Message to citizens of Germany:
I have recently been doing interviews in an effort to promote the new Vicente Amorim movie "Good", a movie our film-making team is proud of, and in which I am proud play a German. It has come to my attention that, when I spoke about realising I had certain prejudices about Germans and their spoken language as I was preparing the role of the professor, 'Halder', it was not always reported that I admitted this in order to explain that playing the part had helped me get past these stupid prejudices of mine. There is always the risk that one's statements will be misconstrued when not reported in their entirety. If the partial reports of what I spoke about have in any way offended Germans or anyone else, I am very sorry. Hopefully, Germans and anyone else interested in this matter will avail themselves of the complete record.
Viggo Mortensen.

I really really hope this extraordinary movie will make it to German Cinemas. It would be such a shame if it can't be seen in Germany.

My publishing philosophy part 1

My publishing philosophy part 2

My publishing philosophy part 3

My publishing philosophy part 4
 
Another argument against publishing original slash emphasises the importance of intertextuality. For a number of slash fans intertextuality is a basic requirement. They like their slash stories and characters embedded within the specific context of a fandom and personally they prefer to stay within a subcultural community without pursuing an active exchange with the “official” culture and market. In other words, if you strip a slash story of its insider hints and obvious relatedness to the source text or the real persons it refers to – like we do and like it has to be done in order to get a story ready for publishing – you take away the main attraction and charms of a slash story for them.

Just to make sure you don't miss a part accidentally :) - I posted part 3 and 4 (this part) at once, in part 3 I introduce the term "original slash" as I understand it.

My publishing philosophy part 1

My publishing philosophy part 2

My publishing philosophy part 3

There are several objections towards publishing original slash I have heard. In this post I answer to the first one.

I often have to explain to friends and acquaintances what kind of literature I write and publish. Once in a while someone criticises that even if we change character names and obvious references to the source text or the real people it’s still copyright infringement or an offence of personal rights (depending on whether the former story was FPS or RPS).

The first half of the year has been successful in regard of publishing. Together with my co-authors and slash-friends I have made three books. Contributions to several anthologies are in the editing process and will come out in autumn.

Last week I was interviewed by the biggest gay magazine in Germany – “Maenner aktuell” – for an article on women who write novels for gay publishing houses. And from what I heard so far, the journalist is going to write something nice. (He called one of the publishers I’m working for and said he was “impressed by the intellectual, well-thought answers”). Among other subjects we talked about “original slash” and I explained my concept of the term to him.

With some luck I’ll be able to get more contracts in the future, because the publishing houses in Germany I’m working with all three signalled their principal interest in more novels and anthologies by “us”.

Therefore I’ve decided to write down and share a few thoughts in regard of my “publishing philosophy” – my basic convictions, my intentions and aims.

It might be interesting for authors who already worked and published together with me, especially for those who’d like to continue the publishing collaboration - or those who might join the group for one or the other project in the future.

I will post my thoughts in several parts. This is not an ambitious essay, I didn't have it beta-ed, I wrote it down just like it came to my mind, I wasn't careful with wording  - it is just meant  to share some of the ideas, plans and theories going around in my head.  

dalehead  wrote a beautiful and interesting sequel to Battle of Eyes by 

helena_s_renn

Yesterday night I attended a concert of my brother with his band "Chinchilla" in the "Schlosskeller " in Darmstadt. It is the location for the weekly gay and lesbian disco, and while I listened to my brother's beautiful jazz, I thought of the times when I went there for dancing, and I remembered a visit in another gay club, the "pulse"  in Frankfurt, two weeks ago, and while I was musing and dreaming it struck me - I came to conclusion in regard of an almost life-long question: I found out why it is that I'm fascinated with gay men.  

Before I get to my longer personal "analysis", here's a photo of my brother with his sax in the "Schlosskeller" yesterday  - he's the older one of my two little brothers : 




My brother and three other members of "Chinchilla":