing (or I would be if I wasn’t suffering from burnout). I’m teaching. More importantly, I’m teaching outside of an academic environment. I’m teaching in an environment where I can make change without forcing people to conform to a set of standards I don’t believe in. I’m promoting creativity, rather than creating stagnation. And I don’t need to give anybody a little piece of paper after helping them gain some knowledge. To learn? I wasn’t learning anything new in school. If anything, my writing suffered from being there.

I’ve learned more from working in a community writing center than from all my time in college. My instinctual understanding of the English language has been tested. I’ve been forced to find the “whys” and “hows” of things I always accepted as fact. I’ve become a good teacher, able to find new ways of demonstrating and explaining information with each individual I work with. I’ve learned the ins and outs of graphic design, typography, layout, printing, publication, and distribution. I’ve lost any fear of public speaking and gained the confidence to speak with any individual. I’ve presented at conferences, taught workshops, assisted in the development of a variety of personal and professional writing projects, and given a few moments of my time each week to people in need. So, why am I going to school?

My family’s passive contact has moved from light attempts to look like the white-hats, to active harassment: a full voicemail box and multiple text messages a day ranging from “I really miss you” to “I hate you—why are you doing this?” (Often sent back to back). Changing my phone number did no good. Letters arrive, care of my work, reminding me of holidays and birthdays I should be attending. Family members call to ask when I work, or show up in an attempt to trap me. My stomach hurts on a regular basis, and I’ve been fighting off the signs of what is bound to be the mother of all migraines. I’m pissed and frustrated and paranoid. I’m irritated and embarrassed. I kept waiting for family to call because they found my new number, or corner me because they spot me on the street.

This is why I’m suffering from burnout. And I’m finished with being in this position.

I’ve been hurting myself at this point—forcing myself to conform to things that I knew were wrong in my situation, because society told me this was the way things were: “family is forever,” “school is a necessity,” “you’ll never love what you do.” This where the burnout is coming from, and I’m taking steps to end it.

***

The boxes are cleared out, and our house is beautiful. Alex has been amazing in helping to create a space where I can feel comfortable, while still ensuring she will have room to do art. In fact, she’ll be teaching lessons soon, and our financial situation should be looking up.

I’ve changed my phone number again. I’ve started to mark the letters “return to sender.” All I wanted before was an apology, and some time to find distance and collect myself. I was ready to move on and accept the fact that they failed on the only day I ever asked for them to be there. I wanted to forgive my family. Now all I want is for them to leave me alone. They’ll up the efforts around the holidays, but there aren’t any birthdays in January.

And I’ve made the active decision to stop going to school. I don’t believe in the academic model, and continuing to use it as a means to an end is at best hypocritical, at worst harmful. I’m finished doing busy work. My creativity is stimulated by doing, not practicing. I’m finishing a 24-part short-short miniseries, getting back into the swing of regularly adding to the never-ending novel, and recently submitted a short piece to the anthology Nothing But Red—because I want my words to make change, not be part of a meaningless assignment. I don’t need a piece of paper to prove my abilities, and any job worth doing will recognize my abilities based on talent rather than hearsay. Besides I don’t need a better job, I just need to keep being a better writer, a better teacher, a better me.

It’s taking longer than expected to pick up the pieces, but I got up early to finish writing this. The last few paragraphs just sort of wrote themselves. My stomach is less queasy, and I’m just a little less angry.

Things are looking up.

Street Walkers of Whitechapel

2007-11-05T01:04:00.000-07:00

by J.E. Remy

It all started with Polly. Sweet Mary Ann with her skirt hiked up,
street walker of Whitechapel--throat cut left to right, bottom to top her gut.
"It was enough," Mrs. Holland said, "to make anybody shed a tear."
But Dark Annie's death painted London in blood and fear.

Street walker of Whitechapel--throat cut left to right, bottom to top her gut
Insides out at No. 29. Breath stopped short as a swollen tongue sealed lips shut.
Dark Annie's death painted London with blood and fear
and by the time he reached Lizzy Stride, the cycle was clear.

He caught her by her flowing scarf, but halfway through was forced to flee.
And while he continued the slaughter, they would hunt for Lipski.
He'd made up time with the next--stomach gashed, nose removed, jawbone broken--
"She was ripped up like a pig in the market," the Constable stated, so well-spoken.

They would hunt for Lipski, while he continued the slaughter--
the same night he took Long Liz, he'd taken Catherine Eddowes' daughter.
"She was ripped up like a pig in the market," the Constable stated, so well-spoken.
Old Jack had escaped again, this time taking the woman's kidney as a token.

Confident in his safety he left his leather apron and a chalk written something:
"The Juwes are The men That Will not Be Blamed for nothing."
Insides out at Dorset Street--he broke the window to open the door--
He would do to her what he wanted do to the others, and then no more.

"The Juwes are The men That Will not Be Blamed for nothing."
Street walker of Whitechapel--gashes and incisions obliquely running,
Insides out at Dorset Street--he broke through the window to open the door--
It all ended with Ms. Kelly. Sweet Mary Jane with her skirt on the floor.

So Warm, So Sweet

2007-09-28T19:15:00.000-06:00

by J.E. Remy

Gingerbread house stitched
with candy floss
So warm
the bread
So sweet
the flavor

Fallen in an oven
a cannibalistic witch
So warm
her flesh
So sweet
the scent

Children needing food
other than gingerbread
So warm
the bread
So sweet
the scent

Learning from their captor
the ways of the wood
So warm
her flesh
So sweet
the flavor

J.E. Remy in the News

2007-09-20T14:23:00.000-06:00

Salt Lake Tribune, September 20th 2007:
Center Demystifies Writing, Takes it to The People
by Glen Warchol

Writing Consultant J.E. Remy, right, gives Jeff Erickson
some pointers on his screenwriting project.

Any article in the average newspaper is read by a minimum of two editors before it makes it into print.

This one was read by editors.

Yet, ordinary folks regularly turn in life-altering documents like job résumés, college application essays - even obituaries - without even asking a friend to glance it over.

Pulp Fiction

2007-09-10T17:31:00.000-06:00

Weird

In weird fiction, the author presents a story where the wellbeing of all humanity is at stake. These stories were told in a way meant to inspire terror, keeping all but the most courageous of readers on the edge of their seats through heavy suspense and a fear of the unknown. Weird tales are often deeply pessimistic, directly contradicting ideas established in the Enlightenment, Romanticism, and Christianity.

Several methods have been used to tell weird stories:

Weird Menace. Weird Menace stories were popular in the “shudder pulps” of the 1930s and 1940s. They featured a hero pitted against a sadistic antagonist—often a “yellow peril” style character—where graphic scenes of violence and death were used to frighten the reader, similar to that of splatterpunk horror.

The "yellow peril" is an anti-Asian stereotype started in the 19th century, and spread through the 20th century, based on a supposed threat by Asians toward the West. While such an attack was highly unlikely after the 15th century, it became exaggerated in racist imaginations which saw the immigration of Asian laborers to Europe and America as a threat to Western civilization and Christianity.

Pulp stories such as Zorro’s 12 Must Die (1935), and heroes such as Doc Savage, were the eventual development of continually darkening pulps such as Dime Mystery, Terror Tales, and Horror Stories.

Lovecraftian Horror. Read about Lovecraftian Horror at Types of Horror: Lovecraftian.

(Return to Pulps: Fiction for the Masses)

Pulp Fiction

2007-09-02T04:15:00.000-06:00

Sword and Sorcery

Sword and Sorcery fantasy was inspired by Robert E. Howard’s Conan the Barbarian series, which first appeared in the pulp Weird Tales (1932). While using high fantasy themes of morality and social classism, swords and sorcery tends to focus on action and physical dangers. Heroes in this type of tale are more motivated by self interest than the values of their culture.
Michael Moorcock’s Elric series and Karl Edward Wagner’s Kane series are both examples of this type of story.

Sword and Space. The term “Sword and Space,” was originally coined in the 1960s by Ace Books editor Donald A. Wollheim. He originated the phrase when planetary romance adventure combined with sword and sorcery themes was undergoing a revival. Sword and Space was most famously used in Lieutenant Gullivar Jones: His Vacation (1905) by Edwin Lester Arnold and A Princess of Mars by Edgar Rice Burroughs, which first appeared as the serial “Under the Moons of Mars” in the pulp All-Story (1902). “Sword and Space” has also been referred to as “Sword and Planet.”

Spacepunk. In Spacepunk, the tools of the punk genre are combined with the themes of a Swords and Space tale. Here, a seemingly older civilization with advanced Space Age technology. These stories have also been referred to simply as “Sword and Space” fantasy when dealing with an ancient civilization with advanced technology or “Retrofuturism” when the society is a modern society with advanced technology.

(Go to Pulp Fiction: Weird)
(Return to Pulps: Fiction for the Masses)

Pulp Fiction

2007-08-29T02:07:00.000-06:00

Superhero Fantasy

The terms “superhero” and “superman” originated in English translations of Thus Spoke Zarathustra (1885) by Freidrich Nietzsche. The character “Superman” first appeared in Action Comics #1 in June 1938. Since that time, comic books have increased in popularity and established the superhero archetype in the minds of readers.

In superhero fantasy, the author combines contemporary themes and hard fantasy to present a world where fantastic concepts exist alongside beings of mythological power. The central character of such tales is often a costumed hero with fantastic abilities, or “superpowers.”

Versions of the superhero story have been reinterpreted through different cultural expectations:

Wǔxiá. Blending the words “xiá” (or “hero”) and “wǔshù” (or “martial art”), wǔxiá literally means “martial arts heroes.” Wǔxiá combines fantasy with martial arts, and is quite popular in Chinese culture. Wuxia has also been called “mów hàb.”

(Go to Pulp Fiction: Sword and Sorcery)
(Go to "Look Up in the Sky!")

(Return to Pulps: Fiction for the Masses)

Pulp Fiction

2007-08-28T00:00:00.000-06:00

Planetary Romance

Earlier pulp romantic adventures took place in exotic locales, both real and imagined. In planetary romance, the author takes the reader to the even more exotic locals of exotic alien planets and futuristic cultures. The hero of such stories is often a traveler from Earth, who travels to the savage lands of another planet or time. Scientific accuracy is less important in such stories than architectural, ecological, political, philosophical and sociological imagery—largely due to an oft-repeating desire by planetary romance authors to present a personal philosophy through the guise of fiction.

Edgar Rice Borroughs’ Barsoom series, which first appeared in the pulp All-Story (1911), is the earliest example of such and adventure. Frank Herbert’s Dune (1964) is another example, demonstrating more recent desire to place planetary romance outside our known Solar System.

Space Opera. The term “space opera” was coined by author Wilson Tucker in 1941 as a derogatory term, similar to “horse opera” or “soap opera.” He used it to refer to sci-fi he deemed “hacky, grinding, stinking, outworn space-ship yarn.” Eventually, the term was embraced by fans who enjoyed the familiarity of the themes.

Space opera takes the themes such as politics, philosophy, and sociology, familiar to planetary romance, and sets them largely aboard a spaceship with the ability to travel faster than light. Just as planetary romance mirrors the lost world/civilization ideas common in pulp romantic adventures, space opera mirrors the exploration tales and frontier stories of dime novels. Space becomes a new frontier, while topics of good and evil are explored through savage alien races.

E.E. Smith’s The Skylark of Space, which first appeared in the pulp Amazing Stories (1928), is the earliest example of such a tale.

New Space Opera. Due to the success of the Star Wars movie franchise and an Interzone editorial by David Pringle and Colin Greenland, a new form of space opera developed in the 1970s. This new space opera was heavily influenced by the cyberpunk genre while still using the themes and ideas of a space opera. The idea of a triumphant and glorious future for mankind were abandoned, replaced by a heavier discussion of good and evil—often through the use of morally ambiguous characters. New space opera has also been called “space opera noir” when using noir fiction tools.

Military Science Fiction. In military sci-fi, the themes such as politics, philosophy, and sociology familiar to planetary romance, are set against a futuristic or interplanetary war. Here, the traveler-hero is replaced with a soldier, and military tactics replace discovery and exploration themes. Commonly, the conflicts mirror actual historic battles. Just as planetary romance stories are often used to present the author’s personal philosophy, military science fiction is often used to present a political message.

Uller Uprising (1952) by H. Beam Piper, Starship Troopers (1959) by Robert A. Heinlein, and Ender’s Game (1985) by Orson Scott Card are all examples of military science fiction.

(Go to Pulp Fiction: Superhero Fantasy)
(Return to Pulps: Fiction for the Masses)

Pulps: Fiction for the Masses

2007-08-27T01:16:00.000-06:00

by J.E. Remy

In the 1830s, Gothic thrillers were serialized to market the publication to a wider audience. Printed on cheap pulp paper, the publications were printed on a weekly basis, at a cost of only a penny each. Even this cost was too much for many of the working class teenage boys the magazines were marketed to. Often, the cost for the flimsy booklets would be shared between them.

Beginning with Boys of England in 1866, these “Penny Parts” would eventually expand into an eight page magazine, featuring both a serialized story and articles of interest. The fiction was often sensationalized, highlighting horrific and lurid details of actual event. For this reason, Penny Parts became commonly known as “Shilling Shockers,” “Penny Bloods,” “Blood and Thunders,” while critics dubbed them “Penny Dreadfuls.”

By the mid-1890s, publisher Alfred Harmsworth tried to improve the reputation of Penny Parts. Issuing three new publications, he attempted to present morality tales based on true experiences, at a cost of one half-penny. Eventually, The Half-penny Marvel, Pluck, and The Union Jack would suffer the same sensationalized corruption of previous Penny Dreads, becoming what author A.A. Milne called “the ha’penny dreadfuller.”

Around the same time of the Penny Dreads’ peak of popularity, American audiences were presented with Dime Novels. Beginning with Beadle’s Dime Novels in 1860, the salmon-colored Dime Novels also presented serialized novels with lurid, sensational stories—starting with reprints, but quickly offering original series. Increased literacy and high demand from soldiers fighting in the Civil War assisted in the success of these novels. As time went on, other publishers began offering “dime” novels, sometimes at a cost of fifteen to twenty cents.

While crime and mystery stories were often the most popular of Britain’s Penny Dreads, American’s leaned toward Westerns. Dime Westerns offered an American West distant from reality which would become the Western genre’s ultimate legacy.

By 1874, Beadle & Adams were fighting to keep up with the competition, and started to offer full-color covers. The New Dime Novels were largely reprints of the original series, but at a higher quality. In 1896, Street & Smith dropped the price of their novels to five cents, in an attempt to make them accessible to a younger audience. The “Nickel Weeklies” were a success, and made Street & Smith the leader of popular novel publication.

In 1896, Frank A. Munsey turned his juvenile magazine Golden Argosy into a new form of fiction magazine aimed at adults. Argosy Magazine paid authors less than other markets, left the edges ragged and uncut, and used a cheap pulp paper, allowing for a lower cost with and expanded page count—giving the first of the “pulps” a chance to compete with higher quality “glossies” or “slicks.” By 1915, Street & Smith followed suite, altering the format of the Nickel Weekly Nick Carter Weekly and renaming it Detective Story Magazine. By sponsoring the radio program “The Shadow,” they were able to offer stories from the magazine over the radio, eventually offering another new pulp magazine based on the host character, The Shadow. Consistent radio advertising and demand again came from soldiers, this time fighting in the First World War, which ensured the magazine’s success.

A unique pulp magazine began in 1923—Weird Tales, focused largely on fantasy and horror tales. Among its most famous authors were Clark Ashton Smith, Robert Bloch, Tenessee Williams, Ray Bradbury, and Howard Phillips Lovecraft. H.P. Lovecraft would join with several Weird Tales writers to create a modern horror mythology which continues to influence the genre to this day. Dubbed “Cosmic Horror” by those he corresponded with, Lovecraft’s work involved a great unknown, and possibly unknowable, evil that could not be escaped. The protagonists of his tales rarely survived with their sanity.

Three years later, Amazing Stories became the first magazine devoted exclusively to publishing science fiction. It changed the appearance of pulp magazines, printing in an increased size with neatly trimmed edges. While writer such as H.G. Wells and Jules Verne were often reprinted, it also featured new authors developing stories of space age technology and fantastic concepts. By 1930, Amazing Stories had opened the door for Astounding Stories, the longest running and arguably most important science fiction magazine of all time. Astounding Stories would provide the means for such authors such as Isaac Asimov, Arthur C Clarke, Fritz Leiber, and A.E. Van Vogt to publish their first professional work.

Later pulps began featuring interior illustrations, depicting events within the story. This method of adding to the story opened the door for a new method of storytelling: comic books. Comic books, as we now understand them, first appeared as The Funnies in 1929, which presenting humorous collections of illustrated narratives originally published in news strips. It wasn’t until 1932 that the sci-fi themes of Amazing Stories, mythological archetypes present in Weird Tales, and fantastic crime fighters such as the Shadow, all combined to form the “superhero.”

In 1932 Joe Shuster and Jerry Siegel created the character “Superman.” Superman first appeared in Action Comics #1 in June 1938. Since that time, comic books have increased in popularity and established the superhero archetype in the minds of readers. Within two years of Superman’s appearance, most comic book companies were publishing superhero titles. Comic books again targeted a young audience, and were able to limit print costs through overproduction and cheap labor. Demand soon arrived from soldiers fighting in World War II, and the popularity of superheroes and comic books took off.

Competition from comic books and newsprint shortages during World War II caused a change in the method used to print pulps. Some pulps, such as Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine, became digest size and increased in price. Others turned to even cheaper production—presenting fan fiction based on existing characters. Most pulps, however, abandoned the market entirely. Nevertheless, their effect on genre fiction continues to be seen even today.

(Go to Pulp Fiction: Planetary Romance)
(Go to Pulp Fiction: Superhero Fantasy)
(Go to Pulp Fiction: Sword and Sorcery)
(Go to Pulp Fiction: Weird)

Speak Out

2007-08-15T01:15:00.000-06:00

There seems to be an all-too-often occurring response to any voices speaking against degrading art. This response equates speaking out with a desire to censor or police thought. It also gives respect to the words of the artist, while devaluing the words of the audience. “Artists can present their thoughts as they want,” they seem to be saying, “You, however, cannot voice your concerns.” The irony is not lost.

The right to free speech allows the artist to present ideas in a public forum. The right to free speech also allows the audience to protest, rebut, ridicule, debate and scrutinize the art. Sometimes the audience uses a collective voice in an attempt to instigate change. This is not encouraging censorship or monitoring thought—quite the opposite.

The process of moving toward equality requires voices speaking out against those who disregard minority groups or ideas. It is easy to stagnate, to ignore issues of discrimination against race, gender, sexuality, ability, or status. It is simple to pretend equality exists, and attack anyone with the audacity to question the ethics of “the majority.” It is far more difficult to attempt to raise awareness, to start building a better community, and to fight against inequality.

The novel

2007-08-13T00:00:00.000-06:00

The Aria has begun.

To start from the beginning, click here.

Let’s talk about objectification...

2007-08-08T02:58:00.000-06:00

by J.E. Remy

Featured in:
Carnival of the Feminists No. 43

Unfortunately it's difficult to debate the concept of objectification on its merits because the term "objectification" is not well-defined. There's no clear-cut criteria for determining what is objectification and what isn't.

--C. L. Hanson

I would argue otherwise. There are those who take the idea of objectification to the extreme—lumping together all mass media as patriarchal propaganda and all expressions of physical attraction as condemnable lust. There are others who dismiss it entirely, claiming it to be nothing more than an element of our natural appreciation for the aesthetically pleasing—basic desire. The reality is somewhere in between.

Sexual objectification doesn’t demonstrate a respectful attraction. Rather, it devalues individuals beyond their use as sexualized objects. Objectification is most obvious on an immediate scale: when an individual’s personal worth is disregarded for their ability to be physically appealing, submissive, or a potential sex partner. Here, being sexy is defined solely by narrowly defined physical attraction, and the possibility of independent action and decision making is ignored. This can also be accomplished on a broad scale: creating a role for an entire group of people which devalues the group’s individual worth for these sexual roles.

Let’s take a look at some of these broad-scale objectifications:

My understanding is that what most people are concerned with is the thoughts the statue creates or implies are in the people who buy it. If people are not concerned with the thoughts of those people, what are they concerned with? The statue, in and of itself, doesn't appear to be what people are bothered by. They appear to be bothered by the thoughts in engenders and the actions it might provoke. If one is not concerned with the thoughts and actions associated with the statue, what is the problem?

I would say that statue might inspire lust, but it very unlikely to inspire objectification of real women.

BTW, the statue is an object, created to resemble another object (i.e. an image in a comic book.) It is not a person. Objectifying an object isn't a problem, is it?

--Scott Anderson

This is where the distinction between immediate-scale objectification and broad-scale objectification causes confusion. It’s easy to see the harm caused by someone yelling, “Hey baby, nice ass” to a passerby. It is much more difficult to see the harm in an artistic representation of a fictional character. The problem isn’t centered on the thoughts or actions present in those who purchase either statue. Rather, the concern is the socialized normalization of objectification through glamorized gender roles.

First, notice there is no personal ability or independent action presented in either of these images. The role of the female figure is one of a sexual prop: submissively washing, coyly smiling, and bending at an unnatural angle to provide ample view of cleavage and a carefully placed tear at the rear of her jeans. The role of the male figure is one where violence and aggression are considered attractive, even heroic. Both statues present unreasonable body images—the female unnaturally thin, the male unnaturally muscular.

This becomes problematic as behavioral differences between men and women develop on a sociological basis, rather than a biological basis. Historically, the group which has been devalued most has been women. From street harassers making suggestive comments at passing women, to the overly submissive position of women in pornography; from western society’s obsession with cosmetic surgery, to the media’s obsession with the feminine form—women are being told that their appearance is more important than intelligence or competence. Sexual liberation has assisted women in redirecting some of these attacks, but some of the redirection has simply caused men to become the targets—creating similar feelings of inadequacy with regard to body image and sexual performance.

Social reinforcement (toward unnaturally thin, virginally sexualized females and unnaturally muscular, violently aggressive men) ultimately serves to create an expectation of hostility in men and subordination in women. These expectations may not be the reality, but still serve to hinder intimate connections and present an acceptance toward treating others as objects for sexual conquest. This increases the propensity of violence toward women, and causes many men to fail to connect beyond aggression and sex.

Unfortunately, depictions of sexualized women, aggressive men, heterosexual “normality,” and submissive sexual encounters, are not exclusive to comic book merchandise (see here and here). Still, a society claiming equality between the sexes needs to strive to provide equal treatment in gender roles, acceptance toward gender identity, and an understanding of sexuality—in comics, art, literature, and day to day life. This can only be achieved once each of us begins recognizing the role objectification plays in reinforcing these stereotypes and rejecting attempts (intentional or not) to normalize roles that are harmful for men and women.

Thank You for Linking

2007-08-06T19:40:00.000-06:00

Just a quick note of thanks to those who recently linked to Die Wachen:

Thank you to the Curio, for your interest in The "Punk" Subgenre, particularly Steampunk, in your recent post "The -punk Subgenre".
Thank you to Musings of a Med Student for including Virus in The Blog Carnival of Short Stories – Edition IV.

If you get a chance, show a little love their way.

Doctor Who: Memento Mori

2007-08-05T13:09:00.000-06:00

by J.E. Remy

Cuts and bruises healed months ago, but the remaining knot of tension and surrender held sleep at bay. The hard, dead ground of the cell provided nothing more than a dusty reminder of what was taken: pride, freedom, the garden, her love…. Waiting each day brought more of these thoughts and less time for rest. Tomorrow, however, all that would end, and the true punishment could begin.

She was certain Tlotoxl was quite pleased with himself. His successful sacrifice, and the inevitable failure of her appeal, meant being taken to Tenochtitlán at dawn—where she would be humiliated before the citizens, and her god.

***

The familiar hum of his old friend helped ease the pain. She’d changed again, distancing her walls, softening the light, altering the size and locations of her rooms to provide the space he needed. He didn’t have to talk about the events on Perfugium; she understood.

“Thank you.” His hand slid across the TARDIS console. She’d taken on a warm, wooden texture—simplifying once cold steel and erratic gauges with Victorian-style bronze, reminiscent of Jules Verne. The change was comforting and calm.

Together they drifted through the Time Vortex, like so many times before. She was the only constant, changing less often even than himself. And they were alone. Sure, others would always find him. Companions, too easily accepting of the TARDIS’s odd nature and the dangers inherent with their travels. He fell in love with each of them, in his own way. Fell, then left them behind: Ace, Benny, Romana, Barbara, Sarah Jane… They were family, the only he knew since leaving his granddaughter, and they kept the loneliness at bay.

He’d tried his hand at romance, even considering a relationship with Cameca, one of the people on the little blue planet he cared for. It always ended badly. Now, Time’s Champion owed Death a favor: the life of an innocent. Loneliness would be something he would have to grow used to, at least until that bargain was fulfilled.

He wasn’t sure why it unsettled him. It wasn’t as if his actions hadn’t caused the deaths of countless individuals, directly or inadvertently. He wasn’t even required to take the life of someone not already destined to die—the blood just needed to be on his hands. And maybe that was it. Innocents died, some due to his inability to prevent it, but the blood could be so easily dismissed as the burden of others: tentacled monsters, old gods, ghosts, mummies, robots, the High Council. Never his.

Never the Doctor’s.

Or wasn’t it? His presence and ultimate inaction was just as deadly to John as it was to the people at Maiden’s Point, Adric… or Cameca. He left her to die so long ago, in the hands of the High Priest of Sacrifice. He chose when events should be changed and when they couldn’t. Wasn’t it time to finally take responsibility for those actions? Shouldn’t the blood be on his hands?

***

She watched as the first of the sun’s rays slipped through the cracks in the wall. Her god, Huitzilopochtli—the left-handed hummingbird—was once again rising. His expectant eye focused on the room, glaring at her. It was he who punished her, Tlotoxl said. When his eye was darkened, she too was blinded. Her love for the false god Yetaxa almost prevented the sacrifice of the Perfect Victim. Her actions nearly left the sun permanently darkened.

But she never stopped worshiping hummingbird, and there was no room in her heart for any false gods. What little didn’t belong to her god belonged to the one promised to her, the one who left her on the Day of Darkness. For him, she would suffer this punishment a thousand times, simply for the pledge he think of her always. And as long as she waited for her imprisonment to end, she waited for him.

Now the waiting was over.

“Hello, Cameca.” The man who entered her cell had an accent—one strange, but familiar. Dawn arrived, and they were wasting no time to take her to Tenochtitlán.

“I am ready.” She stood, tall and proud, as beautiful as he remembered.

“Yes, but what is it you are ready for?” He pursed his lips and stared at her, questioning. He needed to be certain.

“Are you not sent to take me to the Place of Sacrifice?”

His eyes lowered, no longer able to look into hers. It was true, she was left to die. And how many months did she suffer, a prisoner awaiting this end?

“No. I am not.” As he spoke, the dawn rays reflected briefly off the Aztec brooch on the lapel of his jacket. Her eyes caught sight of the familiar medallion, and she stepped closer. “I’m here,” Time’s Champion owed Death a favor. “to make sure you never make it to the pyramid of Tenochtitlán.” The blood needed to be on his hands.

“Where did you find that?” She touched the brooch, certain it was once hers. Briefly he grew embarrassed. He took to wearing it again recently, as if it were a protective talisman to cover his hearts. Today, of all days, it seemed only right he keep it in sight.

“It was a gift.”

He didn’t expect it to hurt so much, but perhaps he should have. Six lifetimes passed, and he never forgot her. Her hand gently lifted his chin; their eyes met. His were darker, as was his hair, and his shape was completely changed. But there was something…

“I once gave someone such a gift.” She brought his face into her hands, leaning closer. She needed to be certain.

“We should be going.” He forced the words out, turning his eyes to look somewhere else—anywhere but at her.

“The man,” she continued, “that I love.”

Her words were almost as soft as her touch, and he couldn’t be sure if she was speaking of the someone she gave the gift to, or of him. When last he saw her, he was a white-haired old man masquerading as a servant of Yetaxa. Now, Barbara was not around to impersonate the god, and he was so much younger. She couldn’t possibly know they were the same man. Could she?

“You are destined to die, Cameca.” His eyes filled with tears as he spoke. Reaching into his coat pocket, his fingers wrapped around the knife hidden among the menagerie of trinkets.

“No.” The word was gentle, loving.

“If I don’t interfere, they will take you to the Place of Sacrifice and the butcher, Tlotoxl, will have you killed. Better it be…”

She pulled him close, holding him as if he never left. She couldn’t know…

“You do not understand. My punishment is not death.”

“What?” Wasn’t it time to finally take responsibility?

“I am to be taken to Tenochtitlán to have my pride stripped from me. Tlotoxil will humiliate me before the people and my god. Not by killing me, but by marking me as his slave.”

“If not today…” He pushed her away, anger washing across his face. He could no longer show compassion; it was meant to be easier. Her position in the stream of time was unnecessary. Her life was uneventful and unrecorded. Even if she wasn’t killed today, her city would be destroyed within a year, her civilization within fifty years. He should be able to remove her from history, because history should never be affected by her. “If not today, death will still come. In a year floods will destroy this place, and kill thousands. The famine that arrives thereafter will finish off what the army of Moctezuma doesn’t. You are destined to die.”

Her brow furrowed. She spoke slowly, carefully.

“Then make sure I never make it to Tenochtitlán, my love. It doesn’t matter what form your spirit inhabits.” She glanced at the brooch, “I know you by the sign of your divinity. The gods have returned you to me, and I place my life in your hands.”

He was sickened by her species’ capacity for self-deception—their willing surrender to fate. “I am not divine. The gods don’t exist—at least not in the way you believe them to—and your continual focus on them has served only to make your life meaningless.”

“Doctor, why do you say these things?”

“You won’t be remembered. You won’t be missed.”

“There is where you are wrong, servant of Yetaxa.” Crippled and bent, Tlotoxil stood at the room’s entrance. His eyes glowered at the Doctor from beneath dark face paint, his mouth a Cheshire grin as he stepped toward Cameca. “You hide your spirit beneath new flesh, but do not think you are changed.” His gnarled hand wrapped around her arm.

“Release her.” The Doctor rolled his “r” unnaturally, words dripping with venom as he brought the knife into view.

“So you may spill her blood for Yetaxa? The gods have grown thirsty since your first intrusion, but your love for the False One will no longer burden the people of this land. You should never have returned.” Tlotoxil’s fingers dug into Cameca’s arm. “I am the High Priest of Sacrifice; I choose when blood is spilled in worship. Return to the Death Realm of Mictlan and burden us with your presence no longer.”

“You don’t understand.” His joints grew white around the blade’s handle.

“I understand the people demand punishment for the interference of your false god,” the priest glanced at her: confident in his authority, pleased her disgrace was certain, “and I require a servant to clean the blood from my hands.”

“I’m not here to serve Death.” Quickly, Time’s Champion brought the knife to Tlotoxil’s throat. Tearing Cameca from his grasp, the Doctor spat his words. “I’ve decided to break that bargain. It’s time I take responsibility.”

***

On the edge of the Milky Way—in the heart of the Minyan constellation of Kasterborus—is a small, mostly-red planet named Gallifrey: the Doctor’s home. Hidden in the silver-leafed forests of Gallifrey’s southern mountains is a large rose garden, safely enclosed behind an ivy-covered wall and scented with time’s memories. He has shared this place with few, traveling here only when he required solace and reflection. She would never understand how they got here, but he’d given back her freedom with a garden of peace.

They walked slowly, the blue box watching quietly in the distance. Cameca longed to ask questions, but he was silent, glancing only briefly at her. The words he spoke earlier still stung, but knowing the promise was kept—that he remembered her—helped ease the pain. She suffered for months, a prisoner awaiting the end of her imprisonment; a lover awaiting the return of her love. Now the waiting was over, but the man she loved was gone. He’d changed, become distant and angry. Still, he didn’t have to talk about his reason for returning. She understood.

The accidentally engaged man, the man who still wanted this love, died long ago. But he never forgot her—never forgot how his inaction placed her in Tlotoxil’s hands. She deserved better, and this time, he would provide it. She wouldn’t be remembered by the people of her own time. She wouldn’t be missed.

They stopped at the center of the garden, and he pulled a flower from the base of the Tree of Possibility: Memento Mori, the Gallifreyan Flower of Remembrance. He placed it in her hair and kissed her cheek.

With the library closer to her entrance, the TARDIS started water boiling for tea. They would be traveling again soon, the rose garden left to the woman from the little blue planet. Everything she needed was within those walls—enough to make the last few years of her life as simple as their goodbye. Loneliness would be something he would have to grow used to, at least until he learned to love again.

Doctor Who and TARDIS are trademarks of the BBC.

Continuity Notes:

For Cameca and Tlotoxil, these events take place after The Aztecs. For the Doctor, this takes place after "the events on Perfugium" in Master, while he still owes Death a life.
Huitzilopochtli appears in alien form in The Left-Handed Hummingbird.
The Doctor took to wearing the brooch again in Birthright.

All Sorts of Punk

2007-08-03T00:00:00.000-06:00

Mythpunk

In Mythpunk--a term coined by Catherynne M. Valente--themes, symbols, and archetypes of folklore and myths are combined with postmodern fantasy techniques. “For me,” Valente claims, “mythpunk describes a writer who uses myth and folklore as a launch-point and then warps it with their own voice. Someone for whom language is more than a simple tool, whose use of it is sometimes jangling, sometimes melodious, often musical, always passionate. Someone who uses the basic set of authorial instruments: character, plot, setting, and the fabulous orchestra of human language in a way that challenges and innovates, changes the reader's perception of mythology, both traditional narrative and new worlds combined and recombined. It's more fun to write than anything I know, and more profound to read than most things I find.”

Valente's The Labyrinth is a fine example of this style of story (read an excerpt here), as is Sonya Taaffe's Postcards from the Province of Hyphens.

Other styles have developed out of the mythpunk movement:

Elfpunk. Contemporary fantasy character types—elves, fairies, dragons, etc.—are placed in an urban setting. Elfpunk has also been called “modern faerie tale” by such authors as Holly Black, describing her novel Tithe (read an excerpt here) or “urban fantasy” by such authors as Emma Bull, describing her novel War for the Oaks.

Mannerspunk. Elabororate social hierarchies and complex traditions are presented in a fantasy setting. Etiquette is then critically examined through the lens of a fantastical comedy of manners--a sort of Jane Austin meets C.S. Lewis. Mannerspunk has also been called a “fantasy of manners,” a term coined by science fiction critic Donald G. Keller. The Death of the Necromancer by Martha Wells (read an excerpt here) and Swordspoint by Ellen Kushner (read an excerpt here) are examples of mannerspunk.

(Return to The "Punk" Subenre)

All Sorts of Punk

2007-08-01T00:00:00.002-06:00

Timepunk

Steampunk was a term coined by K.W. Jeter in an attempt to find a general term for works by Tim Powers (The Anubis Gates), James Blaylock (Homunculus) and himself (Morlock Night), who all wrote Victorian speculative fiction. In a letter to "Locus" (April 1987), he wrote:

Dear Locus,

Enclosed is a copy of my 1979 novel Morlock Night; I'd appreciate your being so good as to route it Faren Miller, as it's a prime piece of evidence in the great debate as to who in “the Powers/Blaylock/Jeter fantasy triumvirate” was writing in the “gonzo-historical manner” first. Though of course, I did find her review in the March Locus to be quite flattering.

Personally, I think Victorian fantasies are going to be the next big thing, as long as we can come up with a fitting collective term for Powers, Blaylock and myself. Something based on the appropriate technology of the era; like “steampunks,” perhaps ...

Since the development of steampunk, several terms have been created to specify the time period and divergent themes of “gonzo-historical” fiction. “Timepunk,” a term coined for the GURPS roleplaying game Steampunk, by William H. Stoddard, is arguably the most apt for describing the anachrono-futurist genre as a whole (although “Punkpunk” has also been used). In such tales, technologies stagnate around a specific technology--bronze, steam, diesel--which then becomes the major contributing factor to the advancement of humankind. Science advances, but only through the use of the specific technology, and the time period where the technology originated determines fashion, artistic styles, and religious belief.

Timepunk has a variety of categories, each title based on the time period or major technology which provides the theme for the tale:

Stonepunk. This term, coined by the GURPS roleplaying game Steampunk, denotes a Stone Age civilization provided with technological advances. Edgar Rice Borroughs' The Land that Time Forgot (download a copy here) and Jean Auel's Clan of the Cave Bear are early examples of this style of story.

Bronzepunk. This term, coined by the GURPS roleplaying game Steampunk, denotes a Bronze Age civilization provided with steam-based technological advances. The novels of Mary Renault are often good examples of this type of timepunk.

Sandalpunk. This term, coined by the GURPS roleplaying game Steampunk, denotes an ancient civilization, often the Romans or some other Iron Age civilization, never collapses—with scientific advancement (based on such technologies as the Antikythera mechanism) continuint at a rate relative to later modern civilizations. Sandalpunk has also been called “Classicpunk” or “Ironpunk.”

Candlepunk. Denotes an late medieval civilization with futuristic technology. Candlepunk has also been called “Castlepunk”and “Middlepunk.” It can also be “Dungeonpunk” when adding magical elements, or “Plaguepunk” when describing a plague-ridden candlepunk society. Connie Willis' Doomsday Book is an example of this type of timepunk.

Clockpunk. This term, coined by the GURPS roleplaying game Steampunk, denotes a Renaissance era civilization with clockwork-based technology and Da Vinci inspired advances. Terry Pratchett's Discworld series and Pasquale's Angel by Paul J. McAuley are examples of this type of timepunk.

Steampunk. A Victorian, English Regency, Industrial Revolution, or Edwardian English setting is provided with a variety of steam-based technology and Victorian advances such as difference engines. Inspired by actual Victorian science fiction (Edisonades, Scientific Romances, and Voyages Extraordinaires), Steampunk was the first of the timepunk categories, and has inspired real-world anachrono-futuristic culture, technology, games, fashion, and art.

Steampunk has also been called “Victorian Steampunk” and “Gaslamp Fantasy.” William Gibson & Bruce Sterling's The Difference Engine (read a historical supplement here) and Alan Moore's The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen are modern examples of this type of timepunk.

“Western Steampunk” places the story in the same time periods, but set in America’s Old West. These stories have also been referred to as “Weird West” fiction and “Cattlepunk.” They may also be called “Desertpunk” when referring to a post-apocalyptic Western Steampunk, where water is mostly absent from the world (although this style of Timepunk can also be achieved in a Dieselpunk setting).

Dieselpunk. This term, coined by game designers Lewis Pollak and Dan Ross for the roleplaying game Children of the Sun, denotes an Industrial Age civilization with futuristic petroleum-based technology. Dieselpunk has also been called “Teslapunk” when describing futuristic electrical technology in an Industrial Age civilization.

Atomicpunk. An Atomic Age civilization where the Great Depression never occurred, and World War II remained a prolonged cold war.

“Nazipunk” places the story in the same time periods, but one where the Nazi's continue existing after World War II has come to an end. Nazipunk has also been called “Blitzpunk.” Examples of this type of timepunk include The Man in the High Castle by Philip K. Dick and Fatherland by Robert Harris.

Transistorpunk. Denotes an exaggerated and glamorized Cold War era society. The ideals and fads of the 1960s prevail, while a countercultural movement moves forward governmental advancement. Transistorpunk has also been called “Psychedelipunk” or “Weedpunk” when describing the psychedelic drug-ridden elements of the society or hemp-based technologies.

Spacepunk. In Spacepunk, the tools of the punk genre are combined with the themes of a Swords and Space tale. Here, a seemingly older civilization with advanced Space Age technology. These stories have also been referred to simply as “Sword and Space” fantasy when dealing with an ancient civilization with advanced technology or “Retrofuturism” when the society is a modern society with advanced technology.

(Return to The "Punk" Subgenre)
(Go to All Sorts of Punk: Mythpunk)

Sexist, Degrading Bullshit II: Comic Book Edition (Part Three)

2007-07-29T15:09:00.000-06:00

(Continued from part 2)

For those of you not already familiar with this ongoing story, you may wish to read part one and part two. The basic premise: Dark Horse Comics is re-publishing John Norman’s Gor in a series of Omnibus Editions--a blatantly sexist work of poorly written sci-fi that advocates victimization of women, and marketing it to “all age groups.” You needn't take my word for it, Bellatrys has sacrificed her time to delve into the work included in the first volume. Her analysis can be found at Nothing New Under the Sun under "Planet of the Complete Bloody Psychopaths" (part 1, part 2, part 3, part 4, part 5, part 6) and "Return to the Planet of the Complete Bloody Psychopaths" (part 1, part 2, part 3, part 4). Bellatrys has also looked into the publishing history of Norman's work, and Kester Pelagius into the film history of the Gor series.

I have presented my concerns to both Dark Horse Comics and Diamond Comic Distributors. I expect to receive a response sometime this week.

Additionally, I attempted to contact the author in regard to his decision to republish this work. Dr. John Lange--who wrote the Gor series under the pseudonym “John Norman”-- is a philosophy professor at Queens College of the City University of New York. Since he ignored my request for comment, I directed my concern to Queens College. They have issued the following official response:

Professor John Lange, who holds a Ph.D. in Philosophy from Princeton University, is a member in good standing of the Queens College Philosophy Department, where he teaches courses in the philosophy of history, the philosophy of knowledge, and the philosophy of the future. Under the First Amendment, the private, legal activities of faculty members do not have a bearing on their employment at the college.

Unsurprisingly, the college failed to address my question regarding their view on the sexist, subservient, and violent treatment of women. Rather, they seemed to think I was attacking their choice in professors. I don't know John Lange, and can't speak to his character beyond his work. Yet, Queens College doesn't seem to understand that standing against the misogynistic words of this professor does not necessitate dismissal of his employment. See Lisa Fourtuner's article "Just Past the Horizon," for a more in-depth discussion in this regard.

However, this brings up another point of contention. For those of you who don't read the comments section, a similar argument was presented by a Mr. Douglas Cahill (not something new for him):

Don't like it don't read it. It is simple in the extreme.The First amendment to the Constitution of the United States guarantees freedom of speech. To use the name of the author, John Norman wrote a 26 book series that has been around since the 1970's. Also published in I don't know how many languages. I've read them and although the BDSM nature of some of the individual books gets tiresome, I've enjoyed reading them all. Kudo's to Black Horse Comics for goung through with this.

To quote Kierkegaard, “People demand freedom of speech to make up for the freedom of thought, which they avoid.”

As I mentioned to Mr. Cahill, the First Amendment does not provide prevention of audience rebuttal or ridicule, or allow for a written work to be published, publicized, distributed or otherwise presented. Further, speech that, taken as a whole, appeals to prurient interests and depicts sexual conduct in a patently offensive way is considered obscene and has no protection under the First Amendment. Hate speech--in this case, speech that intends to degrade, intimidate, or incite violence or prejudicial action against individuals on the basis of gender--has questionable protection when placed in the public setting. Despite the Gor series' standing as obscene or hate speech, once placed in the public forum, all creative work is open to scrutiny.

With this in mind, Greg Morrow gives very succinct reasoning as to why it is unethical to republish Gor.

If you have yet to do so, contact Dark Horse today concerning the publication of the Gor Omnibus. Call Dark Horse at 503.652.8815. Write them via their contact page at http://www.DarkHorse.com/Help/ContactUs.php or via snail mail at:

Dark Horse Comics
10956 SE Main Street
Milwaukie, OR 97222

Also, contact the author in regard to his decision to republish this work. He can be reached via email at: John.Lange@qc.cuny.edu.

Finally, present your concerns to your local comic book shop and the major bookstores in your area (Barnes & Noble, Borders). Let them know their decision to place John Norman’s Gor Omnibus on the shelves will effect your decision to shop there.

(Go to: Sexist, Degrading Bullshit III: Have a Drink, Get Raped)

All Sorts of Punk

2007-07-29T00:00:00.001-06:00

Cyberpunk

In Cyberpunk, the author presents a gritty near-future, often dystopian, setting to examine present issues through the malevolence of technology and the influence of corporations on society. High technology, ruined societies, and a tarnished global environment are often used settings in these stories. The term “Cyberpunk,” coined by author Bruce Bethke in his 1980 short story by the same name, is a portmanteau of “cybernetics” and “punk.” Authors William Gibson, Bruce Sterling, Rudy Rucker, John Shirley and Lewis Shiner helped to launch the movement, heavily influenced by Gibson’s Neromancer. Cyberpunk has also been called “Cybernoir” when using noir fiction tools, and “Cybergoth” when using Gothic fiction tools to accomplish the same goals.

Other styles have developed out of the cyberpunk movement:

Biopunk. Uses elements of noir fiction to examine the social effects of genetic engineering. Biopunk has also been called "ribofunk" by Paul Di Filippo, a lead author in the genre, after ribonucleic acid.

Nanopunk. Uses elements of noir fiction to examine the social effects of nanotechnology.

Post-Cyberpunk. Examines the social effects of a ubiquitous datasphere of computerized information, genetic engineering and body modification, and the continued impact of technological change.

Cyberprep. Attempts to reflect the themes of Cyberpunk by examining technology in a beneficial near-future, often utopian in nature. Cyberprep has also been called “Cybertopia.”

(Return to The "Punk" Subgenre)
(Go to All Sorts of Punk: Splatterpunk)

(Go to Virus)

The "Punk" Subgenre

2007-07-26T00:07:00.000-06:00

by J.E. Remy

In the mid to late 1970s, the United States, England and Australia saw the emergence of a youth subculture influenced by the lyrics of the anti-establishment rock music genre, punk rock. The punk music scene first appeared outside of a small underground movement through the music of the Sex Pistols and the Ramones in New York City and London circa 1975. Soon other bands spread the sound to Los Angeles, Brisbane and Boston. Like Romanticism, the punk movement started as a reaction against the generation before it. The New York Dolls even fashioned themselves after French Symbolist poets like Rimbaud: “Rimbaud would write about the monstrous city and the effects it would have on the species,” said lead singer David JoHansen, in John Savage’s England’s Dreaming: Anarchy, Sex Pistols, and Beyond, “And here it is 1973 and everything is very fast moving and I try to understand how people feel about it, how they relate to the environment. That’s what my songs are about.”

The Sex Pistols enhanced American punk with anger and hopelessness toward their socio-political environment. The Ramones acted like violent, drug-addicted street thugs. Yet each band displayed outrageous and theatrical fashions to mask their strong social and political beliefs. Critical of current society, and inspired by the perception of an individual’s right to freedom, punks embraced individualism, anti-authoritarianism, political anarchism, free thought and expression.

The spirit of the punk movement spread beyond music, first spreading into zines, like New York’s Punk, started by John Holmstrom, Ged Dunn and Legs McNeil in January of 1976. The zines started through a reinterpretation of amateur rock fanzines which, in turn, had been inspired by sci-fi fan fiction fanzines. It wouldn’t take long before the movement came full circle, reaching speculative fiction in the early 1980s.

The suffix “-punk” started to appear in the names of a variety of subgenres of speculative fiction by authors who wanted to break from traditional modes of writing and denote a concurrence between subgenres that makes use of “punk” tools. These tools include the free thought of postmodern literary techniques such as confessional poetry, stream of consciousness, non-linear storytelling, linguistic calisthenics, and literary appreciation beyond the academic. Themes are typically countercultural, focused on underground movements, marginalized groups, and anti-establishment tendencies. However, they can go so far as to become nihilistic in their lack of adherence to clichéd conventions. Settings are gritty, downbeat, and shocking and urban locations where lives are enhanced by technology and information. And the fantastic elements prevalent in speculative fiction are made more realistic, ambiguous, or prosaic and protagonist may take on an individualistic and anti-heroic tone. As author Bruce Sterling stated, “Anything that can be done to a rat can be done to a human being. And we can do most anything to rats. This is a hard thing to think about, but it’s the truth. It won’t go away because we cover our eyes. That is cyberpunk.” This harsh view of reality is prevalent across the whole of the “punk” movement: cyberpunk, splatterpunk, timepunk, and mythpunk.

Some “punk” subgenres have been criticized as being overly categorized and unnecessary. In fact, the movement itself has achieved little more than a cult following, but the nontraditional style has provided new expressive techniques for contemporary literature.

(Go to All Sorts of Punk: Cyberpunk)
(Go to All Sorts of Punk: Splatterpunk)
(Go to All Sorts of Punk: Timepunk)
(Go to All Sorts of Punk: Mythpunk)

Types of Horror

2007-07-25T02:27:00.000-06:00

Supernatural

In Supernatural Horror, the author uses a fantastical creature, typically of a classic sort (i.e. vampires, werewolves, ghosts, demons, zombies, etc.), like Gothic Horror the elements of occult are used to emphasize a particular human weakness or fear in a sort of morality play. This type of tale is similar to Dark Fantasy in its use of dark elements, but is intended to both frighten and caution. The classic ghost story is a well-established version of this horror type. Supernatural Horror has also been called “Supernatural Suspense.”

Several directions can be taken to tell a story of Supernatural Horror:

Horror-of-the-Demonic. The focus of a world where evil forces undermine good through the corruption of innocence—typically for some sort of vengeance on a Christian god. While a common theme in Western culture, Horror-of-the-Demonic was popularized in the late 1960s and early 1970s through such works as Rosemary’s Baby (1967) by Ira Levin and William Peter Blatty's the Exorcist (1971).

J-Horror. Japanese contributions to the horror genre focus on the psychological effects of the supernatural on people. Often using Yūrei, Japanese ghosts, in a watery motif or creatures of Japanese folklore, J-Horror tends to focus on misplaced vengeance and societal shame. This type of horror has been around as long as its Eurocentric cousin, beginning with Bancho Sarayashiki in 1741 (redeveloped by Okamoto Kido in 1916), continuing through the works of Koizumi Yakumo (1850-1904), and more recently Ring (2003) by Koji Suzuki. “K-Horror” uses similar motifs as J-Horror, but from a Korean perspective. J-Horror has also been called “Kaidan Horror,” “Katakana Houra,” or “Kowai Banashi.”

(Return to A History of Horror)
(Return to Types of Horror: Apocalyptic)

"Her face was nothing but red."

2007-07-24T02:51:00.000-06:00

On April 7, Du'a Khalil Aswad--a 17-year-old Iraqi woman--is stoned. In a mob of what seems like thousands, she can see her brothers, her cousin, people she worships alongside. She is almost naked, stripped of any pride. One of her attackers tosses her a loose covering to hide her shame.

Armed police stand by, doing nothing.

Du'a attempts to stand, blood stinging her eyes as she cries for help. She receives taunts in return, several filming the attack on their cell phones. Stones bruise flesh, break skin, and shatter bone. After thirty minutes of agony, someone places all of his hatred in a final blow. Her skull cracks. Her spine breaks. She stops trying to stand. She stops crying out. She stops breathing. She stops.

But they continue.

They drag her to the edge Bashika, her limp body shredded against the ground. The flames take a minute to grow. A dog yelps as they snap its neck, adding the filth to her glowing corpse. Everyone must see her worthlessness. Everyone must know of her love.

...it’s no longer enough to be a decent person. It’s no longer enough to shake our heads and make concerned grimaces at the news. True enlightened activism is the only thing that can save humanity from itself. I’ve always had a bent towards apocalyptic fiction, and I’m beginning to understand why. I look and I see the earth in flames. Her face was nothing but red.
--Joss Whedon

Do your part. Click here for more information.

Types of Horror/All Sorts of Punk

2007-07-24T02:14:00.000-06:00

Splatterpunk

In Splatterpunk Horror, the author attempts to disturb the audience by use of a variety of grotesque and gory images. The term "Splatterpunk," coined by David J. Schow at the World Fantasy Convention in Providence in the mid-80s, is used less often since the original inception of this type of horror. Now used mainly to refer to the originators of this style, Extreme Horror is the more current term. Splatterpunk has also been called "Gross-out" or "Gore" Horror.

Several methods are used in Extreme Horror to present elements of the grotesque:

Body horror. The classic rampaging monster used in the movies has made its way onto the page, but more effective elements of the grotesque have also been used in Extreme Horror literature. In Body Horror, for instance, the author attempts to create a sense of alienation with the body. There may be physical transformation or degeneration, disease, or the invasion of foreign organisms. The focus remains on the psychological effects of the individual undergoing the changes, but demonstrates the changes in a grotesque fashion. Body Horror has also been called "Biological" Horror.

(Return to A History of Horror)
(Return to The "Punk" Subgenre)

(Go to Types of Horror: Supernatural)
(Go to All Sorts of Punk: Timepunk)
(Go to Splatterpaint)

Sexist, Degrading Bullshit II: Comic Book Edition (Part Two)

2007-07-23T01:09:00.000-06:00

(Continued from Part One)

For the few of you who are still unaware, Dark Horse Comics is publishing John Norman’s Gor Omnibus Vol. 1, to be released November 21, 2007. The three novels--collected in this first of the series of omnibus editions--are blatantly sexist works of poorly written science fiction. With gender stereotypes, submissive roles for women, and barely disguised rape scenes--no one should find this work acceptable… but to market it to “all age groups”?

I have written to Dark Horse in regard to their decision, but not yet received a reply. However, Steven G. Saunders, author of “All the Rage” for Silver Bullet Comic Books, has obtained a statement. Mike Richardson, head of Dark Horse, says:

We picked up a number of successful fantasy series that have been long out of print. [The Gor series] was one of the titles available. We knew there would be some controversy, but sometimes the best work is that which inspires a strong reaction.

If you have yet to do so, write to Dark Horse today. Let Mr. Richardson know his decision to support the subjugation and victimization of women is causing this strong reaction, not "good work." The publication of this obscene material is unacceptable--as is the decision to market it to "all age groups."

Call Dark Horse at 503.652.8815. Write them via their contact page at http://www.DarkHorse.com/Help/ContactUs.php or via snail mail at:

Dark Horse Comics
10956 SE Main Street
Milwaukie, OR 97222

If you have already written Dark Horse, don’t stop there.

Contact the author in regard to his decision to republish this work. Dr. John Lange--who wrote the Gor series under the pseudonym “John Norman”-- is a philosophy professor at Queens College of the City University of New York. He can be reached via email at: John.Lange@qc.cuny.edu. When writing Dr. Lange, keep in mind his previous claims of discrimination against him.

Present your concerns to your local comic book shop and the major bookstores in your area (Barnes & Noble, Borders). Let them know their decision to place John Norman’s Gor Omnibus on the shelves will effect your decision to shop there.

(Go to Part Three)

P.S. Thanks to Tamora Pierce, Alternatefish, the women of "When Fangirls Attack," Simargl Wings, and Nagaina for bringing more attention to this issue.

Update: Received a faux-reply from Freddye Lins of Dark Horse, who states:

Hi Jeremy,

Thank you for your interest and concern for Dark Horse.

I will pass your email onto our editorial department for review. I can't say if it will make an impact, but we do appreciate hearing from our fans (whether its good or bad--though to be honest, good does make us a lot happier).

Best,

Freddye @ DHC :)

[Professional opening followed by statement of intent. After that say whatever the fuck you want] "Can't say if it will make an impact," [insert joking line here followed by a smiley]?

So professional. I truly feel as though my concern is being seriously addressed.

I'll be making a phone call tomorrow.

Types of Horror

2007-07-23T00:12:00.000-06:00

Quiet

In Quiet Horror, the author develops the story with little or no mayhem and blood. The tale doesn't insight large-scale scares, rather creating an overall eerie mood. Growing out of mid to late 20th century American culture, the idea was to take what would otherwise be a normal situation and make it scary. Freudian psychology, prosaic locations, and brightly-lit scenes--all previously unimportant to the horror genre--become central to the fear. Quiet Horror has also been called “Suspense Fiction” or "Horror-of-Personality."

(Return to A History of Horror)
(Go to Types of Horror: Splatterpunk)

Types of Horror

2007-07-22T02:06:00.000-06:00

Psychological

In Psychological Horror, the author refrains from making use of the supernatural, instead utilizing more pragmatic means of frightening the reader. Typically, this type of horror involves an insane and murderous antagonist and an unlikely hero. Psychological Horror has also been called "Thriller Fiction," and "Psychological Thriller."

So-called "smart" horror, Psychological Horror started in early mysteries, but developed through pulp fiction:

Weird Menace. Weird Menace stories were popular in the “shudder pulps” of the 1930s and 1940s. They featured a hero pitted against a sadistic antagonist—often a “yellow peril” style character—where graphic scenes of violence and death were used to frighten the reader. Pulp stories such as Zorro’s 12 Must Die (1935), and heroes such as Doc Savage, were the eventual development of continually darkening pulps such as Weird Tales.

(Return to A History of Horror)
(Go to Types of Horror: Quiet)

Types of Horror

2007-07-21T02:10:00.000-06:00

Non-Fiction

In Non-Fiction Horror, the author attempts to highlight the horrific elements of an actual event.

(Return to A History of Horror)
(Go to Types of Horror: Psychological)

Types of Horror

2007-07-20T02:05:00.000-06:00

Lovecraftian

In Lovecraftian Horror, the author sets the work of horror within the world created by H.P. Lovecraft for the pulp Weird Tales. The author may also makes use of some element of Lovecraft's creations to establish a particular feel. Typically, this type of horror involves some great unknown, and possibly unknowable, evil that cannot be escaped. In such stories, humanity is unaware of the feeble nature of its reality. As Lovecraft himself stated, “The most merciful thing in the world, I think, is the inability of the human mind to correlate all its contents.” The protagonist of Lovecraftian horror rarely survives with his sanity.

Lovecraftian Horror has also been called “Lovecraft Mythos,” “Cthulhu Mythos,” “Cosmic Horror,” and “Weird Horror.”

Obviously, the work of H.P. Lovecraft is a prime example of this type of horror, but both collaborators--such as Robert Bloch collected shorts in Mysteries of the Worm (1981)--and followers--such as Brian Lumley in Necroscope (1986)--have presented their own take as well.

(Return to A History of Horror)

(Go to Types of Horror: Non-Fiction)
(Go to Pulp Fiction: Weird)

Sexist, Degrading Bullshit II: Comic Book Edition

2007-07-19T20:34:00.000-06:00

Featured in:
16th Carnival of Feminist Science Fiction and Fantasy Fans

For those of you unfamiliar with Gor, it's a science fiction world written of in a series of novels by Dr. John Lange--under the pseudonym “John Norman.” Lange is a philosophy professor at Queens College of the City University of New York, who found inspiration for his Gor novels through Edgar Rice Burroughs’ John Carter of Mars, Nietzschian philosophy, and historic military engagements. Dark Horse Comics describes it this way:

When Tarnsman of Gor was first published in 1966, author John Norman introduced the world to Tarl Cabot, a man ripped from his homeland and cast across space to the savage world of Gor, where thousands of kidnapped prisoners toiled as slaves for the all-powerful Priest-Kings.

Part science fiction, part adventure novel, the stories in the world of Gor would unfold to show Tarl Cabot's growth from a novice to a man whose fate might determine the course of every man, woman, and child on Gor.

John Norman's Gor Omnibus 1 collects the first three novels in the series. Prepare to take a journey to a land of passion and sorcery.

The first of a series of affordable omnibus editions collecting the longest-running science fiction action/adventure series of all time.
With twenty-six books in the Gor series, there are millions of copies in print, with a global audience that reaches across all age groups and demographics.

What isn’t to love? Quite a bit, actually. The “thousands of kidnapped prisoners” toiling as slaves are, almost universally, naked and underdressed women bound by steel collars and bracelets. The story is “part science fiction, part adventure novel,” but also part BDSM pornography. Lang takes the darkest portions of Nietzschian philosophy, twisting ideas of master and slave morality to reflect a “natural” submission of women to men. Don't believe me? Read for yourself:

In Gorean mythology, it is said that there was once a war between men and women and that the women lost, and the Priest-Kings, not wishing the women to be killed, made them beautiful, but as the price of this gift decreed that they, and their daughters, to the end of time, would be the slaves of men.
--Dancer of Gor, page 352

And yet it was not a strange thing, particularly not on Gor, where bravery is highly esteemed and to save a female’s life is in effect to win title to it, for it is the option of a Gorean male to enslave any woman whose life he has saved, a right which is seldom denied even by the citizens of the girl’s city or her family. The Gorean man, as a man, cheerfully and dutifully attends to the rescuing of his female in distress, but as a Gorean, as a true Gorean, he feels, perhaps justifiably and being somewhat less or more romantic than ourselves, that he should have something more for his pains than her kiss of gratitude and so, in typical Gorean fashion, puts his chain on the wench, claiming both her and her body as his payment.
--Priest Kings of Gor, page 138

In the eyes of Gorean law you are an animal. You have no name in your own right. You may be collared and leashed. You may be bought and sold, whipped, treated as the master pleases, disposed of as he sees fit. You have no rights whatsoever. Legally you have no more status than a tarsk or vulo. Legally, literally, you are an animal.
--Explorers of Gor, page 316

It’s doubtful that this blatantly sexist work of poorly written science fiction would reach out to “all age groups and demographics” on its own. The misogynistic Gor books have inspired niche segments of the BDSM community--including UK-based sex-slavery cult, the Kaotians--with gender stereotypes, submissive roles for women, and barely disguised rape scenes. Yet, Dark Horse feels it not only appropriate to support the subjugation and victimization of women by republishing this long out-of-print work, but to market it to “all age groups.”

State your concern regarding the nature of this work, by calling or writing to Dark Horse. Their phone number is 503.652.8815. They can be reached via their contact page at http://www.DarkHorse.com/Help/ContactUs.php or via snail mail at:

Dark Horse Comics
10956 SE Main Street
Milwaukie, OR 97222

I also encourage you to write directly to Dr. Lang at: John.Lange@qc.cuny.edu

It may also be beneficial to inform your local comic book shop of your concerns.

Update: Just finished reading an interesting (albeit older) Salon article about "Goreans"--individuals that base their lifestyle around the novels of John Norman. Two of the most disturbing quotations I think I've ever read. From a "slave" (she is not allowed to use the pronoun "I"):

The day this one begged for her rape is one of the happiest of this girl's life.

From a "master":

If women respond the most to the Master who takes them without even showing the weakness of begging permission, then why should I, who know myself to be such a man, ask their consent? That is why I've said I am leaning against consent as an ideal.

(Continued in Part 2)

Types of Horror

2007-07-19T02:02:00.000-06:00

Humorous

In Humorous Horror, the author seeks to both scare and amuse. There are levels to the comedy that can be brought to horror. A small amount serves to heighten the horror by making the non-horrific events light-hearted. A sort of corruption of innocence then tends to happen. A large amount serves to make light of the horror and make little more than an amusingly dark story.

(Return to A History of Horror)
(Go to Types of Horror: Lovecraftian)

Types of Horror

2007-07-18T01:59:00.000-06:00

Historical

In Historical Horror, the author uses a historical event or particular time period to establish an atmosphere to the work of horror. This is a similar sub-genre to Non-Fiction Horror, except the events don’t necessarily have to be based on fact, only set during an actual time period.

Modern examples of such fiction can be found in Elizabeth Kostova’s The Historian (2005) and Mark Ricketts Night Trippers (2006)

Historical events and themes can also be used to expand upon any fictional world:

Alternate History. In Alternative History, the story is set in a world with clear connections to our history, but a distinct divergence has altered events from the history we know. This divergence has caused society to develop in a way that is different from our own, and the story makes use of this new society to examine the ramifications of that change. While the reason for this divergence is often left unexplained, some tales will make use of magical, cross-time, or multiverse themes.

Lost History. In Lost History, the story is set in a world with connections to our history, but provides an account of a history forgotten through the passage of time. Society to develop in the same manner as our own, but the forgotten history gives a glimpse into a world that might have been.

Secret History. In Secret History, the story is set in a world with clear connections to our history, but provides an account of a concealed or suppressed history. Society developed in the same manner as our own, but the suppressed history sheds a new light on why events took place in the manner which they did.

(Return to A History of Horror)
(Go to Types of Horror: Humorous)

Types of Horror

2007-07-17T01:57:00.000-06:00

Gothic

In Gothic Horror, the author makes use of Gothic imagery (i.e. dark castles, medieval ruins, graveyards and tombs) and romantic suspense to establish a particular feel to the work. This type of horror leans heavily upon the idea of a dark past holding tightly against or encroaching upon a more enlightened present. This has also been called “Romantic Suspense.”

“Gothic” was a medieval term used disparagingly to describe elements of culture that were rude and barbaric. The term was later embraced by 18th century romantics, who felt the architecture labeled “Gothic” showed the beauty of darker, extreme emotions. From this perspective, various fashions and styles started taking on a Gothic theme—eventually finding its way into the romantic fiction of the time. Starting with Horace Walpole’s The Castle of Otranto (1764), the gothic-feel lasted until well past the late 19th century with stories like Charlotte Perkins' “The Yellow Wallpaper” (1892).

Southern Gothic. A second gothic revival occurred in the American South during the 1930s, 50s and 60s. Here, Gothic archetypes and grotesque characters are used to create both empathy and disgust. Antebellum stereotypes are confronted through highlighting of racial bigotry and self-righteousness. Excellent examples of Southern Gothic include Flannery O’Connor’s Wise Blood (1952) and William Faulkner’s As I Lay Dying (1930).

(Return to A History of Horror)
(Go to Types of Horror: Historical)

Types of Horror

2007-07-16T01:54:00.000-06:00

Erotic

In Erotic Horror, the author seeks to both frighten and titillate. Visceral horror is paired with elements of desire and flesh; pain and pleasure tend to overlap. Erotic Horror has also been called “Dark Erotica.”

Some claim that sex has always been a constant in horror, at least metaphorically. In Dark Echo, Paula Guran stated, “In our culture today, the only traditional equation of sex with danger and death is not only metaphorical, but a reality we confront constantly. As an integral horror metaphor or as an explicit evocation—sex may have become as important to horror as the supernatural.” By exploiting that metaphor, anthologies such as the Hot Blood series of books have become quite successful.

As might be expected, the level to which the mirroring of pain and pleasure occur can vary:

Ero Guro. Ero Guro Nansensu is a mainly Japanese subgenre of Erotic Horror, a play on the English terms “erotic grotesque nonsense.” Beginning in the 1920s and 1930s, such erotic material was largely censored by the Japanese government during World War II, but is returning to popularity more recently in the form of manga. Here, the macabre is bizarre and violent, heavily mixed with sexual overtones. Fear is often replaced by shock; titillation by disgust.

(Return to A History of Horror)
(Go to Types of Horror: Gothic)

Types of Horror

2007-07-15T01:51:00.000-06:00

Dark Fantasy

In Dark Fantasy, the author uses the fantastic and supernatural to tell a story that uses dark elements, but may not necessarily be intended to frighten the audience. Some argue that horror involving vampires, werewolves, or ghosts shouldn't be included in this category, but the difference often has little to do with the creature as it does the theme. Dark Fantasy has also been called “Dark Fiction.”

There are levels to the use of the supernatural in Dark Fantasy, uneasily broken into Fantastique, Magic Realism, and Horror Sci-Fi:

The Fantastique. In Fantastique Horror, supernatural phenomena and magical elements are introduced in an otherwise realist narrative. Characters in the narrative are unwilling or hesitant to accept the supernatural—leading to doubt, disbelief, fear and the attempt to rationalize. This type of horror is quite popular in French fiction, demonstrated in works such at Gaston Leroux's The Phantom of the Opera (1910) and Jean Ray's Malpertuis (1943).

Magic Realism. In Magic Realism, supernatural phenomena and magical elements appear in an otherwise realistic narrative. Characters in the narrative may believe or disbelieve in the supernatural as intuitively logical, often due to the incorporation of legend or folklore. The reader is often left uncertain with how to interpret the magical and realistic events in the story. This type of horror quite popular in Latin American fiction, demonstrated in works such as Mário de Andrade's Macunaíma (1928) and Gabriel García Márquez's One Hundred Years of Solitude (1967).

Horror Sci-Fi. In Horror Sci-Fi, supernatural phenomena and magical elements are explained through technological, physical, historical, sociological, or philosophical ways. Characters will likely believe in the supernatural element, based on the explanation provided in the narrative. As Arthur C. Clarke stated “Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.” Early examples of horror sci-fi can be seen in Mary Shelley's Frankenstein; or the Modern Prometheus (1818) and H.G. Wells' The Invisible Man (1897).

Additional combinations between fantasy and horror also exist:

Bangsian Fantasy. In Bangsian Fantasy, the story includes a plot set wholly or partially in the Afterlife. Named for John Kendrick Bangs, who wrote a series of novels in the late 19th and early 20th centuries about a group known as the Associated Shades. The Associated Shades were a group of dead characters that experienced their adventures in the afterlife. Characters used in a Bangsian Fantasy are typically historical or mythical in nature and frequent the good (Elysium/Nirvana/Heaven), neutral (Underworld/Limbo/Purgatory), and bad (Erebus/Gehenna/Hell) sections of the afterlife.

(Return to A History of Horror)
(Go to Types of Horror: Erotic)

Sexist, degrading bullshit (Part 3)

2007-07-14T15:58:00.000-06:00

Gary Baseman's show "Hide and Seek in the Forest of ChouChou" starts today at Billy Shire Fine Arts Culver City, CA. Thank you to everyone who has taken seriously the concerns I expressed about this show (see Part 1 and Part 2). I have received encouraging email from a variety of you, and hope those who have expressed similar concerns will address them with the artist and gallery.

If you have not yet stated your concern regarding the nature of this show, I would encourage you to call or write the gallery displaying Baseman’s work, Billy Shire Fine Arts. Their phone number is 323.297.0600. The gallery director, Annie Adjchavanich can be reached at: AnnieA@BillyShireFineArts.com

I also encourage you to write directly to Mr. Baseman at: BasemanArt@earthlink.net

Update: It has been several days since writing to Mr. Baseman. And, while I have not received a direct reply to my concerns, he has linked this critical response to his own website (filed under "A Blog of Venomous Goo").

***

There have been a handful of replies to my original posts that still seem unable to see the sexist and degrading nature of the show. I have replied to each individual with a more detailed analysis, but recognize there may still be questions in the minds of readers who have not taken the time to write. For this reason, I will attempt to break down some answers to specific questions that have come up across these replies.

Do you know/have a vendetta against Gary Baseman? I don’t know Mr. Baseman beyond his art, and cannot speak to the quality of his character beyond the pieces he has presented for public scrutiny. My concern is that no one with a voice in the art world seems to be acknowledging the degradation apparent in this body of work. While readily visible, there is a general apathy toward calling on Baseman’s art for what it is: a mockery of his female fans.
Do you just hate Pop Surrealism/Lowbrow art or happen to be Republican/conservative/religious/[insert whatever personal attack here]/trying to manipulate me? There are some pop surrealists I enjoy (Eric Joyner, Scott Musgrove, Chet Zar, etc.). This isn't about taste, it's about objectifying women and treating them as only valuable in terms of male sexual conquest. It also has nothing to do with my political stance, philosophy, or religious beliefs. That said, I’m not Republican, conservative, or religious. You are welcome to whatever opinion you have regarding Baseman’s show; I’m stating my opinion and backing my concerns with information you can use to make a personal decision.
Where do you see misogyny apparent in “Hide and Seek…”? Misogyny can be seen through the obvious use of a virgin/whore dichotomy in women-doll-children who are both sexually attractive and innocent. Painted in sexualized positions with personal ability and independent action ignored, the women become disarmed, infantilized and subordinate.

Where do you see subjugation/women valued only as objects apparent in “Hide and Seek…”? Subjugation can be seen through the nude (or Stepford-wife-clothed) women—no men—pinned by piles of ChouChous, and placed in sexualized positions while they are used as props without independent action. Baseman’s work sells for thousands.
Where do you see victimization apparent in “Hide and Seek…”? Victimization is apparent in the ChouChous assaulting, grappling, and ejaculating on childlike women.
Aren’t there worse artists? There are artists who are presenting themes of a similar nature, if not worse (KuKula and BuffMonster – 1, 2 – were brought to my attention in this regard). These themes should be just as concerning. Yet, the images they present don’t make the misogyny in Baseman’s art any less disgusting, they just verify the existence of a culture where attitudes excuse—if not condone or normalize—disrespecting and disregarding women.

***

With that in mind, if KuKula and BuffMonster concerned you, I encourage you to be just as vocal:

RE: Buffmonster

Call or write the gallery displaying BuffMonster’s show (Wet Dream, August 11 – September 8), Split Obsession. Their phone number is 808.395.3380. The manager of the location providing gallery space for Split Obsession, Suzie Setzler of to Koko Marina Center can be reached at: 808.395.4737 or SSetzler@SofoRealty.com

Hotel Des Arts in San Francisco has an ongoing display of incredibly offensive BuffMonster art. Their phone number is 415.957.3232 or 800.956.4322. They can also be contacted via their “Contact Us” page (http://www.sfhoteldesarts.com/contact.php) or via email at: reservations@sfhoteldesarts.com

I also encourage you to write directly to BuffMonster through his MySpace page at: MySpace.com/BuffMonster

RE: KuKula

Call or write the gallery displaying KuKula’s show (July 13 – August 4), Roq la Rue. Their phone number is 206.374.8977. The owner, Kirsten, can be reached via email at: Kirsten@RoqLaRue.com

The next gallery displaying KuKula’s show (October 2007), Shooting Gallery, can be reached by phone at 415.931.8035. The owner, Justin Giarla, can be reached via email at: Justin@ShootingGalleriesF.com

I also encourage you to write directly to KuKula at: KuKula@KuKulaLand.com

Update: As a note, David Pescovitz of BoingBoing recently advertised KuKula’s show. If you have concerns regarding this show, it would also be helpful to contact him at: David@Pesco.net

(Go to: Sexist, Degrading Bullshit II: Comic Book Edition)

Types of Horror

2007-07-14T01:42:00.000-06:00

Apocalyptic

In Apocalyptic Horror, the story revolves around the end of the world, or the threat of the world ending if the protagonist fails in achieving some goal.

The variety of catastrophic events and scenarios are used in Apocalyptic Horror to demonstrate the End should also be noted:

The Biblical End. Classically, Apocalyptic Horror makes use of the biblical End is used—characterized by events described in the Bible's Book of Revelation becoming a reality. Left Behind (1995) by Tim LaHaye and Jerry Jenkins is a good example of this type of horror, as is Brian Keene's The Rising (2003). The Rising, however, also overlaps with the Zombie-style End.

The Dystopian End. A dystopian End is characterized by oppressive and widespread social control, usually by an authoritarian or totalitarian government. The world, as the narrative presents it, is often a near-utopia, but a single flaw (or the nature of utopian society relative to our own) makes it dystopian. Other than a small flaw, the dystopian world would be a utopia. Dystopia Horror has also been called "catotopia," "kakotopia," or "anti-utopian" horror. "The Lottery" (1948) by Shirley Jackson and A Clockwork Orange (1962) by Anthony Burgess demonstrate dystopia at its best.

The Pandemic End. A Pandemic End is characterized by the world ravaged by plague. Mary Shelly's The Last Man (1826) was an early demonstration of such an end, more popularly Steven King's The Stand (1978) started a pseudo-biblical apocalypse with a plague.

The Zombie End. A Zombie End is characterized by the dead rising from the grave to destroy the living. I Am Legend (1954) by Richard Matheson twisted the Pandemic-style End to create this new twist on Apocalyptic horror. More recently, the graphic novel The Walking Dead (2003) by Robert Kirkman has put a more human face on the style.

Post-Apocalyptic. The story is set in the world that exists after an apocalyptic disaster. This type of fiction has also been called “ruined Earth” or “dying Earth” fiction.

(Return to A History of Horror)
(Go to Types of Horror: Dark Fantasy)

Sexist, degrading bullshit (Part 2)

2007-07-09T00:06:00.000-06:00

(Continued from Part 1)

For any of you who are still paying attention, Gary Baseman's show "Hide and Seek in the Forest of ChouChou" is still scheduled at Billy Shire Fine Arts in Culver City, CA. The pieces in this show are misogynistic representations of doll-like women painted in thinly disguised "cumshots."

Mark Frauenfelder of BoingBoing touted this side of Baseman recently, drawing this artist to my attention (more on this here). I wrote to Mark with my concern:

Mark,

As a reader of BoingBoing, I am concerned by your recent advertising of Gary Baseman's ChouChou Show. The pieces in this show--and thumbnailed on your article--are blatantly sexist "cumshots" that you chose to highlight as an upcoming art event, rather than pointing out the degrading nature of his work.

Since I never had an interest in Baseman prior to seeing these disgusting images, I didn't take the time to glance at his work. Now that I have, there is an obvious theme of victimization. I hope you can recognize this theme as well.

With this in mind, I encourage you to retract your support of Gary Baseman's show.

Thank you for your time and consideration.

Sincerely,

J.E. Remy

Mark was kind enough to write back to me and acknowledged that he had no desire to place anything advocating victimization on the site. Nonetheless, he found Baseman's art to be nothing more than "weird" and "quasi-sexual," not warranting any change to the site. I've written back, more specifically addressing the concern, but have yet to hear anything new--I'll let you know if I do.

In the meantime, I would encourage those of you with similar concerns write Mark at mark@boingboing.net/

You may also wish to write the gallery displaying this work, Billy Shire Fine Arts. The gallery director, Annie Adjchavanich can be reached at: AnnieA@billyshirefinearts.com

Update: I have sent email to both Billy Shire Fine Arts and Mr. Baseman directly. At this point, neither has replied.

(Continued in Part 3)

Sexist, degrading bullshit

2007-07-07T01:12:00.001-06:00

Gary Baseman's ChouChou Show is some of the most blatantly sexist "art" I've seen in a long time. The fact that Mark Frauenfelder is touting this side of Baseman--rather than pointing out the degrading nature of this work--may be enough for me to stop reading BoingBoing altogether. Baseman's images are misogynistic representations of doll-like women placed in situations where "joy" arrives at the bukkake end of sticky, white ChouChou juice. It certainly makes me question the scruples of Billy Shire Fine Arts, a gallery more concerned with being hip enough to display lowbrow/pop surrealism art than its support of the objectification of women.

Update: I was never interested in Baseman before, so I didn’t take the time to glance at his work. Now that I have--due to the chauvinistic images displayed on BoingBoing (apparently a theme)--I cannot believe he is being respected in the art community. Skeleton bones pushing through thin slits cut into fish women and cats; children and doll-like women placed in suggestive and vulnerable poses; phallic bubbles surrounding objectified female figures where all other characters are drooling and staring lecherously at her naked form; women with bound legs and arms; blackface muppet ChouChou’s with semen pouring from their bellybuttons. It isn’t difficult to see the ongoing theme here.

Baseman claims it’s “pervasive art” that appears childlike “but it’s really an adult allegory about desire, longing, sex, the acceptance of man’s attraction to unattainable beauty.” Let’s be honest, Mr. Baseman. Your art isn’t “pervasive,” it’s invasive. You create a disparaging adult fantasy where women are objects to be victimized by man’s attraction, and hide it under the childlike illusion of hipster art.

The National Portrait Gallery and Rome’s National Gallery of Modern Art should be embarrassed to have your work in their collections.

(Continued in Part 2)

Virus

2007-06-12T00:18:00.000-06:00

by J.E. Remy

Featured in:
The Blog Carnival For Short Stories IV

It was more obdurate than he originally believed; a digital parasite with a pension for spilling out through the corners of the screen. Cordyceps NanoEris is what she called it, a virus transmitted via human contact (and what cowboy worth his salt didn’t download his virus/worm/spyware onto nanos anymore) but could actually infect humans, with or without wetware.

They knew he’d firewalled the systems; all they needed to do was lock down before leaving. Still, some idiot in the Company goes baggy pantsing between offices, leaving this ancient dickless-workstation open, and the virus took advantage of bit rot—mutating into the crawling horror now before him. For an hour and a half he attempted damage control before realizing it was just what the beast wanted. For the next hour and a half he tried the direct approach, but every time he thought he’d figured out a bit of code, the solution would simply de-rezz. Not as if it mattered—in the time he’d wasted cracking code, innumerable nanos bled through his skin and attached to a variety of neural pathways.

This was going to be a very long night.

***

“I’m in,” he called back, slowly stepping through the office. Almost indolently, he glanced between cubicles—row after row after row of harrowing alcoves. It could have taken all night to find the body, but this was an inside job.

“Well, Mr. Johnson will be pleased to see the program suite does its job.” He knelt down, staring at the face of the corpse below him, “What about the collar?”

“Forget him,” the commlink crackled in his ear. At some point he’d get a bioware link—until then, he had to depend on Chip’s drekky PLTG.

“You don’t think someone’s gonna wonder why the meat checked out after hours?”

“He’s just some bit-jockey. Nobody’ll give a damn. Grab the console and don’t forget what I told you: Sagans and Sagans of those little bastards.”

He clapped his hands and the firewall gloves started to hum. Like smoking a beehive; it kept the tiny buggers confused and docile. Their iso-pentyl transmissions should keep quiet for a while, leaving any nanospores in the air without instructions from the host swarm, and making it safe long enough to get the machine out of here.

“How’s this steam-powered piece of shit work anyway?”

“Automagic. Go ahead, press the button and find out.”

“Ha. Ha.”

***

“Most users won’t even know they’ve been infected.” She took a slow drag from her Partagas; the cigarette’s tip crackled lightly. “At best, they may assume they’ve contracted one of the lesser viruses we’ve already offered freeware patches and antivirus protection for. And even if they take an antiviral agent, the nanospores will have more than enough time to imbed themselves into the soft tissue of the host.”

“But, the choice is completely random?”

“Yes. The virus is supplied with thousands of possible death scenarios. One is chosen at the moment of infection. When it’s time to die, mycelia probes grow into the brain, modify behavior and lead the host to their chosen destiny.”

“Still, the choice is random. What good can that possibly do us?” There was tension in his voice. He’d given a small fortune for the development of the virus, and shipments to Shanghai were scheduled for next Tuesday. He couldn’t afford any mistakes.

She leaned in close, the stale scent of smoke striking his face. His lack of insight was insulting. This was art.

“You were looking for a universal and invisible weapon. We’ve created one. The method of death is random. The time of death needn’t be. Spore growth appears arbitrary, but functions at a controlled rate—unless otherwise specified. Slow them down, speed them up… The host’s sequence number provides you with the trigger.”

That’s what he needed; spell it out.

“And what if a target decides to decline use of the initial program suite?”

She smiled. Now she could demonstrate the true beauty of her creation.

“Upon death of the host, the nanospores transfer from the body into the surrounding area. Before long, not a single soul will lack infection. The world is about to change, Mr. Johnson.”

All I Really Need To Know I Learned From Mommy and Comics

2007-04-05T23:27:00.000-06:00

by J.E. Remy

My mother denied herself the life she deserved. At age eighteen she abandoned a job as a flight attendant and dreams of college to marry my father. In the years that followed, she gave birth to six children—four boys and two girls. When her first child died from SIDS (and she was shortly thereafter informed she was again pregnant) her place in life was solidified. Despite the lack of control she had over her first son’s life—or perhaps because of it—she wouldn’t allow her next child to be taken from her. She would be the best mother she knew how, caring little about any other aspect of her own life. I was given love and respect, an education beyond that which the public school offered; my growth was nurtured further than could be reasonably expected from any one woman.

Without my mother, I wouldn’t have chosen the path of a writer. Forget what they taught me in high school, or what they’re still trying to teach me in college. Without her, words would still be something altogether elusive to me.

I was two grades behind for my reading level in elementary school. The school’s answer was to hold me back a grade, ignoring the fact that their method of teaching wasn’t working for me. My mother would have nothing of it. She knew her son was smarter than most of the kids in his class, even if the administration couldn’t see it. They failed to give him the education he deserved, so she would.

We spent an entire summer that year, and not a day passed that we didn’t read a book. Dr. Seuss, the Berenstain Bears, and Shel Silverstein were just the beginning. I would soon become an avid reader of James Howe’s Bunnicula series and any book describing the many monsters of Universal and Hammer films. My mother didn’t care what it was I wanted to read, only that I was reading. Hers was an odd mix between current-traditional pedagogy and minimalist pedagogy. From a current-traditional approach, proper pronunciation was insisted upon and I was never denied the definition of a word of which I was unsure. From a minimalist approach, she constantly hounded me to “sound it out” and “look at the sentence—tell me what you think it means.”

Critics claim current-traditional pedagogy “is limited to getting students to use grammar correctly, to conform to formal and stylistic conventions, and to argue exclusively from existing authority available in books” (Burnham 22). This may be true, but this was the starting point that the public school’s educational model wasn’t providing. I needed to understand grammar, style, and the knowledge available in books. Avoiding this method of teaching was doing little more than ignoring the very foundation that was necessary for me to build upon. The addition of minimalist pedagogy “she put [my] long-term interests ahead of short-term interests” (Sherwood 3).

By the end of the summer, I was two grades ahead for my reading level and beginning to write my own stories. While I’ve learned a great deal since those days, never have I been taught as effectively as I was over that summer.

Through most of my schooling, I was given little in the way of an appropriate academic approach to my learning: Terrible formatting examples made little sense to the direction my mind wanted to approach writing. Outlining and multiple drafts left me feeling as if I was acting out a redundant and tedious exercise. Tests—provided with the threat of destroying my future potential if I were to get a grade below what was expected of students—left me more fearful than excited to pick up a pen. The “interpretation of literary texts and the production of rhetorical texts” based around the overused and often archaic questions of unsophisticated teachers took any amusement out of the process all together (Berlin 183). While I was going to school, students were “a commodity to be weighed and measured, and nationally normed achievement tests were introduced in virtually all of the states [resulting] in a decline of writing instruction in the public schools” (Berlin 212). To this day the negative reinforcement has left me with heavy test anxiety and a general annoyance for academia. It wasn’t until my Junior and Senior years of high school that effective methods of developing my writing were presented to me.

Larry Gries mentored me through my Junior year creative writing class, working as Editor-in-Chief of the school literary magazine, and Advanced English for the first half of my Senior year. Holding strong to some current-traditional approaches—breaking down sentences and strictly following Chicago and MLA styles—his was mostly an expressive process approach emphasizing “freewriting, voice, personal narrative, and writing as a form of discovery [stressing] the organic nature of the composing process” (Tobin 9). Through his methods, I was able to find a voice for my writing, both creatively and academically, and learn to trust myself as a writer. Now, this isn’t to say he was one of the kind, gentle, get-in-touch-with-your-inner-writer types. He was stern; from the older school of teaching. His praise was seldom, but when he complimented something about your writing you knew he meant it. I’ll never forget the day that I overheard he and another student discussing the short story I’d read in class that day.

“He’s pretty good.” She said, complimenting my work.

“Yes,” he replied, “but don’t let him hear you say it—he’ll get a big head.”

Those words were all that got me through the second half of my final year of high school. My family moved back to Utah, and—due to some rhetorical confusion over the terms used for advanced studies between states and a difference in opinion in regard to Huxley’s Brave New World—I ended up in an English class two years behind my previous class. I’d love to tell you the manner in which this class was taught but, to be frank, I didn’t pay enough attention.

From graduation to college, I spent several years learning on my own. Autodidactic pedagogy I guess you would call it. I did well enough with this method to warrant working as a supervisor over a national email response team. There, a collaborative pedagogy existed within “a community of knowledgeable peers” (Howard 54). Constant feedback in a professional environment assisted in developing a further grasp on my writing ability. I left this promising leadership position in the business world to focus my efforts in a more fulfilling direction, only when offered a better position that would have solidified my career.

I became a continuing student at age twenty-eight. My interest in the field of religion and a desire to understand ethical dilemmas—and find solutions—led me to a Philosophy major. A talent with words and interest in creative writing and English literature led me to an English minor. Through constant effort, my academic achievement has remained above average, but I again feel unchallenged. Rhetoric and process are a large focus of the current model of teaching, but I’ve taken what I can from these models. Either the pedagogies or the professors have little left to offer.

I am currently employed at the Community Writing Center, a non-profit organization open to all Salt Lake area residents. It is here that I have found my newest and best method of learning to date: I teach others. As a writing assistant, I work to support, motivate, and educate people of all abilities and educational backgrounds who want to use writing for practical needs, civic engagement, and personal expression.

I’ve changed drastically from that little boy who could barely read. Now a five page paper is only a challenge when the first draft was too concise, answering everything in only in two pages. I find myself editing more often than I am able to read the work of other authors. Pre-determined academic assignments tend to do little more than cause ennui. Not to imply my talent cannot be improved—far from it. Yet, a determined mother, an autodidactic nature, loving friends with honest feedback, hard work and several lucky breaks have left me the ability to formulate words in ways some find too complex to attempt.

I’ve also found my way past the most difficult part: finding the words. I’ve given up on the formats taught to me in high school, left behind the redundant outlining, and found the ability to recognize good and bad feedback. So, how do I find the words? I think Steven Seagle said it best:

One thing writers have in common is the need to procrastinate. People don’t really understand this, but it’s not avoiding work, it is work. Going to lunch, cleaning house, walking around eavesdropping, reading.... All of it informs the process of pulling a story out of nowhere. After you’ve burned through the two or three tales that are born into your brain—you have to siphon the rest out of your environment. So, when I need something for my stories—I open my eyes and ears to the world around me…. Because I never know where the next idea, or scene, or line of dialogue is going to come from. (Seagle 71)

Then, I sit down and write a more-or-less finished product. Except, it isn’t. I edit, research, and rewrite. I have others read it, take the advice they give me, and pass it along to others. I edit again, rewrite again, remove superfluous words and phrases, add hints of a larger implications, metaphor, implication, and double meaning.

Then I stop.

I read.

And I share.

Work Cited

Berlin, James A. “Writing Instruction in School and College English, 1890-1985.” A Short History of Writing Instruction. Vol. 22, No. 4. Memphis, TN: Rhodes College, 1997. 183-220.

Burnham, Christopher. “Expressive Pedagogy: Practice/Theory. Theory/Practice.” Tate, Gary, et. al. 19-35.

Howard, Rebecca Moore. “Collaborative Pedagogy.” Tate, Gary, et. al. 54-70.

Sherwood, Steve. “Ethics and Improvisation.” The Writing Lab Newsletter. Vol. 22, No. 4. Memphis, TN: Rhodes College, 1997. 1-5.

Seagle, Steven T. It’s a Bird…. New York, NY: DC Comics, 2004.

Tate, Gary, Amy Rupiper, and Kurt Schick, ed. A Guide to Composition Pedagogies. New York, NY: Oxford University Press, 2001.

Tobin, Lad. “Process Pedagogy.” Tate, Gary, et. al. 1-18.

Handprints

2007-04-02T01:00:00.000-06:00

by J.E. Remy

A child’s handprints, left smeared upon the glass—
easily washed away. Thoughts of them pass.
Imagine lives reflected in the lines:
One line reaches out, both silent and kind.
One line lifts up, strong within and without.
One line holds on, showing love beyond doubt.
One line plays, and finds the world to be strange.
One line creates, attempting to make change.
A child’s handprints, left smeared upon the glass—
leave some behind to remember the past.

Last Call

2006-10-04T12:08:00.000-06:00

I made a song. Have a listen.

“Look Up In the Sky!”

2006-09-09T00:00:00.000-06:00

A rhetorical analysis of “it’s a Bird…” by Steven T. Seagle
by J.E. Remy

What I remember most is the big red “S,” that and his way of speaking to me. Even though we had only just met, it was as if he realized the facade needed to be dropped. That if he didn’t open up to someone, instead letting it eat away at his insides, eventually the Juris of Secrets would pull his hidden fears from him. Word… By word… By word…

So I sat, hearing his confession. Watching this sharply edged man, dressed in faded tones, as he bore his soul. Listening to this Teddy Kristiansen painting speak the words that fear had kept from his lips for so many years.

“Huntington’s Disease.”

The Costume

Everyday we put on our second skins and slither out of our holes. People make judgments based on the cloth-flesh we are covered in. We expect them to.

When I first met Steven, he was clad in all black. The drab tone made his skin appear grey and cadaver-like. The crowd surrounding him should have obfuscated Steve in their reds, yellows, and blues. Yet, somehow he stood out. Despite the sepia toned sky and his attempt to costume himself in depression and anger, he stood out.

His notebook open, he scribbled words that were anything but pages 21 and 22 in the final issue of the comic book his editor was waiting for. This sort of automatic writing had become a necessity for him. He took his ideas as they came. Pages 21 and 22 had simply not arrived yet. They wouldn’t show up either, before becoming pointless in comparison to the razor edge events about to occur in his life.

Steven’s family secret, a genetic disease known as Huntington’s Chorea, has always been scratching at the soft flesh near the base of his mind. Soon, however, he would be offered a position writing Superman, and his editor would expect him to be ecstatic. It is the world’s top comic property and best known iconic figure, after all. Instead, the offer will play havoc with his career.

He would also soon receive a call from his mother, who would inform Steven of his father’s disappearance. She would claim he didn’t leave her. “No… he just… left.”

Both events can make the prospect of writing perfection cause for more frustration than pleasure. Memories of his grandmother’s death have come to the forefront, and the innate flaws in writing an omnipotent being are becoming very obvious.

When you write things for publication or place your writing in a public forum, you are bound to have someone notice a bit of themselves in your work. Despite your best efforts to hide them under the illusion of fiction, there is the chance people recognize themselves. When you write non-fiction, even if you change the names or don’t mention them (to protect the innocent, of course), even if you alter the situation slightly, you’re still writing about real people and events—even the most minor of mentions will be caught. You may not intend on having a character represent anyone in particular, but somebody is bound to believe the character is “just like” them or “surly based on” them.

Leaving Krypton (Life on another world)

Lisa and Steven got in an argument recently. It was a small thing, really; but something very important to Lisa. He said he didn’t want kids, and I get the feeling she isn’t too happy about it. What I think Lisa doesn’t understand is that Steve believes having children to be the single most important decision one can make in life. What I don’t think he understands is that it isn’t a lack of desire to have children within him, it’s a fear of what this world has to offer them.

Kal-El was a lucky immigrant orphan who ended up being given a better life with a friendly Kansas couple. Other than a mild allergy to some green, dues-ex-machina rock, he has been healthy and happy his whole life. He’s a talented journalist with no occupational worries (despite the excessive breaks he may take at work). He has a mother and father who love him unconditionally, a girlfriend with similar interests who never ceases to be amazed by him, and friends worldwide who could easily be termed “super.” With a life as perfect as his, who wouldn’t be walking on air?

In reality, we can never choose the life our children will lead. I watch my best friend fret over the future well-being of his daughter on a daily basis. My mother still sends food home with me whenever I visit, despite the fact that I may be doing better than her financially. Christopher Reeve is the first image to burst into many people’s heads when the name “Superman” leaves another’s lips. Completely understandable considering his dedication to the role from 1978 through 1987. Yet even this former “Man of Steel” now struggles with paralysis from a tragic spinal cord injury.

We try to ensure the next generation’s well being, but have little control over such things as their appearance, intelligence, environment, personal choices… health. “What if,” Steve once rhetorically commented, hiding his fear behind sarcasm “your baby isn’t some perfect little Kal-El dropped from Krypton.”

Who among us is perfect? If man is fallible by nature, why do we strive to become what we are not? Why do we clothe our heroes in bright colors and present them as unreachable ideal, only to pretend that nonpareil paragon is attainable?

Outsider

“More powerful than a locomotive.” More powerful than… more power….

I understand Steven’s difficulty with writing for Superman. As much as it may be the story of an immigrant leaving his home to find a better life, the American dream, it is also the story of a god in human form, furthering an American mythos. The story of an outsider, who hasn’t aged a day since 1938, making believe he can fit in, when everything within him should say he can’t.

He is Nietzsche’s proverbial “übermensch.” Despite the sense of justice presented in his story, the knowledge of right and wrong has become cloudy in our own reality. Yet, as Steve so eloquently puts it, “Superman doesn’t use power to mitigate situations and point people toward what’s right. Hell no—he uses power to force what he wants.” We call him a “hero” when he uses muscling clout to rule over us, no better than a dictator. “It’s reprehensible in Hitler, Mussolini and Franco, but in ‘Kal-El’ it’s heroic?”

This is a large reason as to why Superman’s plot lacks an intellectual soundness. Perhaps this is why, while we all recognize the last son of Krypton, he doesn’t appear in the world’s top-selling comic. And why, despite countless product placement and appearances in almost 11 titles each month, relatively few people actually pick up the comic and read it. Or, if they do read one of the titles, they’re like Steve’s friend Rafa; more interested in the victor of fantasy super-hero battles than the search for any literary quality.

Invulnerable

She left him… Lisa did. There was some stupid fight about Steve needing quiet time that got blown all out of proportion. He needed time to finish pages 21 and 22. Time to consider how to appropriately reject his editor’s attempts to hand off the torch of Superman. Time away from Lisa. Time away from the world. Time to torture himself over the disappearance of his father. Of course, he failed to inform her of that last bit, letting her walk out the door without even attempting to stop her. Easier to accept her heartbreak than his own.

Now he’s holed up in his apartment, having built a miniature “Fortress of Solitude” to keep the rest of us out. Not a word has been given to anyone in weeks. Not Lisa. Not his editor. Not his brother. He hasn’t even spoken to me. Me, the man who he’s been unnecessarily open with since the first day we met, and the most I’ve heard from him is the terrible answering machine that makes him sound like a gangster. I understand his need for solace, but Steve has become a recluse. He’s trying so hard to keep out the world, to create a wall of invulnerability, he’s suffocating.

There’s an aspect to truly preventing oneself from being harmed that necessitates the avoidance of being touched. Adam fell from the grace of his god when the woman who held one of his ribs handed him a fruit filled with the knowledge of nudity. Achilles’ mother held him by his heel when baptizing him with the invulnerability offered by the River Styx. The touch of her hand left him with a wound waiting to open. Sampson was filled with the strength of a hundred men, until the quickest touch of his lover’s scissors snipped away his fortitude. Judas walked along with his messiah, until the touch of a few coins cost him his closest companion and eternal salvation. How many individuals trusted one of man’s greatest inventions when their boarding pass touted it as “unsinkable?” Yet one of nature’s most simple creations tore open its titanic hull with but a touch. Clark Kent is a man of steel until the touch of a little green rock turns him into a man of flesh.

We lie to ourselves when we think it possible to push away society in our attempt to build an impenetrable shield to our heart. When we think each minor intrusion into our lives can be eliminated until we are left in blissful stillness. As humans, we find ourselves attached to countless numbers of our own kind. While invulnerability may only be achieved by avoiding the touch of another, breaking previous bonds can cause more pain than living through the burdens of fortune’s slings and arrows. Life is suffering; it’s the journey between agonies that makes it all worthwhile.

Consider the “S.” From one perspective, the symbol of the definitive comic book hero. From another, a letter that can both pluralize and possess.

Steve was only five, so the details of the hospital visit are a bit fuzzy. From how he tells it, though, it was the day he stopped enjoying comics. “They reminded me of the smell of rubbing alcohol and sick people with veins showing through their legs,” he once explained, “and doctors—who I saw as something like secret agents… plotting against my family… they new things about us that no one was telling me.” Perhaps some of the dilemmas he has with writing Superman are caused by the fact that he was being babysat by the first Superman story he ever read the day his grandmother died.

Early symptoms of Huntington’s Disease include depression and involuntary movement. At the full onset of the disease there is little left of the personality that once inhabited the writhing husk that remains. That violent jerking is where the original title of the disorder came from: “Huntington’s Chorea.” “Chorea” comes from the Greek “khoreia,” meaning “dance.”

“…What you know… is that there’s no good thing to hope for a Huntington’s patient. If you hope they’re fine except for their body—you’re condemning them to a life sentence lived out inside a useless shell.” Steve would tell me, once we began talking again, “If you hope they’re vegetative and mentally gone—then you’ve damned them to a meaningless living death.”

Dave, Steve’s brother, finally got the man to pick up the phone. Mainly due to the calls from Steve’s mom and Lisa, but I have to admit to my fair share of pushing. In no time, we ended up at his door. One of the first things Steve did after Dave and I stepped into the slipshod apartment was to rectify our opinions regarding Lisa’s absence. He claimed she didn’t leave him. “She just… left.”

He also let Dave know about the disappearance of their father. I’m not sure if he was upset that Steve had first informed me of the vanishing act or if he was angered that Steve hadn’t immediately told him. Dave and their father had never really gotten along, but he was still his son. I could see the frustration in Steve’s eyes, and wondered about the ties it may have with the Superman back-issues strewn across the floor. I assumed it had less to do with that than it did his father causing memories of his grandmother’s death to take prominence in his mind.

A genetic disorder floating across your gene pool can cause concern for anyone, especially when you won’t know for another twenty years if you’ve lost the genetic lottery. We try to ensure our own well being, but have little control when a disease is lurking around the corner, delayed only by time. Lurking and waiting to take away so much.

More power….

Steve quit working on a comic a while back when he realized the fact that the main characters were gaining tremendous power from their genes. “Some genes don’t give powers…” he told me, “they take powers away. The power to walk. The power to sit up. The power to eat. The power to speak.”

The man is terrified and hiding his fear behind a curtain of artificial control. He can say “no” to Superman. He can say “goodbye” to Lisa. He can give everyone in his life the silent treatment. Yet, he cannot escape words like “genetic” and “no cure.” He can keep the family secret no longer. He is only feeding the delusion that the disease won’t exist if he never lets anyone see it, or that it skipped his generation, or that he himself may eventually fall victim to it, or that his children might. The secret is killing him more than any disease could.

Escape

We found Steve’s dad….

"it's a Bird..." by Steven Seagle

Stressed

2006-09-08T15:15:00.000-06:00

(Part One: Apartments A-G)
by J.E. Remy

Okay, so this story’s a little hard to follow, but try to keep up. It all starts with the original apartment, where Loren and I lived. For the sake of simplicity, we’ll call this Apartment A. Little known to me there would also be an apartment in Taylorsville where Alex was currently living, we’ll call this Apartment B.

Loren and I moved out of Apartment A and into a place he was able to locate on a moment’s notice, we’ll call this Apartment C (separated by my room “C1” and his room “C2”). Shortly thereafter, I met and fell in love with Alex, and essentially began living in B while keeping my stuff in C1 (except for my books, which were in C2). Within a short time, we realized this would be a permanent move, and moved the things in C1 to B and C2 (admittedly, there was still a little left in C1).

Alex and I decided to leave B as soon as her lease ran out. Around the same time, Loren found out that he couldn’t stay in C2. After some searching we found Apartment D.

Here’s where it starts to get complicated.

We moved everything that remained from C1 into D and prepared to move from B into D while moving everything from C2 into D, but there was a flood. So, the apartment complex for D moved everything from D into E and back into D when the water had subsided. Then we started moving from B to D, but there was another flood. Alex and I were furious and demanded an F, but it wasn’t available straight away. Meanwhile Loren found a G and moved his stuff from D to G. We couldn’t find the energy, and were far too stressed, to finish moving from B to D until F became available. Once it did, there was all sorts of chaos.

So in the course of a few nights, it was necessary to pack up D for movers to move to F, but they didn’t get everything moved. So Rach and I moved what remained from B into the truck (we’ll call this X) and what remained from D into F. Now everything is in F, except for what remains in X and boxes are everywhere.

I feel a little sick.

(Click here for Other Stories)

A History of Horror Writing

2006-09-06T17:49:00.000-06:00

by J.E. Remy

Published in:
The Community Writing Connection (Fall 2006 Vol. 4 No. 3)
The Globe (16 Oct. 2006)

“As may naturally be expected of a form so closely connected with primal emotion, the horror-tale is as old as human thought and speech themselves.” –H.P. Lovecraft, “Supernatural Horror in Literature”

Frightening imagery has existed since the dawn of time, but horror as a genre has only been present since the eighteenth century.

The first major work of what would become known as “Graveyard Poetry,” Thomas Parnell’s “A Night-Piece on Death,” was published in 1714. “Graveyard poetry, rejecting human vices and vanities through an insistence on morality, encouraged an interest in ruins, tombs and nocturnal gloom as the frontiers that opened on to an afterlife of infinite bliss” (Botting). The attraction to darkness and melancholy would eventually inspire Gothic literature.

Following graveyard poetry, such novels as Horace Walpole’s The Castle of Ontranto (1765) and Ann Radcliffe’s Mysteries of Udolpho (1794) made use of gothic imagery—i.e. dark castles, medieval ruins—and romantic suspense to establish a particular feel to their work. Leaning heavily upon the idea of a dark past holding tightly against or encroaching upon a more enlightened present, the English Gothic novel, the German Schauer-roman, and the French roman noir often avoided the supernatural or explained it away (Carroll).

By the early nineteenth century, supernatural suspense stories involving fantastical creatures, typically of a classic sort—i.e. vampires, werewolves, ghosts, demons, zombies, etc.—and elements of the occult began to pop up. Supernatural elements were used to emphasize a particular human weakness or fear in a sort of morality play. To do this “the authors work by sudden shocks, and when they deal with the supernatural, their favorite effect is to wrench the mind suddenly from skepticism to horror struck belief” (Tompkins). The best known of these stories included Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein (1818) and John Polidori’s The Vampyre (1819).

On April 13, 1897, the French Théâtre du Grand Guignol was opened by Oscar Méténier. “For sixty-five years, various troupes of actors titillated Parisian audiences with one-act performances of murder, mayhem and revenge. Every night on stage they performed stabbings, mutilations, beheadings, gougings, tortures and dismemberments in gloriously graphic detail” (Barker). The theater provided an outlet for a variety of authors throughout the years, including James Hadley Chase, Charles Dickens, Guy de Maupassant, and Edgar Allan Poe. It also brought horror to the masses by becoming arguably the best-known tourist attraction in Paris.

Throughout the 1800s, cheaply printed popular fiction was also finding its way into the hands of the masses through Penny Bloods, dubbed “Penny Dreadfuls” by critics. These one-cent publications tended to highlight the horrific elements of actual events, avoiding a point-by-point factual outline to develop the story as if it were a fictional plot. By the late 1800s, the horror didn’t need to be over-invented. 1888 brought the world its first notable serial killer—Jack the Ripper.

While Penny Bloods twisted reality into barely recognizable fiction, American author Edgar Allen Poe attempted to twist fiction to near-reality. Refraining from the use of the supernatural he worked with more pragmatic means to frighten the reader. Poe developed a sort of psychological horror, where the mind of the reader was left with a sort of curiosity regarding the truth of the situation.

Similar attempts to bring reality into horror appeared in the 1890s in the works of Herbert George Wells. His work would later be viewed as early science fiction, but the horror found in The Island of Doctor Moreau (1896), The Invisible Man (1895), and The War of the Worlds (1895) would be unmistakable for generations to come.

The early twentieth century brought Howard Phillips Lovecraft to the forefront. Inspired heavily by Poe and the works included in Weird Tales, the “Penny Bloods” of his time, H.P. Lovecraft would create a type of horror which continues to influence the genre to this day. Dubbed “Cosmic Horror” by those he corresponded with, Lovecraft’s work involved a great unknown, and possibly unknowable, evil that could not be escaped. The protagonists of his tales rarely survived with sanity.

By the late twentieth century, “Splatterpunk” horror attempted to disturb its audience through use of a variety of grotesque and gory images while dark fantasy pieces used horror elements, but didn’t necessarily intend to frighten the audience. Apocalyptic horror, which revolves around the end of the world or the threat of the world ending, became more popular. Authors such as Anne Rice, Dean Koontz, Ramsey Campbell, Clive Barker, and Steven King became rich off their ability to continually scare readers.

Why do we keep reading presentations of terror and emotional dread? Why do we desire the expression of intense fear, repulsion, and loathing? Jack Ketchum once wrote, “We are curious about anything unusual. Including agony. Including bloody murder.”

Works Cited

Barker, Clive. Clive Barker’s A-Z of Horror. London: BBC Books, 1997.

Botting, Fred. Gothic: The New Critical Idiom. London: Routledge, 1996.

Carroll, Noel. The Philosophy of Horror or Paradoxes of the Heart. New York: Routledge, 1990.

Ketchum, Jack. “Splat Goes the Hero: Visceral Horror.” Writing Horror: A Handbook by the Horror Writers Association. Ed. Mort Castle. New York: Writers Digest Books, 1997.

Lovecraft, H.P. The Annotated Supernatural Horror in Literature. New York, NY: Hippocampus Press, 2000.

Tompkins, J.M.S. The Popular Novel in England. London: Methuen, 1996.

(Go to Types of Horror: Apocalyptic)

Rest

2006-06-01T00:00:00.000-06:00

by J.E. Remy

Gently he peeled the rest of her clothing away from the limp body. Her skin glistened with sweat; slowly drying as it cooled. She had passed before he had even finished feeding from her. Disappointing really, she was barely able to handle the effects of absinthe, let alone the consequences of his lust.

The pain in his head was subsiding as he ran his finger across the curve of her form. “There are so few things left in this world that bring me pleasure.” He spoke as he pulled his body close to hers. “The taste of a good wine. The strange dreams brought on by the wormwood. Making love to a beautiful woman.

“I’ve bartered my soul for the power that demons offered. I have spent restless nights hearing the voice of my grandmother as she begged me to help her escape hell. I once even tasted the blood of my enemy as I sucked his eyes from their sockets.” He chuckled, “I wonder sometimes if it is the world that is mad, or if it is I.”

He wrapped his arm around her naked body and nuzzled his face in the crook of her neck. They lay, spooned together like two lovers, as he spoke.

“I was in love once. It’s so long ago now that I can barely remember her face. Ah, but the way she smelt. Do you know that scent the air has just before a summer rain? Wet with anticipation, a charge of electricity flowing through the breeze? It seeps into your skin and fills your lungs in an ecstasy of calm. Its flavor is more fresh than a newly blossomed bud, but you know that it is only the beginning of something violent. She smelled like that.

“No one else smells quite that way.” He drew his lips close to her ear, speaking softly to her absent soul, “But you know, when I found her that day… they had raped her. I don’t know how many.

“She had these bruises. Dark and alien on her pale skin. She couldn’t speak; the cloth they had used to gag her had cut into the sides of her cheeks. Her mouth had swollen. She made this terrible rasping noise when she breathed.” His voice remained icy calm as he spoke, but his eyes glistened with tears. “Her hands were black from being bound too tightly for so long. And her eyes… dear god in heaven….

“I stayed with her until the end. It wasn’t very long. Yet, she didn’t smell the same. More like a dying piece of flesh, or an animal that had been locked in a cage for its entire life. Then, she….” His voice trailed off briefly.

“I still haven’t quite let go of her.”

His arm held her close drawing her nearer. It was as if, had he the ability, he would have made themselves one. His hand felt the soft skin of her stomach. His chin rested next to hers. He felt the remaining warmth of her body slipping, like a dying fire.

“It is so long ago now, but I was in love once.”

(Click here for Other Stories)

Stillborn

2006-05-30T00:00:00.001-06:00

by J.E. Remy

FADE IN:

INT. HOSPITAL – NURSERY – DAY

Slowly our point of view is drawn through the doorway to the body of a NURSE. She is sprawled upon the floor—scabbed wounds upon her uncovered flesh, clothing damp with puss and blood. The cry of a single BABY can be heard. For an uncomfortable few moments our point of view sits with the nurse, until it is obvious the crying will not be responded to.

Our view again begins to move, over the sterile hospital CRADLES of newborns. Each child has a hardened rigor and flesh darkened with death; otherwise their general appearance is similar to that of the nurse. The sickened image continues. All the while the crying increases in volume until our view finds a lone living baby.

INT. HOSPITAL – NURSERY VIEWING ROOM – CONTINUOUS

Viewing the nursery through the viewing room window, it becomes obvious that none of the children have been left alive. A SILHOUETTED FIGURE steps in front of the glass. He glances inside, both ominous and strangely familiar. In a different situation one could imagine the figure being a proud father peering at his newborn child. Suddenly, he leaps forward as if trying to reach through the glass. He is stopped by the glass and slides off of it as he walks away, a foreboding streak of blood left behind.

END

Plaster Burro

2006-05-29T00:00:00.000-06:00

by J.E. Remy

Ella chica hermosa se sentó en un lugar de la Mancha, de cuyo nombre no quiero acordarme. She wept atop the worn and weathered icon of Rucio, cursing the day she allowed Sancho to follow her uncle. The house was nearly empty, the curate having burnt all of her uncle’s books in an attempt to cure him of his delusions (Nicholas and the housekeeper seemed all too happy to help in that endeavor). And she’d sold most everything else just to keep food on the table and a scorched roof over her head. Yet she couldn’t let go of the little plaster burro.

She was angry with Sancho for supporting her uncle in his spuriousness, but more angry at herself for falling in love with him. Teresa had been so good to her, and Sancho had a daughter with the woman.

She had to leave these thoughts behind—to stop chasing after windmills.

(Click here for Other Stories)

The Photo

2006-05-28T00:00:00.000-06:00

by J.E. Remy

The haunting figure hovered before him like a specter of someone else’s past. Her face was the same, her hair, her eyes… Yet, that was the “her” of sixty years ago; the “her” trapped in the photo album image. He never knew this woman as anything other than a reproduction upon a photosensitive surface. She was a beautiful, nameless face among hundreds to be found in the old trunk. A face that should have long ago aged or passed on.

Still, there she was beckoning him to the other side of the attic, captivating him, entrancing him... He could no longer consider the thought of “her” being an illusion; of “her” being the attic’s version of deadly ignis fatuus. He’d never known the woman in the photo, and he never would. She was a beautiful, nameless face among hundreds to be found in the old trunk. A face used to bring him into the creature’s pernicious embrace.

(Click here for Other Stories)

New Book

2006-05-27T00:00:00.000-06:00

by J.E. Remy

“That is not dead which can eternal lie/And with strange aeons even death may die.” She grinned as Mommy read the words to her. A girl couldn’t ask for a better present than the old book Daddy brought home.

“N'gai, n'gha'ghaa, bugg-shoggog, y'hah,” she said, pointing to one of the printed woodcarvings. Mommy thought she was just speaking baby-talk; Yog-Sothoth knew better.

(Click here for Other Stories)

King Nick

2006-05-26T00:00:00.000-06:00

by J.E. Remy

He should never have joined us at the barbeque. He didn’t understand the intricacies of eating the food that pleased our particular palates, and the disease’s incubation period is so long there was no way of knowing of his infection at the time. That night he’d enjoyed snacking on spinal tissue. Now, several years later, microbial prion spirits infest the recesses of his brain like parasitic past-lives.

Just last week he was the manifestation of Princess Diana, only larger and prone to scrapping his face across the side of the fence like a cow with bovine spongiform encephalopathy. Before that he was Mr. Rogers, only with restless leg syndrome and a pension for doing uncomfortably dirty things with King Friday (seeing a grown man grind a puppet while wearing nothing more than a cardigan sweater is enough to give anyone the willies). Today he is King Kamehameha the Great, Slayer of Chiefs, during the battle of Nu’uanu, pillaging and raping his way across the kingdom of O’ahu.

Shame about the neighbor’s dog.

(Click here for Other Stories)

Jack & Coke

2006-05-25T00:00:00.000-06:00

by J.E. Remy

It required only a moment for the drunkenness to turn ugly. I offered him a glass and he went through five in as many minutes. Just when I thought he was slipping into the blissful solitude of unconsciousness (or preparing to liven up the party, prior to its start, with a regurgitated mixture of Jack & Coke) he began… Well… How was I supposed to know that the piñata held a trapped avatar of some half-bred-Grigori-demon-ape who waited patiently for just such a vulnerability to defeat the array of psychic blockades intricately placed within his subconscious? Now it isn’t the fecal Jackson Pollock he’s made of the dining room floor that disturbs me as much as his quoting of the Book of Jubilees. The piñata that once imprisoned the Grigori-ape has become his anally eviscerated concubine, impregnated with demonic seed. I can hear the papier-mâché Nephilim chortling inside as a knock on the door indicates the first of the guests.

Ah well, he doesn’t seem too different from our last party.

(Click here for Other Stories)

Die Wachen

Ah Mublbu

Three Steps

An Open Letter to Planned Parenthood Federation of America

5 Questions for President-Elect Obama's Transition Team

Preface to sine cera: What I Think People Think About

Another Open Letter to President-Elect Obama and Vice President-Elect Biden

The Tiresomely Offensive Martyr Stance of the Mormon Church

An Open Letter to the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints

An Open Letter to President-Elect Obama and Vice President-Elect Biden

In the Mood For Love

A Little Loud

False Authority

The Truth of the Matter

Ghost Calls

The Edge

Flash Fiction

More Six Word Memoirs

Six Word Memoir

The Room

Preface to sine cera: Saturday

Preface to sine cera: Two Old Guys From Brooklyn

She Stopped

Sexist, Degrading, Bullshit IV: "Child-Men"

Sexist, Degrading, Bullshit III: Have a Drink, Get Raped (Part 2)

Sexist, Degrading, Bullshit III: Have a Drink, Get Raped

In Abaetetuba

Burnout

Top 20 Horror Short Stories

Street Walkers of Whitechapel

So Warm, So Sweet

J.E. Remy in the News

Pulp Fiction

Pulp Fiction

Pulp Fiction

Pulp Fiction

Pulps: Fiction for the Masses

Speak Out

The novel

Let’s talk about objectification...

Thank You for Linking

Doctor Who: Memento Mori

All Sorts of Punk

All Sorts of Punk

Sexist, Degrading Bullshit II: Comic Book Edition (Part Three)

All Sorts of Punk

The "Punk" Subgenre

Types of Horror

"Her face was nothing but red."

Types of Horror/All Sorts of Punk

Sexist, Degrading Bullshit II: Comic Book Edition (Part Two)

Types of Horror

Types of Horror

Types of Horror

Types of Horror

Sexist, Degrading Bullshit II: Comic Book Edition

Types of Horror

Types of Horror

Types of Horror

Types of Horror

Types of Horror

Sexist, degrading bullshit (Part 3)

Types of Horror

Top Ten Stories In Vampire Fiction

Sexist, degrading bullshit (Part 2)

Sexist, degrading bullshit

Virus

All I Really Need To Know I Learned From Mommy and Comics

Handprints

Last Call

“Look Up In the Sky!”

Stressed

A History of Horror Writing

Rest

Stillborn

Plaster Burro

The Photo

New Book

King Nick

Jack & Coke