Shock against Racism

Shock Against Racism is a network of horror and weird fiction writers, artists and readers taking a stand against racism and fascism. We aim to raise funds for groups that are combating the rise of nationalism, anti-semitism and white supremacist movements while enjoying fiction that confronts these issues.

The main Shock Against Racism Facebook page is here and you can also read thoughts on the founding of SAR from Simon Bestwick. Two Shock Against Racism events are planned for this year, which will also commemorate writer and activist Joel Lane on the fifth anniversary of his death, 25 November 2013. As Simon writes: “Joel was avowedly political and a committed anti-fascist: I can think of no better way to honour his memory.”

 

The first event will take place at Write Blend, 124 South Road, Liverpool L22 0ND, 7.30pm on Friday 23 November, and will feature readings by Ramsey Campbell, Priya Sharma, Cate Gardner and Simon Bestwick. Tickets will be £3.00 on the door, and all proceeds will go to Hope Not Hate. The Facebook page for the Liverpool event is here.

I’m proud to be taking part in the second event in Brighton, where I’ll join Tom Johnstone and VH Leslie in a reading at the Cowley Club, 12 London Road, Brighton BN1 4JA at 7.30pm on Sunday 25 November. Tickets £3.00 on the door, with all proceeds donated to Brighton Antifascists.

I hope to read from “Survivor’s Guilt”, a story that appeared in the 2010 anthology that Joel edited with Allyson Bird: Never Again: Weird Fiction Against Racism and Fascism. It was through this book that I got to know Joel as a friend. He also showed himself to be a sharp editor when he caught a misplaced umlaut in the German word “räterepublik”.

Speaking of which… “Survivor’s Guilt” also touches on another anniversary that took place this month – the German revolution of 1918. This was an uprising against war, hunger and the monarchy, which led to the overthrow of the Kaiser and the upsurge of workers and soldiers revolutionary councils. There were also councils of writers and artists, who worked and created with the idea that ‘art is bread’. If you’re interested in finding out more about this, check out this article about women in the German revolution, and have a look at this general reading list from the Libcom website.

Another possibility will be a reading from “All That is Solid”, a tale of anxiety, art therapy and Brexit that appeared in The Scarlet Soul, an anthology published by Swan River Press that has since sold out. The story starts with a stroll in Covent Garden in the summer of 2016, where young Gosia hears a bunch of lads singing: “Rule Britannia… Britannia rules the waves, first we get the Poles out then we get the gays”.

Tom and Victoria no doubt are hatching plans for their readings. I look forward to them. In the meantime, check out the Facebook page for the Brighton event. And keep an eye on this space for news about a London event in the New Year!

We’ll come from the shadows

“Yesterday I was a writer who was lost for words. I expect to find them again soon…”

This was my Facebook status on 10 November, prefacing a link to an article in the Independent about spontaneous protests responding to the election of the fascistic Donald Trump – and I’m not one to use this particular F-word lightly. For more details check out the links on An anti-trump masterpost and A final response to why Trump is a fascist.

So I was lost for words on 9 November… and while I’ve managed to scrape together a few of them now, I think it will be a work in progress.

The gloom cast by the US election results deepened when Leonard Cohen’s death became public a couple of days later. I loved Leonard’s music when I was growing up. Now, perhaps I’d be critical about some of his idealised images of women. But a lot of the music still works. One of my favourites is The Partisan, a song that he didn’t write but popularised for a new audience in the late 1960s. And this song needs to be shared now, more than ever.

Like many I’m full of fear and foreboding, and I’ve indulged in many a post-apocalyptic meme along with some darkly satirical ones.

Meanwhile, I’ve been inspired by the expression of strength, endurance and hope as well as grief in “The Partisan”.

A line in this song – the frontiers are my prison – has haunted me since I first heard it decades ago. It echoes in my mind as we prepare to resist those who aim to impose more borders and frontiers within our societies and throughout the world.

And then there are these lyrics:

“Oh the wind, the wind is blowing
Through the graves the wind is blowing
Freedom soon will come
Then we’ll come from the shadows” 

It’s early days, but we’re already fighting. I read stories about growing opposition to Trump & what he represents – this includes longer term initiatives as well as demonstrations. The American Civil Liberties Union is taking up the mettle, city councils declare their determination to remain cities of refuge to immigrants despite threats to cut off federal funding; universities, legislatures and other bodies are declaring to stand firm. We’ll also see what happens when more US workers find out just what billionaire Trump’s promises to them are made of. Meanwhile, struggles such as Black Lives Matter and Standing Rock continue.

I’ve also been trying to take hope from the high proportion of young people involved in the demonstrations.

Yes, winter is indeed here but perhaps we’ll see a hot and lively spring…

Meat, motion and light

My story “Meat, motion and light” has been released in The Outsiders, a shared-world Lovecraftian anthology edited by Joe Mynhardt at Crystal Lake Publishing. This is my first venture into shared worlds as well as Lovecraftian fiction, and I enjoyed the process of brainstorming ideas with the editor and the other contributors. I was also pleased to see that co-contributor James Everington also set out to tackle the same “shoggoth in the room” that shambles around any Lovecraft-oriented conversation…

When Joe invited me to contribute to this anthology, I knew straight away I wanted to write about racism, given the issues around HP Lovecraft’s racist and anti-Semitic attitudes – he has described black people as ‘gorilla-like’ and among the world’s ‘many ugly things’ – and how they manifest in his writing. Some critics have suggested that Lovecraft is not simply a ‘man of his time’ expressing mild prejudice, but a virulent racist whose hatred of the ‘other’ is intrinsic to his work. Much has been written about this, which I won’t try to reproduce here.

A quick google for ‘Lovecraft’ and ‘racism’ will result in a plethora of links and discussions. Much of this was sparked by a move to replace the bust of Lovecraft awarded to winners of the World Fantasy gong, supported by writers including 2011 winner Nnedi Okorafor. Some writers and fans suggested a bust of Octavia Butler as suitable for an inclusive award. Personally, I would favour replacing Lovecraft with a more abstract trophy, one that represents the breadth of fantastical fiction and not merely one author or sub-genre within it.

This came from a bunch called Cthulhu Punx. Check out their (Polish) Facebook page

I found this post by Noah Berlansky interesting. While taking a critical view, he also adds: “At the same time, focusing on race in Lovecraft can also lead to a greater appreciation of his work, and a better understanding of its horror.” Fellow contributor James Everington wrote at Crystal Lake’s link for the book: “I don’t think Lovecraft shouldn’t be read or enjoyed because of his views on race… but I do think they matter.”

I did read a lot of Lovecraft in my early teens, which I hoovered up along with anything that was strange and mysterious. I’m not entirely sure whether I picked up on racism in his writing at the time; I just thought some of it was old-fashioned and florid and it just went by me. However, I do remember feeling uncomfortable when reading “The Horror at Red Hook” and this wasn’t caused by eldritch entities either.

In terms of classic weird fiction, it really was Machen who first cast that special spell with The White People – I discuss this in my post Writing Helen’s Story. While I appreciated Lovecraft’s atmospherics and I was wowed by the wild gibberings amid non-Euclidean angles, the final melodramatic deluge of ichor often let me down. At the same time, I did find his less ichorous tales like “The Music of Erich Zann” haunting and compelling.

I have not yet had a cat in this blog, so that oversight must be corrected. So here’s a cat. Don’t remember if cats featured in any Lovecraft stories. Poe was the go-to guy for dodgy cats if I recall… Pic also from Cthulhu Punx.

I often regale Facebook friends with selections from Shoggoth on the Roof and inflict “It’s Beginning to Look Like Fishmen” at the appropriate season, yet the old Mythos still exerts a certain fascination amid all the piss-taking. Why? Perhaps it’s the idea – also found in Machen with works like The Great God Pan and in Robert W Chambers’ The King in Yellow – there are words, sounds, structures and beings that are so alien to us that our minds would break under their weight. Well, I just love those books of hidden lore that put your sanity and life in peril if you read them. Maybe that’s why I turned out the way I am… 🙂

I also enjoy contemporary Lovecraft-inspired writers such as Livia Llewellyn and Caitlin Kiernan, who distill the brooding, mysterious quality of Lovecraft while transmuting it into tales that would have HPL himself spinning with rotary precision in his grave. Perhaps these authors write more from the perspective of the outcasts, the loathsome lower orders and “infesting worms” that horrified Lovecraft so much. I tend to think they transmute Lovecraft’s dread of the alien into an encounter with what is unknowable within ourselves and the hostile world we struggle to make our lives in. Writing my own story has led me to appreciate how Lovecraftian themes can be used in a challenging, potentially subversive way – and I have definite plans to try more of this.

And this brings us to the exclusive gated and cult-like community of Priory, setting for The Outsiders. I imagined that the exclusive Priory population would share Lovecraft’s prejudices, so how would a black family end up in such a restrictive place? And what would it be like to grow up there?

Meanwhile, I’d been listening to the music found under the broad umbrella of Afropunk. So Claudia, the protagonist of “Meat, Motion and Light”, morphed into an Afropunk enthusiast. In fact, she sings in a band. After some years at university she’s returning to Priory, which would definitely not be rock ‘n’ roll friendly. I also imagined cracks in the cohesiveness and control of Priory. The recession has made an impact even in this enclave; factions have formed.

As I wrote the story, I drew on my experience of returning to places where I grew up as an outsider, the ‘home town’ that was never home – many people go through this. Add to this some scattershot googling that took in deep-sea bioluminescence and the mating habits of the giant squid…

Music has always been a big influence in my writing, so I’ll share some of the music behind my story. One of Claudia’s favourite songs is Tamar Kali’s “Fire with Fire”, where the Brooklyn-based “hard-core soul” musician covers Gossip:

Afropunk has been known as a US-based movement, with an annual Afropunk Fest in Brooklyn that attracts thousands of people. But there are also burgeoning punk scenes in parts of Africa, as well as in Asia and Latin America. In Europe, Paris recently held its own Afropunk Fest Paris. And there are groups here in the UK like Big Joanie, a black feminist punk band based in London. In addition to the video below, you can find out a little more about Big Joannie on this Vimeo link.

The late Poly Styrene has been a major inspiration for Claudia (as for many women and punks of colour), who puts up a photo of Poly in her room at Priory. Here’s a 1978 performance of the X-Ray Spex classic “Oh Bondage Up Yours”, prefaced by a poem.

I’ll now finish off with an even older song, which happened to give my story its title. I remember listening to it as a teenager and giggling. It might have been the period when I’d been reading lots of Lovecraft, but I never imagined that this song could inhabit the same stream of thought, let alone the same story and blog post.