Volume 1, Issue 3 : August 3, 2008
Activism and the Trickster
Welcome to our third issue. I hope all the changes are welcome. Navigation is at the top and you should be able to find everything relatively easily. Let us know if you don’t. We’ve added contributor bios to the end of each piece instead of at the “back”–it just seemed a little more logical. Hopefully with this new design it will be better for you, and setting up and archiving each issue will be much easier for me.
Funny to have an issue about change just as we undertake such a major design change. Activism, at its best, is about improving things for everyone, and the Trickster never shies away from changing things–sometimes for the best. I chose this theme a long time ago, but while putting together the issue an event occurred that caused a lot of ripples in the blogosphere. An author posted a rejection letter from an editor. I don’t think any editor expects that, but it happens and usually it’s no big deal. Unfortunately for him, this editor used some inflammatory, racist language. He tried to say later that he had been talking about terrorists, but considering the context, it’s doubtful that anyone believed him. As a result, a number of authors have withdrawn their work from his publication and many more have said they won’t ever submit any. If you look around, I’m sure you can find information about the event on a lot of blogs, much of it written by much more articulate people than I.
There are a couple of posts that came out of the issue that I’d like to draw your attention to in particular. One is K. Tempest Bradford’s request that editors post links to magazines that are open to diversity. The post is here: Magazines that Want More Diversity and I think it’s worth reading (as is the rest of her blog).
The other is an opposing point of view. On his blog, Ashok Banker asks if American Spec. Fic is racist: Is American Science Fiction & Fantasy racist? (And sexist, bigotted, and culturally insensitive too?) and though I believe his mind is already made up and I disagree with one of his points, I absolutely do not dismiss his experience. I think this kind of destructive reality can only be recognized and addressed through the experiences of those who live it.
This is me outing myself as incredibly naive. I had no idea. I’ve been hanging out on the blogs of POC for a while. It started because an issue I cared about-the viability of feminism and whether or not it’s a white movement or a woman’s movement-was getting a lot of attention. I’ve been reading, absorbing, and in the meantime ineptly beating the bushes for submissions by more people who aren’t middle-class, heterosexual, white men and women (not because we don’t want their stories, but because we have their stories and we want other stories) for Drollerie Press. On the other hand, the submissions for Membra Disjecta have been beautifully varied. I don’t know what the difference is, though I wish I did.
This issue, we have varied interpretations of the Trickster, and if there’s a call to activism it’s more to be gleaned from the tales than a specific directive to take a particular action that will make everything better. But then, I don’t think there is one specific action that will make everything better, no matter what -ism it is we’re fighting. It would make things much easier if there were.
I’ve always loved fairy tales and myths, and who doesn’t love a good trickster? Of course, my early introductions to Tricksters were Jack, that crazy no-good boy who killed giants and bought worthless magic beans, and B’rer Rabbit who always won the day with his cunning.
As an adult, I ran across tricksters who weren’t always so amiable, such as in the Native American tale where Trickster fashioned a vulva out of an elk’s liver and breasts from its kidneys, and thus arrayed looked like a beautiful woman. He married a chief’s son so he could eat the people’s food during the winter, and he got away with it until the vulva fell off–rotten–when he jumped over a fire. Such a charming fellow. You can read one version of the story here.
Trickster is a magnifying glass on the most extreme human behavior; he (sometimes she) is venal, uncontrolled, a massive id that must be appeased, and sometimes noble, though usually by accident. If you’re interested in learning more about Trickster, Terri Windling has an essay here, there’s a cross-cultural overview (though I’m not sure how seriously to take someone named Thunderspud of Dragonfhain) here, and there’s an interesting essay on Trickster and gender here (scroll down.)
I like Trickster. Even when he’s burning his anus because it won’t stop passing gas and then eating the tasty bits of meat he finds on the trail, he’s an interesting fellow. The best thing about him, however, is that no one wants to be like him. Maybe that’s the kind of activism we need: holding a magnifying glass up to the behavior no one ought to want to emulate, like writing inflammatory rejection letters that just might end up on the web.
If you’re white and naive, or just need pointers, a good start might be to read Tim Wise. I’ve spent a lot of time on that site lately. Of course, it’s not enough to just read. I hope you’ll visit the blog and add some pointers of your own.
