I'm excited to have today's blog post feature an interview with the two authors/editors of the newly released Fae Visions of the Mediterranean, which features a short story by fellow Ghost, Gears, and Grimoires author Mattia Ravasi. You all know how much I love mythology and how traveling to Greece has been one of the highlights of my life, so I couldn't say no. Enjoy!
*** -Author's Note:
Fae
Visions of the Mediterranean is an anthology
of short stories, poems, translations, and other arcane bits of written
awesomeness published by The
Future Fire. It is meant to represent the diverse and
complex nature of the Mediterranean – as a geographical, cultural and
historical entity – through tales both cheerful and dark... but generally quite
dark. Monsters abound in the pages of Fae Visions, and moving as they
are by and beneath the Mediterranean's waves, they hardly ever look out of
place.
Valeria and Djibril, the guys who edited the
anthology,chose one of my stories for Fae Visions. When it was time to
start with the interviews-madness, I thought I should grab the chance and ask
them about the anthology's behind-the-scenes, and about what they wanted to
achieve. I'm sure all fans of the fantastical and horrific, and especially
those of us who are striving to get their stories published, will appreciate
this sneak peek at the world of editors, these bizarre creatures.
Thanks to both Valeria and Djibril for
being such amazing people to work with, and to Amy for hosting this
interview on her fabulous blog. Enjoy!
- Mattia
***
1) Let's start
from the beginning, shall we: where did the idea for the Fae Visions anthology
come from? What was your goal?
Valeria Vitale: It started with a discussion about
material culture. Someone pointed out how the same card games can be found,
with very little variations in the deck, among relatively distant cities that
have in common “only” the fact of being ports of the Mediterranean. That
Mediterranean cities have strong and old (although always evolving) links is
something so apparent to me, born on the Ionian sea, that I had never really
reflected on it; I had never tried to explain the beauty of growing up in an
environment where national borders don’t make a lot of sense. The conversation
moved quite naturally from travelling objects to travelling words, songs, tales
and characters. If you look at the monsters painted on ancient vessels, you can
easily imagine the stories travelling with them—I like to picture ancient
sea-captains giving lifts to monsters, hidden in the hold!
So we decided to create a literary space for the
wonders and horrors (sometimes the line is thin…) of the Mediterranean. We
wanted to allow those peregrine stories to travel even further, reaching the
new, dark and cold seas of the Anglophone countries.
2) The bit on
the card games was seriously dope. I had no idea about it. Moving on: when you
get a story - be it for an anthology or an issue of your magazine - what
elements tell you that it's exactly what you are looking for? Do you take any
background information about the story's author into account when you judge a
story?
Djibril al-Ayad: It’s a more complicated process than
that, I think. It varies depending on the editors, but often we start off by
just filtering those stories that we both absolutely love: beautifully written,
great imagery, that speak to us. Then we discuss that longlist, and decide
which ones meet the theme most appropriately, and which contribute to a variety
in theme, style, genre, representation (of authors, characters, settings)—apart
from that, no the author’s background/gender/ethnicity never comes into the
decision as to whether to publish a story or not. Then we have a shortlist
which is typically double the length of the final table of contents, and we
have to decide not which stories we want to lose—but which stories we know we *mustn’t* lose.
VV: Also, it is very good to work with someone that
shares your general views on what makes a good story, but has different tastes
and background. It makes you look at the stories with different eyes, and
discover other perspectives. Sometimes, after discussing a story with the other
editors, we end up with a complete different opinion about it (funnily enough,
that means that we still disagree, but in a new way :-) ). It is a very
interesting process, and has taught me a lot, not only about literature.
DA: That’s right. One of the most interesting things
I’ve noticed with previous anthologies I’ve co-edited has been that the stories
I hated but was talked into, or the stories my co-editor hated and I talked
them into, are precisely the ones
that end up being the strongest stories, most popular, most likely to win
awards, etc. Having two sets of eyes helping to overcome each other’s
prejudices is incredibly valuable.
3) If you could
have one living writer — any writer — contribute an extra story to the 2nd,
extended, golden, exclusive limited edition of Fae Visions of the Mediterranean, who would she or he be?
DA: Well, we really wouldn't like to prejudge the
slushpile of a future anthology, because for example our very favourite author
could in theory submit something and we might decide the story doesn’t fit
(which is also why I never commission
stories for anthologies). But you’re asking us to dream, so in the spirit of
that I’ll say that it would be great to have people of the calibre of Amal El
Mohtar, Lavie Tidhar, Pilar Pedreza, Ahmed Khaled Tawfik, Alda Teodorani or
Vered Tochterman contributing to the slush some day. Who knows? Nothing’s
impossible.
VV: Actually, we _are_ thinking of a second volume!
(We had not really planned a golden, limited edition, but we could work on
that...). First, it was such a good experience, and we got so many good and
interesting stories, that we don’t really want to stop (well, maybe just for a
while). Second, and more important, we felt that there were some voices and
themes that didn’t get represented as much as we would have liked in Fae Visions. So, we plan to open another
call in the future, looking especially for stories coming from—or talking
about—North Africa and the Near East. So, in case Amal, Lavie, Ahmed or Vered
were a bit upset because they missed the first call… they can cheer up!
4) A bit of
behind-the-scenes: what is the best part and what is the worst part of your job
as editors?
VV: That’s an easy one! The best thing is when,
reading the slushpile, you stumble on a very, very good story. One of those you
stop reading halfway through just to say “wow”; something that is so moving,
and bold, and unexpected that it blows you away. When that happens (and,
luckily, it is not a rare thing) you feel really privileged to have a role in
bringing this amazing thing to life, you’re so proud to have built a little
window for its beauty to shine.
DA: And it may be a cliché, but the worst thing is
having to reject a bunch of stories from the final ToC that you really loved
when you first read them. I’m sure authors never believe us when we write, “We
loved your story, but we couldn’t include everything we loved in the final
anthology,” but I make a point of only saying that when it’s true. It’s hard.
It hurts. We know it’s necessary to make the anthology as strong as it can
be—more than the sum of its parts, not just the best individual stories we have
found, but the finest and most coherent collection of stories on the specific theme—but
it still goes against the grain to turn down a story that’s so wonderful.
5) If you had to
live one full year in a city on the Mediterranean, which one would you pick?
VV: I am deeply fascinated by the cities on the
Mediterranean. They all seem to have incredible stories. Did you know that the
island of Gozo in Malta is supposed to be Calypso’s island? Actually, it seems
that Ulysses himself is buried in a port city of Libya. And, speaking of Libya,
the city of Benghazi once carried the name of the fierce queen Berenike, whose
luxurious hair mysteriously flew to the sky, where it can still be seen, among
the stars. So, what I would really like to do is to spend one year visiting
Mediterranean cities, travelling from tale to tale, following the most bizarre,
poetic names.
But, I know, this is a cheating answer. You asked for
one city. So, if I had to pick one, I’d say Tangier. I irrationally fell in
love with it last year, the same way sometimes we fall in love with people and
couldn’t really explain why. We only know that they look absolutely gorgeous to
us.
DA: I’ve never lived on the Mediterranean, nor even
spent more than a couple of days there, to be honest, so I’d probably pick a
city where I can at least speak the language, and could work, but isn’t too
touristy. Marseilles? Barcelona? (I’m told Taranto is grotesquely beautiful!
;-) )
6) Finally, big
question: what plans do you guys have for the future, whether with the
Futurefire.net Press or on your own?
DA: We’ve had a busy last year or so with both The Future Fire magazine and
Futurefire.net Publishing anthologies, so things will be slowing down a little
bit for the next few months. We still have a couple of projects in the
pipeline: a feminist-themed issue of the magazine, and a possible follow-up to
one of our earlier anthologies being mooted, and we’re open to new ideas, as
always. I really want to be in the position to build up our baseline,
though—for a start to be able to pay illustrators better, since we have a
fabulous quality of artists now, and it’s starting to feel like we can’t impose
on their goodwill and enthusiasm forever. But in the meantime we’ll focus on
the magazine for this year, and see where that takes us.
VV: The best thing about plans for the future is that
you always end up doing something else! So, I’m very curious to discover what
we will be doing that we had not
planned!
***
Thanks to Mattia, Valeria, and Djibril for stopping by! It was great to have you on the blog!
Amy
