Legacy Interview with Georgia Barnes

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Interviews by Fans
Title: Legacy Interview with Georgia Barnes
Interviewer: Legacy
Interviewee: Georgia Barnes
Date(s): 2007
Medium: print, CD
Fandom(s): Star Trek TOS, slash
External Links:
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In 2007, Georgia Barnes was interviewed for the zine Legacy.

See List of Star Trek Fan Interviews.

Some Excerpts

It all started for me when I found a hardcover book about Star Trek that had a whole section in the back about the fans who were writing some of the paperback stories that were being put out. It also mentioned that there were amateur fan publications—called fanzines— and some of them were homoerotic. Kirk and Spock doing the nasty—my heart skipped a beat. The only addresses however were for contacts for the genzines.

One of the first zines I got was Galactic Discourse form Laurie H. and I soon had several poems in one of the issues. Laurie and I became pen pals, and after I felt comfortable with her I asked her about the “/” zines. We had a long discussion on how someone could call their zine “IDIC” and then refuse to sell it to anyone the editor knew wrote or read slash. Laurie said “she named the zine before fans decided what IDIC meant” and I said I was pretty sure it was defined in the show— infinite diversity in infinite combinations. Shortly after that I wrote a story (“Myrddin”) based on one of the covers of Galactic Discourse. It wasn’t blatantly slash, but it could certainly be read that way. Laurie was already using about 4 of my poems in that issue and when she wrote back to me (remember this was pre-internet and email), she suggested that I submit it to T’hy’la (Kathy Resch). I did and it was the start of many long friendships.

[Fandom house parties] all started for me when submitted a story (“Myrddin”) to Kathy Resch for T’hy’la. Within a couple of months at most, Kathy, Sharon G., Marie A. and I were having a party at Sharon’s house in San Jose. A very small start to something that grew beyond belief and spawned several fanzines. I drove down from Berkeley, carefully following Sharon’s directions to her house in San Jose. Kathy was already there and Marie only stopped by for about an hour—but we had sooooo much fun. The next party was up at my apartment in San Rafael (I’d moved shortly after the first party) and the guest list grew by word of mouth. This time it was Kathy, Sharon, Marie, Maureen, Noel and Gloria and we spent hours talking about different stories and episodes. After that the parties really expanded. Noel started hosting them (she does it so well) and the guest list grew each time. By this third party, we even had someone come in from NJ for the party—and she brought a cake with marzipan figures of Kirk and Spock doing 69. We couldn’t believe she found a bakery that would do it, or that she was brave enough to bring it cross country on the plane. Those figures lived on in Noel’s freezer for quite a while. Again, many long and lasting friendships were forged at these parties—friends that I’ve moved with into many, many fandoms.