Village Press
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| Zine Publisher | |
|---|---|
| Name: | Village Press |
| Contact: | Rosemary Wild |
| Type: | fanfic |
| Fandoms: | Star Trek: TOS |
| Status: | active |
| Other: | slash fanzine publisher |
| URL: | http://www.villagepresszines.co.uk/ |
| Click here for related articles on Fanlore. | |
Village Press has been publishing slash zines since 1982.
For a while some of their zines were agented and distributed in the US via Bill Hupe. By 1997, problems with Bill's successor, Peg Kennedy led them to revoke permission in a letter to the K/S Press #16.
Their Zines
- In the Wilderness (1986-1994)
- Heroes in the Wilderness (1997)
- Singing in the Wilderness (1999)
- Prophets in the Wilderness (2003)
- Astray in the Wilderness (2004)
- The Voice (1982-1986)
- The Extremists (1992)
- Locusts.. and wild honey (1984)
History
From their website:
Way back in 1982, two fen looked up from the zines they were reading, looked at each other and said, "Hey, we can do this too!" And they did. They had the stories - two each! They had the technology - an elderly electric stencil printer (100 copies per minute) that went berserk when you took your eye off it. Most of all they had the enthusiasm. And so they wrote a zine. They called it THE VOICE 1 and they sold it. So they wrote some more. Kate came and they kept writing. Frances came and ... Finally after 5 issues, they said, "This is fun let's ask more people." The VOICE wasn't big enough so along came IN THE WILDERNESS (ITW for short) - all 7 of them."
From publisher in The K/S Press #6 (1997):
Village Press dates from 1981 (although I personally have been in fandom since the first Classic airing on BBC TV in 1969) when ‘Vivienne Rivers’ and ‘Eva Stuart’ were writing their first stories and as these seemed to mesh well, they made their appearance in The Voice together with those of Kate Daniels. There were five issues of ‘The Voice’, all of which are out of print. Almost all the stories were established relationship and part of each author’s chronology. We had no A/U or death stories until - shock of shocks - ‘Vivienne’ produced a death story. So rather than go back on our word that Voice wouldn’t have such things (they were very much a fashion after ST2 and unpopular with some readers) we created a new title, and Locusts and Wild Honey came out of the Wilderness.In the Wilderness numbers 1 - 4 followed, the title chosen to illustrate our feeling of being rather away from the mainstream of K/S at the time. As of now, numbers 1 and 3 are in print. We had a wider variety of writers and poets both British and American from ‘Stuart ‘n Rivers’ to Gates and Resch, and we concentrated on finding new insights into K/S and weaving them into strong plots and detailed backgrounds.
A novel came out. The Extremists by Eva Stuart part of her time-scheme, told of the first Federation/Klingon scientific expedition after the Peace and is in print.
Village Press doesn’t go into print very often. This is partly because I have to do the printing myself. The climate of tolerance, although much improved, still makes it hard to find a discreet printer. I have invaluable help with proofing and collating and especially typing... At the same time I get few complete submissions. Most writers contact me with an idea and go away to write it and I wouldn’t dare rush the process. I’m always on the lookout for stories - any subject except death of main character. Editing is kind and caring. If a story fits the zine, I’ll accept it without reservation. I might suggest amendments but they are [open] for discussion.
From the editorial of Heroes in the Wilderness (1997):
The origin of the title of this series IN THE WILDERNESS can be found in the story of John the Baptist (St. Matthew's Gospel) and was meant to express something of the difference that the editor felt lay between her interpretation of K/S and the popular vision at the time (the 1980s.)
About Art
Her zines have a reputation for having no art, although they do in fact include some. Here is why there is so little: “Art in zines is lovely although over the years I think the quality has been rather mixed. In the beginning, The Voice simply didn’t have any money at all, let alone for art so we resorted to cartoons. Then we found that many people wanted a discreet zine they could read in the same room as other people, so we stuck to that for a while. Another consideration was that artists in the days before the PC wanted their work printed offset litho, which was an expensive process. Added to that you needed to find a printer who would handle the work. This meant that In the Wilderness could not include the more explicit art. At the same time we wanted to include some work so all our cash went on a few selected pieces reinforced with line drawings and cartoons. Modern computer art is lovely but I worry about the copyright situation. Also with the coming of the net I don’t feel the need for art in zines any more, so it’s back to cartoons!” So lack of money and a desire for discretion is what drove Rosemary to keep her zines more textual than visual—all very understandable. I have certainly been embarrassed on occasion when a zine I am reading on a train suddenly displays its visual delights! But the last comment is interesting: is it true that now we have the net there is less of a need for art in zines? In fact, there is not very much art on the net and I must say a lot of art looks much nicer printed on paper anyhow. [1]