The Fans from U.N.C.L.E. Interview with Bill Koenig
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| Interviews by Fans | |
|---|---|
| Title: | The Fans from U.N.C.L.E. Interview with Bill Koenig |
| Interviewer: | The Fans from U.N.C.L.E. |
| Interviewee: | Bill Koenig |
| Date(s): | around 1998 |
| Medium: | online |
| Fandom(s): | Man from U.N.C.L.E. |
| External Links: | interview is here, Archived version; reference link |
| Click here for related articles on Fanlore. | |
Bill Koenig was interviewed for The Fans from U.N.C.L.E..
Some Excerpts
The Fleming Affair. I wrote it in late November/early December 1996. It was done on a lark. I participated in an AOL chatroom about UNCLE. We talked about zines and crossovers. I mentioned an idea. One of them said, "You ought to write that!" I said "Who me?" But I hadn't written a fictional story since 1976 -- the year I graduated high school.
It felt good to write the story. At this point, I had only a sketchy knowledge of zines. I saw a few at SpyCon in suburban Chicago in the fall of 1996. That was the first time I had attended any kind of organized UNCLE-related fan event. I knew about zines. I knew there were gen and slash (though not under those names.) I flipped through what must have been the used zine box. I saw one with a cover of Solo and Illya in the shower. "What the heck is this?" I thought.... That's when I remembered there were two kinds of zines. <g>
It doesn't really bother me [to be a guy in a female-dominated fandom]. I never sampled zines until 1997. I think some guys, who tend to be more Solo fans, didn't like the zines of the '80s where (I hear) Illya was built up and Solo de-emphasized. And I've been told there was some kind of defection of male fans from organized UNCLE fandom. Don't know all the details, but I don't have all that baggage, so it's not that big a deal to me. It would be interesting if there were more male writers.