Cascade Library Interview with Martha

Interviews by Fans
Title:	Cascade Library Interview with Martha
Interviewer:
Interviewee:	Martha
Date(s):	1999
Medium:	online
Fandom(s):	fandom
External Links:	the interview is here, Archived version
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In 1999, Martha was interviewed for Cascade Library.

The main topic was smarm.

Some Excerpts

There *are* a lot of similarities [between smarm and slash], since both genres exist primarily -- I think -- because writers and readers waant to see characters express love more openly than they're allowed to do in the aired episodes. (At least TS slash, which tends to be more tender than some other fandoms.)

All the same, even though both genres are writing primarily about love, I really would argue that there's a difference between smarm and slash, and I think it has something to do with the surprise of smarm. Take smarm's favorite chestnut, Jim and Blair sharing a bed. Well, if Jim and Blair are lovers, then there's nothing very unexpected going on when they crawl in bed together. It's sort of the whole point. But when two straight men share a bed, and are comfortable with that degree of intimacy and that degree of trust -- you're never more vulnerable than when you're asleep, after all -- then that is something unexpected. And that's the kick of smarm for me. That "oh, my" moment when the walls come down, and two friends nakedly express their love for each other without reservation or fear, even though they're "just friends."

Why I crave that moment, and obsessively look for it, and try to write it, I can't imagine, anymore than I understand why seeing that preview for Second Chance with all the Blair bonks (I didn't even know the character's name at that point!) was absolutely riveting. It's a kink, a sick fetish. Maybe something in the water?

Feedback is the whole reason I keep writing about Jim and Blair. I think in other forums I've probably bleated on about "having to write", but the truth, obviously, is that after years and years of no feedback but rejection letters, the response to posting fan fiction is intoxicating. Addicting. And I'm just as lovely as a junkie without her fix when the feedback tapers off. So, as desperate as I am to be noticed (pathetic, isn't it?) I try to be accepting of critiques, too. Hey, at least it means someone *noticed* I wrote something, right? In private correspondence, it really is flattering that someone was interested enough in something I wrote to offer her opinion as to what I could have done better.

The situation is a little different in a public forum. Obviously, public criticism of fiction on the lists and on web sites is a topic that stirs up pretty violent passions. What do I think about it? When the critic is saying something nice about my stories, I'm thrilled. When it's not so nice, I get moody and depressed for days. Duh. :)

I do think criticism of fan fiction is still struggling to find a voice for itself. Defenses of criticism seem to draw on academic literary criticism as justification and model for the critic's project (I'm not the only one who spent too much time in grad school). In practice, however, criticism of fan fiction doesn't seem to have much to do with current styles of lit crit, and with a couple of notable exceptions -- torch's "buttons" spring to mind -- even less to do with meaningful analysis. Critical essays about fan fiction are more like book reviews in the New York Times -- highly personal, even autobiographical gut level responses to a work or a genre that usually say more about the critic than the story being critiqued. And, like a review in the Times, even a blistering one is likely to increase sales -- or hits on the author's site.

I still hate the negative ones though. And probably the most frustrating thing about them is the illusion of impartiality bestowed by the title of critic. The author can only look like a frothing madwoman when she protests. Oh well. (wiping the spittle off the screen)

[Smarm] *is* a funny little genre. In fact, it's difficult to talk about as a genre at all, because with some notable (all right, notorious) exceptions, smarm is most effective as a single moment or a scene in a longer piece. For me, smarm is that instant when, pressed by circumstances -- in this fandom, as in most, usually a nasty bonk -- two men who love each other but who don't happen to be lovers -- are driven to touch, or speak, as intimately and gently to each other as lovers would. So it's not merely an expression of friendship, or even a nice buddy moment. Which doesn't mean I don't I treasure those friendship moments all on their own, because I do, and I know how difficult they are to write well. It's just that they're not smarm.

Smarm, on the other hand, is that extraordinary moment when all considerations of personal dignity, pride, and societal expectations are cast aside, and two friends express their love for each other in a way that society-- especially late 20th Century, homophobic, American society -- doesn't sanction as fitting within the approved and narrow boundaries of male friendship. Jim cradling Blair on the floor of the parking garage in Blind's Man Bluff, in the midst of all his colleagues and superiors, stroking Blair's hair and whispering that everything is going to be all right is a hell of a smarmy moment -- whereas Jim grabbing Blair into a headlock and giving him a noogie at the end of The Sentinel by Blair Sandburg isn't smarm at all. Of course rough-housing is one way men express friendship -- and it can be sweet and endearing, but itt's a socially acceptable expression -- it's "safe," i.e., not smarmy.

I think the fact that smarmy expressions aren't "safe" and by definition fall outside accepted norms of het male behavior is the reason some fans despise the genre so much. Fine, to each his own. All the same, I never quite know what to say in response to the criticism most often leveled at smarm -- that real men "just don't act that way." (Leaving aside the unexamined heterosexism of a remark like that in the first place) The observation is usually bolstered by the incontrovertible proof that the person objecting to smarm is married, has five brothers, sixteen uncles and untold thousands of nephews, and none of THEM act the way Jim and Blair act in, say, one of Ann Brown's Moonglow stories, or Michalina Pilcher's Cypher missing scene. But the whole point of smarm is that American men at this point in the millennium don't often express their friendship with other men with a noticeable degree of tenderness. That's why a smarm aficionado is driven to seek it out -- or write it herself, if none is forthcoming.

Cake was the most difficult to write, so I'm pretty proud of myself for finishing it at last. The more I read about the shamanistic experience, the more difficult it was for me to understand how a responsible anthropologist like Blair could find a way to accept the mantle of shaman. Cake was one way of working that problem out for myself. Whether that makes for good story or not -- or even a readable one -- is another matter. But I finished it, by God, so I'm proud of it....Blair has always been easiest for me to write -- I spent too long in grad school, so I already know the mundane details of his life at the university, whereas for Jim, everything about his background is as alien as the far side of the moon. I enjoy research, but it's no substitute for experience (at least when I'm trying to write). Scenes written from Jim's POV always seem a little brittle and fragile to me. Jim and cop-procedure scenes feel like such a balancing act -- like I'm walking along Blair's rope bridge in Nepal, hoping anyone reading the story won't look down at the vast abyss of my ignorance. That's another reason Cake was so difficult to write. Having never been any further south than Daytona Beach, all the Brazil sequences were completely dependent on research. Sort of makes me wonder why I decided to write the story at all ... it must have seemed like a good idea at the time.