Christian Kelley-Madera Hello, everyone! My guest today is Margaret Killjoy. Margaret is an author, musician crafter and self described jack of all trades. Margaret, thank you so much for agreeing to chat with me and welcome to the show. Margaret Killjoy Thanks for having me. Christian Kelley-Madera First of all, just on a human level, how are you holding up in these unusual times? Margaret Killjoy Well, my, my particular curse is anxiety, in the best of times. So I'm spending most of my day convincing myself I'm not dying of poison ivy or, you know, some other random new thing every day that I've decided I'm going to die of. Fortunately, I have a fair amount of tools for it. So I'm doing okay. Christian Kelley-Madera Yeah, I kind of feel it's like, in some ways I've been as someone who also is a bit of an anxious person. I somewhat feel like I've been preparing this. Like, I've told my therapist that like it feels like the world finally caught up to my anxiety, you know? Margaret Killjoy Uh huh. Yeah. Christian Kelley-Madera But yeah, so that's how that's going. My guest Margaret has a large body of published work across several disciplines. But today we're going to be focusing on the Danielle Cain series of novels, which currently includes THE LAMB WILL SLAUGHTER THE LION and its sequel THE BARROW WILL SEND WHAT IT MAY, both of which I should say I really, really enjoyed. I read them both in an afternoon each and I probably owe a reread where I'm not just blasting through at top speed because I'm so invested in the plot. But for any of our listeners who haven't yet read the books, Margaret, can you give them kind of a just a quick pitch to kind of whet their appetites. Margaret Killjoy It's funny, thhey've been out for a year or two so I'm not like on the ball of knowing exactly how to elevator pitch them anymore, but basically Danielle Cain is a a squatter traveler who's trying to find out what happened to her dead best friend, and she stumbles into a squatted village or town in Iowa called freedom Iowa, and realizes that the reason that they have this little anarchist utopia is that they summoned a three antlered deer that kills anyone who tries to take power over anyone else. And that's not normal. Danielle has never encountered magic at any other point in her life. And so that's the that's the first the first book and then basically after that it's sort of punk rock Scooby Doo is maybe the easiest way to describe it. It becomes an ensemble cast, driving around the country dealing with paranormal experiences. Christian Kelley-Madera Sure, um, you know, I always like asking other creators what was kind of the first thing that that sang to you about this particular story? Like when did you feel like there was a there there that you should pursue? Margaret Killjoy This one is a particularly interesting background in that I actually first wrote about Freedom, Iowa, in a completely different novella that didn't have any demons in it, but had most of the same characters and the same settings and everything. And it did not sing to me. And I finished it as kind of, I don't know if other writers have experienced this, but it's sort of an afterbirth to...I wrote a longer novella called "A Country of Ghosts." That came out in 2014, I think. And as I was finishing it, I was just at that point, so used to writing so many words, every day that I just kind of kept going. Once I finished this long novella, I immediately sat down and wrote a short one. {05m 05s - Ad-supported version} {04m 26s - Patreon version} Margaret Killjoy But it wasn't as good. And so I kind of tabled it. And then eventually, I was trying to figure out what to do with it and realized that it needed a stronger hook. And that pretty much it needed to leave literary fiction and kind of join me in genre fiction. And I think it was probably the first moment that Uliksi, the three antler deer, appears on screen that I was like, Okay, this this story will be something and it's turned out that way. It's resonated with far more people than I expected it to. Christian Kelley-Madera Sure that was the thing when you said Oh, yeah, it's spirits are the thing. Margaret Killjoy Yeah. And when I when I specifically just sat down and wrote that one, you know, Christian Kelley-Madera Huh, that's interesting. Yeah, it's so interesting that it started off as as not genre fiction, it seems like you feel a certain affinity to air quotes, genre fiction. Do you have any sense as to why that might be? Is it something you grew up with? Is it... Margaret Killjoy Yeah, it's, I mean, it's funny because I so I grew up reading a ton of fantasy and science fiction, but I also grew up reading a ton of literary fiction and I never really, like bothered to be interested in the divide between them. But it kind of became more important and interesting to me once I became more aware of the politics - not the like grander politics, but the sort of scene politics behind literary fiction versus genre fiction, and I find myself much more aligned with the sort of writing in the gutter. And I think that genre fiction has a longer tradition of sort of writing in the gutter and that's, you know, I don't mean to paint all literary fiction writers or books or publishers or anything with any particular brush, but that's been my experience. And so, I've been kind of proud of the tradition of especially like, I'm really interested in some of the writers who people try to elevate up to literary fiction and they're like, Nah, I'm not…I'm not trying to do that. Christian Kelley-Madera Right, right, right. Margaret Killjoy Ursula Le Guin and Tolkien off the top of my head, who just like, went to bat to defend the fact that they wrote genre and have written some of the like, more thematically important pieces of fiction for me. Christian Kelley-Madera Right, Tolkien has that whole that famous essay about fairy stories, I believe he called them Margaret Killjoy Yeah, I use that quote, way too much. There's a quote about like, you know, why should a man who's trapped in prison be shamed if he wants to think about somewhere other than prison and Certainly as many people right now are experiencing, not actually prison. It's a dramatic difference. But the isolation that people are dealing with right now, I think fantasy is particularly important and escapism is particularly important. Christian Kelley-Madera Sure. Can I actually can I pause 30 seconds, I just need to go get my other set of headphones out of my cat's mouth. So give me one second. INTERMISSION Okay, sorry about that. My cat Purrthurnax loves destroying electronics. Yes. To your to your point about about, quote unquote, genre fiction. I mean, something that I think about a lot is how, you know, if you look at the kind of what is thought of as literary fiction, where it's like, mundane events reveal some emotional truth. And if you look at that in kind of like cross cultural cross historical perspectives, it's a very limited slice of humanity that has written stories that way. And so I think it speaks to certain to certain politics as you say that we elevate that particular way of telling stories when, you know, I think the the vast majority of the history of human storytelling has some sort of larger than life element, which if if told today would get it classified as quote unquote, genre fiction. Margaret Killjoy Yeah, no, that that makes sense to me, that's interesting. It's, it's, it's funny because it runs into one of my strong desires is to often try to write stories that aren't saving the entire world from the apocalypse. You know, like trying to write sort of mundane experiences within a fantastical lens. {10m 05s - Ad-supported version} {09m 26s - Patreon version} Margaret Killjoy But I think that's my own…I mean, I once, I remember I once wrote a legally distinct from Choose Your Own Adventure book, an Adventure Of Your Own Choosing Book. And I, I wrote, you know, 40,000 words of it or something. And then one night I was like, wait, no, I have to completely redo it. And my partner at the time who was like, No, you have to publish that so we can pay rent. I was like, No, no, no, the protagonist has too much agency. And everything I've learned about writing since then has argued against what I chose to do, but I'm actually very glad I did it. I was like, This. This protagonist needs to be be swept along by fate more. So I don't know. Yeah. Christian Kelley-Madera Yeah, that's that's an interesting little bit of history. Now on the on the subject of kind of like, you know how things are classified in in politics. You politically identify as an anarchist and based on my experience that clearly informs your writing. But I wonder for anyone listening who's either unfamiliar with the term or may have misconceptions about it, can you tell them what anarchism means to you? Margaret Killjoy Yeah, um, anarchism to me is...I'm an anarchist, because I am opposed to basically like, systemic hierarchy, systemic oppressions, whether that's white supremacy or capitalism, you know, and I'm going to go ahead and define capitalism not as, not as making money by work, but rather by making money with money, which tends to centralize money and therefore centralize power, because in any economic system, money is a form of power. So the concept of having a democratic society In which power centralizes in individuals is essentially nonsensical to me. But anarchism is basically like I'm opposed to the state and capitalism and white supremacy and homophobia and basically like, these social, economic or political structures that give one individual or group of individuals power over other people. And anarchism kind of stands for the the self actualization of individuals, but it also comes very strongly from a leftist tradition. So, the idea is that we can be our best selves by working with each other - by working with each other by choice, instead of in a sort of top down way. And specifically for me, anarchism is also an existing political tradition that dates back to the mid-19th century actually predates what we would consider communism. And so I'm working within that framework, but there are a lot of people who work for very similar goals that I totally respect who are working from like a decolonization framework or, you know, like the Zapatistas in Chiapas are not anarchists, but we've been in solidarity with them and vice versa for a very long time and I'm kind of proud of that type of coalition. Christian Kelley-Madera On the subject of of hierarchies, you write a lot of fantasy. And it strikes me that "traditional" (with huge air quotes around traditional) fantasy, in some ways is obsessed with hierarchy. Like the, the stereotypical good ending is the quote unquote, right person, usually a chosen one, sometimes a chosen one by blood, ending up on a throne. And of course, there's there's plenty of work that challenges that. But at least some of it ends up in a place of kind of misanthropic nihilism so called like grim-dark fantasy, which your work also doesn't feel like at all. So I have kind of a cluster of questions about whether and where you see yourself within a dialog of fantasy. So I guess I'm curious: Who have you read who has questioned hierarchies in a way that you like? Is there anyone in particular that you feel like your work might be responding to and kind of what in particular, do you feel like you're uniquely bringing to the conversation? Margaret Killjoy So I see myself probably most directly inspired, not necessarily in the style of writing but the kind of framework that I'm writing in that you're talking about, with Urusla Le Guin. {15m 03s - Ad-supported version} {14m 24s - Patreon version} Margaret Killjoy I think that I've never read someone who more effectively and with more heart challenges hierarchy. There are other people who do it and I'm just basically picking her because she was so directly influential on me. One of the first projects I undertook when I was sort of leaving purely an activist background and taking my writing more seriously is I, I ended up collecting interviews, that became my book, MYTHMAKERS & LAWBREAKERS: ANARCHIST WRITERS ON FICTION. And the first person I interviewed was Ursula Le Guin. Christian Kelley-Madera Oh, that's amazing that you got to interview her. Margaret Killjoy Yeah. And, and she took, you know, time to to answer the questions of this like 25 year old nobody, you know, and I remember I got to ask her, I was like, Well, do you identify as an anarchist? And she said, No, only because I lack the activist element. And I said, Well, do you mind if we claim you and she said that she'd be honored, so I claim her. Because she told me I could. And in a lot of ways, her kindness to me opened up a lot of doors that like, like everyone else, as soon as they found out that they're going to be in the same book as LeGuin, I had no problems finding other people willing to talk to me. And but I specifically, I think of the story of hers I don't know how you pronounce it, it's maybe illa forest or le forest [Ed. note - spelled "Ile Forest"] And it's in one of her short story collections. It's probably in ORSINIAN TALES but I'm not sure. And it's just this parable that talks about, you know, two people sit down and say one person, one person says there's no such thing as... basically someone says like, there are certain unforgivable crimes like murder. And this person's like, Well, let me tell you a story about a horrible murder, that is like not a justified glorious killing, it is a horrible murder. And at the end of it, you're going to realize that the legal system should have no part in it. And that, you know, and it's not phrased that way so completely politically, but it's a story about how, in this particular case like it wouldn't do anyone any good to seek vengeance or retribution, whether legally or illegally you know, and, that was like such a, an eye opening bit of anarchist fiction to me of this way of writing to get across ideas. That is like slightly less...like I grew up in a much more pedantic - basically, I read a lot of Heinlein when I was young. And, and he's one of the most pedantic political writers and I actually kind of appreciate his, his style, where he'll have like, I mean, I don't totally appreciate his politics, but I appreciate his style. And where he'll have like, this chapter is an aside where an ethicist tells the young cadet about ethics, you know, but that's never been what I've aspired to do. And so as for being kind of in conversation, it's interesting because I'm a little bit less caught up in - I'm a lot more caught up now than I was when I first started writing - But I'm a little bit less caught up with the sort of modern...the field. I read a lot as a kid, and then I spent most of my 20s doing activist stuff and pretty much just reading purely escapist - like, not anything that I'm like specifically trying to shout out or anything, you know, but like, when you're tree-sitting, you'll read whatever book is up there. And so in some ways, I was responding not to my, my kind of peers who do work around subverting these tropes, but I was Yeah, I mean, in a lot of ways I'm responding to the tropes that I see throughout everything with the, the Chosen king who returns and, you know, all of them. Christian Kelley-Madera Sure. I mean, I've sometimes felt like and this is, of course, a drastic oversimplification, but in the way that, you know, it's been said that all Western philosophy is footnotes on Aristotle, you know, so so so much of what we think of as a fantasy is footnotes on Tolkien. Margaret Killjoy Yeah, and I definitely - it's funny, the two podcast interviews that I have lined up for this week is with you and then a Tolkien podcast because I have a metal band that's like specifically referencing Tolkien. Christian Kelley-Madera Oh, I'm gonna come back to that. I was gonna ask - you know what, since you brought it up, let me just say, you know, your your musical work is is maybe outside the scope of this conversation, but I do know my audience. {20m 01s - Ad-supported version} {19m 22s - Patreon version} Christian Kelley-Madera And I owe it to you and to them to at least mention that you formed a black metal band called Feminazgûl. You wanna talk briefly about that fucking incredible name and what you're trying to do with that band? Margaret Killjoy Yeah, several years ago, actually, before I came out as trans, when only my closer friends knew - I mean, I was named Margaret wearing women's clothes, but you know, whatever. People are really good at putting on blinders about things, including to ourselves. So, you know, my friends told me the joke that has been going around for a couple years prior to that of like, "Oh, I'm not a feminazi, I'm a feminazgûl." And I already knew in the back of my head, I was like, once I come out as trans I'm, like, probably going to start a black metal band called Feminazgûl. And I did a couple years later. And it's mostly I mean, it's it's, the music is very serious and it's not...it's a feminist band, it's me and me and a singer. But with the the name I'm clearly referencing, you know, the Nazgul who obviously aren't good guys. But being willing to be sort of like an undead wraith, rather than a feminazi specifically. Christian Kelley-Madera Sure. And is there...why black metal? Is there like a reason you were... something you're trying to do in that space or do you just love the music and wanted to participate? Margaret Killjoy Okay, so, so black metal is obsessed with Tolkien. And it's funny because everyone on all parts of, you know, the most famous fascist black metal musician is Burzum, which is...in Dark Speech means darkness. It's one of the like, what 11 words or something then Tolkien actually wrote of Black Speech. And, but then on the other hand, you have this band called Summoning who are anti-fascists who have been working in the, in black metal for for decades and are heavily it's so cheesily Tolkien themed, it's wonderful, you know, all of their songs and albums are called like Minas Morgul and all these things and so and I wanted...I listen to black metal, I've listened a fair amount of Summoning and some of the other bands. And that was the kind of metal that I wanted to make. And it's also a type of metal that has more of a tradition of people making it alone and also accepts synthesizers more. And I made the first EP entirely by myself and using a computer. And also black metal has a problem with Nazis and I'm...and Nazis have a problem with misogyny and unfortunately so does a lot of the left. And so it definitely was a provocation within that space to come out and say not only anti fascist but we're actively feminist. Christian Kelley-Madera Right. It is kind of interesting, you know, working in any, you know, I think any space that is like Norse mythology adjacent tends to have a Nazi problem. And I do remember when when we were first kind of getting - not big, but like starting to have a following on Tumblr. And suddenly we were getting followed by all of these, like Norse neo-pagan blogs. And I used to have to say that I get to play this fun game where I'd look back through their posts and see like, are you history nerds or are you Nazis? And in some, I mean, it's like even even before, that was there kind of even before fascism as we currently understand it, coalesced, you know, like with Wagner being a fanatical anti-Semite, and specifically trying to revive Norse mythology as a, you know, way to consolidate German identity in a way that excluded Jews. So it's been it's, uh, I don't, I don't know what I'm trying to say or get at. But I think for those of us who are at least left leaning, but interested in that kind of mythological space, there's always kind of a struggle there. {24m 37s - Ad-supported version} {23m 58s - Patreon version} Margaret Killjoy Well, it's like, it's the...space it's the struggle for romanticism. And I, it's where most of my sort of cultural work is, is in this space of romanticism of this like, I mean, I'm literally in a black cabin I built in the woods, right now. Because I thought it would be aesthetically nice as a way to live. And it's it's it's this contested cultural terrain about whether we get to...well my, my whole argument is that Nazis don't get to have nice things and they don't get to have romanticism and they don't get to have and people are really easy...It's really easy to write off epic fantasy for example, as like, you know, all this, you know, glorification of war, glorification of kings and hierarchy, you know, especially the, the natural, you know, the blood borne Savior, whatever, you know, all of these things, definitely play into Nazi hands. But it's, it's why it's such an interesting space is because it also plays into the hands of anyone who's interested in changing the status quo, or anyone who's interested in preserving, you know, wild nature or is interested in magic, beyond just writing about it. You know, there's all of this space. I don't know. I'm really excited about the work that people are doing to kick Nazis out of Norse paganism and out of, you know, metal and out of fantasy. Christian Kelley-Madera Mm hmm. Yeah. And I mean, I think there, you know, not to say that there isn't...like sometimes I think the, the descendants of Tolkien are less good about some things than Tolkien was himself, which is, I mean, there's definitely a strain of, if not racism, then at least racialism in Tolkien like, you know, Bilbo leaves the Shire, not because the Shire is boring, but because of his "adventurous Took blood," right? But there's also, but there's also I think, a very powerful strain of you know, anxiety around industrialized capitalism that doesn't seem to get filtered down as much into like, you know, D&D and The Elder Scrolls and stuff. And It's like a hugely prevalent aspect of Tolkien. Margaret Killjoy Tolkien is...is one of my short stories I refer to him as the most influential, unconsciously racist author of the 20th century. I'm hugely influenced by Tolkien. And, and one of my favorite, he wrote a letter to his son, I think where he said that, where he was like, as I get older, I'm more and more of an anarchist. Christian Kelley-Madera Oh that's interesting, I didn't know that. Margaret Killjoy Yeah, meaning the philosophy rather than, you know, bearded men with bombs or whatever. And, and then he goes on to say, you know, the worst job of any man is to rule other men. Not one in a million is fit for it, least of all those who desire to do it. And, and in the same essay or letter or whatever he also says that maybe he'd be, you know, he's also more okay with like, monarchy as long as it's like this...I don't remember exactly how to phrase this, or how he phrases it. But basically, he's saying that like, it's not right for people to rule other people. And I think that the reason the Lord of the Rings is so important to me is that it's on some ways, it's also sort of an anti... it's a parable about the need to destroy power rather than using power. It's a parable about rather than consolidating, you know, one huge powerful force, having diverse forces that work together, which is a world I believe in and I believe to be explicitly anti hierarchical, and yet at the same time, of course, yeah, is There's there's definite racism within the work, and you know, it's critique of Nazism but it's a critique of Nazism coming from a not particularly perfect place you know? Christian Kelley-Madera Sure I mean, I think you know, Tolkien was probably one of the more progressive people that he knew personally but also, you know, a white British man who grew up in South Africa in the 1890s is going to have some assumptions that are worth questioning, we'll say it that way. Margaret Killjoy Yeah, exactly. He doesn't belong on a pedestal. Christian Kelley-Madera Sure, but it is, you know, I have to try and look up that that essay because, once I hear you say what Tolkien said about you know, not one in a million is fit to rule, least of all the ones who want it like, once you look back, it's like, well, how could you miss that in Lord of the Rings? Like that's such a huge part of Lord of the Rings. So it's really fascinating to to to hear you say that. {30m 02s - Ad-supported version} {29m 23s - Patreon version} Margaret Killjoy Yeah, it's unfortunately like both left and right. both the left and right will sometimes draw from the same well, and the same concept of, you know, well, like the reason Aragorn is fit to be king is because he doesn't want to be king. But it's also this like blood thing, or like critiquing, you know the orcs - are the orcs the proletarian? Are they the urban poor, you know? And in which case like, they're certainly being demonized, you know, and I've always also been interested in a take - which I haven't done with Feminazgûl, but I'll probably do it more at some point - about basically just from the orcs' point of view about, like Sauron and Saruman being, you know, industrial bosses, but it's not in the orcs' best interest to cut down the forest. I don't know. Christian Kelley-Madera Interesting. Yeah, I mean, we kind of, in ONCE AND FUTURE NERD, we've kind of focused on kind of, you know, an anti-colonial reading of it where - because orcs represent this kind of, they're a racial Other, they're heavily racialized, and they're this always chaotic evil by birth is kind of the thing about orcs. So I see them as kind of the, the racial Other that colonialism uses to justify itself because like, "if we don't destroy them, they'll destroy us" is the implication. But it's, you know, it's - to the point of like, sometimes Tolkien's descendants are less good about some things than he himself was - it's like, you know, there's some speculation in the, in the, with the books that you know, based on how we would define races today that Aragorn might be like, at least North African because there's, you know, some ties between like Numenor and Egypt in Tolkien's mind, whereas like you know Peter Jackson - as much I mean I adore those movies are why I fell in love with movies and that's that's my day job is working in movies - but Peter Jackson definitely made the choice to like, all of the Fellowship was going to be Europeans and all of the orcs were going to be Maori and like, I know that's the extras you get when you film in New Zealand. But still, like you could have put, you know, a few white guys in the front of a crowd just for the optics of it, you know, Margaret Killjoy Right, totally. Christian Kelley-Madera You mentioned, you talked about left and the right drawing on on certain similar veins and something that I wanted to bring up that I that I loved in LAMB WILL SLAUGHTER THE LION is that in Uliksi, I read a good faith expression of a personal anxiety about justice in left wing spaces and a kind of, you know, quote unquote "left authoritarianism" and that's a subject where, in my opinion, reactionary bad faith has made good faith reckoning very fraught. And I wonder if I was off base in reading it that way and if not, can you can you talk about some of that tension? Margaret Killjoy No, I think that's a fairly accurate reading. So in the book, and I don't think it's a spoiler to say you know, this demon dear Uliksi's a guardian spirit who kills anyone who tries to exert power over anyone else, and therefore no one - and they, they have summoned this deer in order to stop essentially an authoritarian takeover of this, this utopian space and it goes badly. {35m 24s - Ad-supported version} {33m 24s - Patreon version} Margaret Killjoy I mean, in a lot of ways, it's the Ring of Power. It’s this critique of taking an easier way out of...instead of acting with agency ourselves - Finding a, an outside force that can do it for us. And right, I think it's that, tied with authoritarianism, that really causes so many projects to fall apart. In so many - I've lived in a lot of reasonably large scale short lived anarchist spaces, where you know, several hundred people are gathered together for a protest for a week or, you know, 40 people are living in the woods to stop a logging project or something like that. I've also lived in large squatted spaces and - never anything quite so large Freedom, Iowa. That's a sort of utopian imagining on my part. But one of the most dangerous things are - and Occupy camps are a good example of this too - the people who are going to volunteer to do security. Like, often, that's where you start having these power imbalances come from. And you could even look at the sort of utopian project that's happening in northern Syria, the place that most people are calling Rojava. The egalitarian aims of it are on some level, need, (by necessity because they're being invaded by Turkey. And before that they were in a war against ISIS). They, the needs of the war have often come ahead of the needs of the horizontalism that they are fighting for. And that's not to say that that's bad of them to not get killed, and figure out what they need to do to not be killed. But it's always gonna be a tension and that's the tension that I'm trying to draw out in THE LAMB WILL SLAUGHTER THE LION. Christian Kelley-Madera Yeah, no I really - that felt really refreshing to me because I tend to see you know, in the conversation online where, quote unquote "authoritarian leftism" is sometimes meant to just say like, "I shouldn't say slurs when I teach a college class." You know, you either get totally, totally bad faith hand-wringing from centrists and conservatives that, you know, an accountability for anyone powerful anywhere is you know, a step away from gulags. And then the response the response to that can be sometimes an almost Tankie-ish tendency to pretend like, oh, "Stalin and Mao did nothing wrong and even if they did, those people deserved it, you know?" And so it felt like really refreshing to hear somebody reckon in good faith with that tension and I will admit that you had me - You know, I'm not I'm not as read up in leftist traditions, certainly as you are. But you definitely had me googling the Kronstadt rebellion and, and things like that, because, you know, how the Soviet Union went off the rails is something that I think the left needs to reckon with. Like we have, we have to talk about, like, how have these major high profile, left wing projects failed and turned, you know - at what point do you go off the rails and now you're just authoritarianism with boring clothes, you know, like, and so yeah, I was like, that was really eye opening to me to read about the Kronstadt rebellion. And I was like, "where is the BATTLESHIP POTEMKIN 2 about this event? Can you actually - can you just give people a quick rundown on that? Because I thought it was so interesting. Margaret Killjoy It's funny, I forgot I referenced it in the book, but it makes sense. One of the characters in the book is reading a book about the Kronstadt rebellion. And what it was, is that, to my understanding, and I'm not crazy read up on it, but I've read up more than probably the average person, I don't know, about the Russian Revolution. The Russian revolution started off pluralist, it was socialist and communist in - by most standards - but it was a pluralism within those where multiple tendencies were working together to have a revolution. And essentially, at some point, the Bolsheviks, who were certainly a minority party, declared it was actually their revolution and that they were in charge. {40m 14s - Ad-supported version} {38m 15s - Patreon version} Margaret Killjoy And there was this rebellion that happened in Kronstadt, which is a city in Northern Russia, I guess. And it was - largely the military force that defended this rebellion were anarchist sailors, and they - but it wasn't a purely anarchist rebellion. That was one of the things that I find so beautiful about it. They put out a list of 10 demands, basically. And they were like, "Look, we hate capitalism and the czar, too. But we can't have the party members eating better than us. We can't have a suspension of free speech." And one of the things that they fought for is that they were like, if some guy has a small farm, and isn't hiring labor, so he's not extracting the surplus value created by someone else, and pocketing it, he can keep having a small farm. So basically, the one of the things that they were fighting for was against forced collectivization. And that's a really important sticking point to me because several of the large scale anarchist projects - Ukraine during around the same time, Spain about 20 years later, and I need to read up more about the People's Republic of Manchuria (the Korean anarchist project. I don't know about how this part went down there), but they didn't force collectivization. Instead, they were like, well, we think it's a good idea. But if you're not, if you're working land that's, you know, sized for you and your family, we're not going to stop you. And at least in revolutionary Catalonia in Spain, as far as I understand, lots of farmers then were like, started off being like, yeah, I'm gonna keep what's mine, and then about a year later, they were like, "Oh, actually, collectivization makes sense." And to me, that's the core of why you can't hold a gun to someone's head and make them be an anarchist. But unfortunately-- Christian Kelley-Madera --Right, that's not anarchy! Margaret Killjoy Yeah, exactly. But you can hold a gun to someone's head and make them a communist. And that's a shame. And, and so I think that's why the Russian Revolution went bad is because it stopped being a pluralist society and started being a single Single ideology. Christian Kelley-Madera Thank you for that. And there's so much more that we could talk about in that vein, but I don't want to keep you forever. I do, before we wrap up, I just want to mention that I don't know how familiar you are with kind of the audio drama space or spaces such as they are right now. But it does...It strikes me that so many of the elements of the Danielle Cain series, that the audio world as I'm experienced in it would absolutely eat it up. And not to put you on the spot or anything. But I wonder if you had ever thought about adapting this to other media. You said something interesting when we first started talking about when Uliksi first appeared "on the screen." So I wonder if you had any thoughts about ever adapting any of this to another medium or anything like that. Margaret Killjoy Well, I am highly - I'm actively encouraging anyone who enjoys the books who wishes they were an audio format to to get at Tor.com about it. And I don't currently have the sort of resources necessary to produce the audio version myself. Or, I wouldn't do it as as well, basically. You know, there's - these are my, my two most like sort of widely published books because they're my my two mainstream published books. And I, like that about them. They're able to reach more people because of that. So I would highly encourage anyone to bug Tor.com about doing an audio version. And yeah, I don't know - I would love it if someone buys the rights although...to do a screen adaptation...I was in conversation with a director, a Hollywood director, about doing it, possibly as a TV show. It ended up falling through and one of the reasons it fell through, which is kind of interesting to me is that, I mean he's a mainstream Hollywood, you know, TV and movie producer, director. And but he, he found something he really cared about in these, in the books. And so he was interested in it, but then through talking to his team, he realized that he'd have to strip out so much of the meaning, the more radical concepts, in order to basically...sell-- Christian Kelley-Madera --To get it made-- Margaret Killjoy --to get money to make it and it's funny to me because I'm broke enough. I was like, I don't care you know, if you make them all liberals, like, I'll be annoyed. As long as you don't have like a, you know, cis actor playing the trans characters or something. Um, because I don't know. I mean, like, that's not what I would want. I would love to see the Danielle Cane series adapted for especially TV, possibly movie, but especially TV. {45m 30s - Ad-supported version} {43m 31s - Patreon version} Margaret Killjoy I had a…A COUNTRY OF GHOSTS was adapted to an indie film in Montreal, that's half-French half-English, and which is not widely distributed, unfortunately. And when they made it, I had to have this like really intense realization that I think most authors who are lucky enough to have people resonate with their work enough to make them their own. But I had to realize that it's not my movie, you know, and, and that letting go was like, hard and worthwhile. And so it's hard to figure out, I would either need to, if I wanted to work on in a different medium, I would either need to find people --I would either need to be in charge or I would need to let go. Christian Kelley-Madera Right. Speaking from what limited experience I have, you know, Hollywood is such a strange place politically in the sense that it, you know, wants to see itself as left-leaning but is obviously this giant industry, that can only, you know...and it's fascinating the stuff that gets through or doesn't. Like there is you know, there was some stuff getting made in the 80's, it's like... I mean when you watch THEY LIVE by John Carpenter today it's like, you know, they could remake that movie, shot-for-shot line-for-line, and all they'd have to change is, you know, give the cops better guns, and it would feel real today. You know? And, but at the same time-- Margaret Killjoy --I would totally watch that. Christian Kelley-Madera It would be incredible. And get The Rock in there, you know. You need another wrestler as a lead. Margaret Killjoy Especially - and you need the really long homoerotic fight that's like-- Christian Kelley-Madera --Oh, yes-- Margaret Killjoy --Unbearably long for no reason. You need that. Christian Kelley-Madera Longer. Longer, ideally. Margaret Killjoy Yeah. Christian Kelley-Madera What an incredible choice Mr. Carpenter made there. But it's, and then, at the same time, you know--and DO THE RIGHT THING is another movie that's like, you know, they could remake it line-for-line. There's a Trump joke in DO THE RIGHT THING. And like, but at the same time, Hollywood is making, you know, TOP GUN, which, while also having plenty of homoerotic subtext is definitely, you know, rah-rah American imperialism. And there's a lot to think about in terms of, you know, why did-- I am very grateful to be part of a union that is still relatively strong, and that, you know, the film industry unions survived Reagan better than a lot of other sectors. And...but it's an interesting question of, why? Is it because it was kind of, it was a, a white collar union that had the kind of cultural capital to weather the storm? Is it because we were willing to participate in the imperialist project with things like TOP GUN? I don't know. But that's a that's a much longer, separate conversation and I won't keep you on the phone for all of that. Margaret Killjoy I bet it was becuse it was less economically precarious. That's my off the top of my head guess. Christian Kelley-Madera Mmm. In the sense that like... Margaret Killjoy If you're coal miner and you strike - I've like talked to coal miners who were part of the destruction of the coal mine unions in the 80s. And they were like we'd be on strike for 100 days, but then all the scabs would come by and just wave hundred dollar bills in our face, you know? And that's not to say, I mean, strike is always an economic hardship. Sorry, not to totally derail. I'm just like, I'm actually really curious. It's a really interesting question of why the screenwriters union survived when so many unions failed. Christian Kelley-Madera Right? Yeah, a part of it is yeah, being able to, you know, weather the, the, the storm longer because of existing, you know, resources and cultural capital and I'm sure... Then again, during that...during the famous writers strike that happened in my lifetime they, just started making more reality TV. Including THE APPRENTICE. So talk about a butterfly flapping its wings. Margaret Killjoy Oh God! Christian Kelley-Madera But anyway... Well, great. So. Anyone who listened to this interview and wants to check out more of your work, Margaret, or find out more about you, where should they go? Margaret Killjoy I have a website that's birdsbeforethestorm.net that'll have links to my different books and short stories that are out in different magazines. And you can get my books wherever you get your books, which hopefully these days is both delivery and not Amazon. If you're able to. {50m 06s - Ad-supported version} {48m 07s - Patreon version} Margaret Killjoy No shame with anyone getting books however they need to, but... And you can follow me on Twitter @MagpieKilljoy. Christian Kelley-Madera Great. Is there any work in particular that you want to plug right now? Margaret Killjoy Well, I did just put out an album with Feminazgûl called NO DAWN FOR MEN. Christian Kelley-Madera Amazing. Margaret Killjoy That's the thing that's on my mind the most right now so... Christian Kelley-Madera And where is that? Where can people get that? Margaret Killjoy Yeah Bandcamp. Go to feminazgul.bandcamp.com Christian Kelley-Madera Perfect. Do I need...I assume I don't need the diacritical mark in my, uh...to get to feminazgul.bandcamp.com? Margaret Killjoy No, yeah. I have gotten good at learning how to type it, but all of our official stuff does not have the mark over the 'u.' Christian Kelley-Madera Yeah, probably wise, whatever else it was. Margaret Killjoy, thank you so much for chatting with me today. It's really been a pleasure and enlightening and I'm really grateful I got the chance to talk to you. Margaret Killjoy Yeah, thanks so much. Transcribed with the help of https://otter.ai