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Q: What does morbid curiosity mean to you?
A: Desiring to perceive and know those matters generally avoided by the mass of human beings, as well as things usually swept under the carpet that make most people flinch upon discovery. Such curiosity is in keeping with my basic philosophy of heroic realism: to face the facts and stare.
Q: How did you discover Morbid Curiosity magazine?
A: I believe there was a mention or an advertisement in Cyber-Psychos AOD magazine. (Editor’s note: I went to look it up. There was actually an excellent review written by Brian Hodge: Morbid Curiosity’s first real review!)
Q: Which was your favorite piece in the magazine?
A: I like the one in the current anthology (“A Night in the House of Dr. Moreau”) best, since it brings attention to heinous things that exist in our society: vivisection and animal experimentation.
Q: What was your favorite story in the zine that wasn’t one of your own?
A: I would really have to go back and re-read them all to find what I thought was best. There were so many articles that were either informative, insightful, or simply entertaining.
Q: How did the piece you have in the book come to be written?
A: From an unsavory life experience. That is where a writer has an advantage over non-writers: we can take things, often personally unpleasant, and shape them into creative work. It also allows us to meditate and muse over the experience and thereby understand it better ourselves (though sometimes it is a bit unsettling to relive certain events or experiences again, even if only on a vicarious level). When the experience is something like a sexual encounter, it is pleasant to recall, but when it is something horrendous or awful, it is not. But in the end, all things are grist for the mill.
Q: Is there anything you’d like to add to that story now?
A: No, it pretty much speaks for itself.
Q: Do you have a tale to tell about your involvement with the magazine or the book?
A: As for the magazine, it seemed a most perfect vehicle for my two stories at the time I wrote them. I can’t imagine any other venue that might have served.
I also met Loren, who is one of the best editors I have encountered. Loren’s editing was always on the mark and she has a great intuition for what works as a pull-quote.
Q: Have you ever been involved in one of the live events?
A: No, it seems like most of the events concerned with the magazine and subsequent book have taken place on the West Coast. I live in the eastern part of the country and it is therefore a long and expensive journey, though I am sure it would be a delight to participate. (Editor’s note: Actually, while I was poking around looking for the reference in CPAOD, I found the photo below. It’s from the first very first Morbid Curiosity Open Mic, which took place at the Death Equinox convention in 1998 in Denver. From left to right: R. N. Taylor, Brian Thomas, Jeffrey N. Stadt, Loren, Gene Santagada, and Michael Hemmingson. Robert, Brian, and Michael have stories in Morbid Curiosity Cures the Blues. The event was so long ago, no wonder Robert’s forgotten!)
Q: Have you had another morbid experience that would make a good story?
( The interview continues... )
- Mood:amused & curious
Hugues provided three covers for Morbid Curiosity: an Italian skeleton, Marie Laveau’s tomb in New Orleans, and the Canadian mummy below. His photographs usually accompanied his essays, whether about “Going Into Tombs” (Morbid Curiosity #4, reprinted in Morbid Curiosity Cures the Blues), working with the dying as a hospice nurse (“Lingering Death,” issue #5), or visiting “Italy’s Undead” (issue #8).
Of all the artwork I published in the magazine, Hugues’s pushed my boundaries the farthest. As a cemetery fanatic, I faced ethical issues about his prying open unlocked mausoleum doors to photograph what was within. I was actually repulsed by Hugues’s luminous photographs of recently dead corpses he encountered at work. Because I felt such strong reactions, it seemed important for me to publish the photographs and start a dialog.
Q: What does morbid curiosity mean to you?
A: If we choose to, or if we have enough money, we can avoid all that is dirty, annoying, and gruesome in this world. But despite our best clothes, the nicest makeup, and walking the red carpet, reality brings us back to the fact that we vomit, we defecate on a regular basis, we get sick, and we’re afraid of dying every time our usual hold on life meets a foreseeable or an unforeseen obstacle. A lot of life’s disagreeable moments are dealt with by workers or professionals, whose main purpose seems to be making money out of our misery and helping us avoid what we fear to see for ourselves.
I think ‘morbid curiosity’ has a lot to do with the inquiring objectivity of the scientific mind. Science has risen as the greatest method of finding out the truth about all aspects of life. Curiosity is the main reason for most of us. Its fun to figure out how your iPod works, but I think it’s much more fun to figure out why mummies exist. Why do we set up these elaborate funeral rites to remember our relatives, but cannot come face-to-face with corpses unless they are in a museum? ‘Morbid curiosity’ isn’t morbid at all; older civilizations dealt with death in different ways but we, today, prefer to sugarcoat it.
Death is the ultimate weirdness about life. The pages of Morbid Curiosity magazine were filled with events that dealt with a special kind of ‘unknown.’ It was a great read because there isn’t a higher purpose in life than sharing our experiences.
Q: How did you discover Morbid Curiosity magazine?
A: My girlfriend was in San Francisco on a book tour (she’s a writer) and doing a signing at Borderlands. Morbid Curiosity #1 was on the counter and she brought it home. We both pored over that issue, delighted and amazed. We bought the next one from the website. Ultimately, I submitted articles.
I’ve always like unusual reads. For example, I liked RE/Search, especially the book that dealt with “modern primitives.” I was fascinated with what people did with their bodies in the name of freedom, but these people were also following a long cultural tradition of mortification and they claimed to achieve higher conscious awareness. Hey! There were still freaks around in this world that weren’t complaining about not being normal, i.e., who enjoyed their differences. We’re constantly told to act ‘normal,’ but we all know that there’s something wrong just waiting to happen, so it’s pretty hard being normal. Individuality is more than genetic. It’s in the way we interact with the world that we test our values and reach an understanding of others.
Q: Did you have more than one piece in the magazine? Which was your favorite?
A: I had three stories published. One was about exploring local cemeteries, going where no one dreams of going. One was about my work experience in a geriatric ward, sharing final moments with strangers. The last was about traveling to Europe to search for these rare places where beauty and death coexist.
The first two pieces were my favorites. “Going Into Tombs” was so out-of-this-world. We have great cemeteries here in Montreal. The essay was about visiting cemeteries in a way that verged on ‘sin.’ It was a rebellious, amoral, dangerous experience. I wanted to see everything, inside and out. “Lingering Death” was more about my work and what I see and experience daily. My work environment changes slightly from week to week, but I’m still dealing with ‘end-of-life’ situations. I don’t really enjoy accidents/crime scenes, nor people dying from illnesses at an early age. But I can empathize with old age, running out of steam, living your final moments. I’ve seen it over and over.
Q: Did you have a favorite story in the zine that wasn’t your own?
A: I can’t say. I loved going through the magazine over and over. Every story was unique and worthy. Morbid Curiosity was so refreshing and thought provoking. I loved it all.
Q: How did the piece you have in the book come to be written?
( The interview continues... )
- Mood:honored
Q: What does morbid curiosity mean to you?
A: Morbid curiosity means just plain weirdness to me. There are lots more people out there interested in the morbid side of weirdness than I originally thought. Like people sleeping out to have Sarah Palin sign their copy of her book: that's morbid curiosity.
Q: How did you discover Morbid Curiosity magazine?
A: I met Loren in a class at the Writing Salon. She told me about Morbid Curiosity and gave me an issue. (Editor’s note: I think that was one of the Round Robin classes. There’s another one starting up in January: http://www.writingsalons.com/class-desc
Q: Did you have more than one piece in the magazine?
A: I didn't discover Morbid Curiosity until the final issue, so I only had "Brain Salad Surgery" published.
Q: What was your favorite story in the zine that wasn’t your own?
A: I like “A Week in Hell," Bryan Marchese's story about Hurricane Katrina, in Morbid Curiosity #10.
Q: How did the piece you have in the book come to be written?
( The interview continues... )
Seth reading at Borderlands, October 2009.
- Mood:proud
KFOG had Kevin Hunsanger from Green Apple Books on yesterday morning. I have shopped in Green Apple since before I moved to San Francisco. When Mason and I came out in 1986 for our honeymoon, the only person I knew in the city insisted we visit Green Apple. I was giddy with joy when I heard that Kevin would sell the Morbid book at the Hypnodrome the night we did the show there. I would swoon with happiness if he mentioned my book on the radio station I actually listen to.
It was time to run Lenore to school, though. We argued in the car because she wanted to listen to the dinosaur CD again and I really, really wanted to hear my book recommended for Christmas. Because, yes, I am just that sad.
We found parking in a construction spot beside the vacant lot where the new community garden is going in. I figured it was only 8 a.m. I could run Lenore to class and get back in the car in time to hear the book suggesting recap. And then I locked my keys in the car. In my purse. Beside Lenore's backpack with her lunch inside.
I called AAA again. This is the second time I've done this in a couple of weeks. I was on hold for 10 minutes and was told I'd need to wait 45 minutes for a truck. I went out into the cold to stand by the car, wishing I'd taken the extra minute to pull a sweater out of the dryer.
It was cold, but at least it wasn't raining. I daydreamed and meditated and longed for the notebook just inside the gap of the door, where I could see but not reach it.
Then the asphalt saw started up. Everyone on the garden crew put on their earplugs. Mine were in my purse. I decided God hated me and wondered if he'd be propitiated if I gave up and cried.
Eventually I walked to the Mercury Cafe and asked to use their phone. AAA said they'd had a computer outage and the original call hadn't ever been sent to a truck. Two hours after the car door swung out of my hand, I got Lenore's lunch delivered to her.
I was shivering so hard that I came home and ran the hottest bath possible. Then I put myself to bed until it was pickup time. Oh, and somewhere in there I burned my lunch, too.
So today is going to be a better day. With the help of melatonin, I got 6 good hours of sleep. The ache in my throat has kicked back to manageable. And I have an interview already to go up...
- Mood:done with yesterday
Q: What does morbid curiosity mean to you?
A: It means being open to exploring whatever interests me, even if “normal” people don’t think about that stuff. (Or maybe especially if.) Being brave and totally real and looking life in the face, every bit of it.
Q: How did you discover Morbid Curiosity magazine?
A: Once it existed, it seemed like it had always been there…
Q: What was your favorite story in the zine, one that wasn’t your own?
A: Definitely Lee Smith’s “You Lock It Behind You,” the one about the man who got trapped in an insane asylum when he was a kid. What a perfect metaphor for an abusive childhood… except it really happened to him. But (cheating here) I also loved Frank Burch’s “Blood Gags,” about making “snuff” films. Right up my alley, so to speak. (Editor’s note: Lee’s story appeared in Morbid Curiosity #6. Frank’s was in Morbid Curiosity #1. Both are reprinted in Morbid Curiosity Cures the Blues.)
Q: How did “Amsterdam,” the piece you have in the book, come to be written?
A: I did some traveling for a time and discovered that I am simply a naturally morbid person -- the kind who wants to see the ruins and the graveyards and the torture museums, who notices the dead cow by the railroad tracks in Spain and wants to discuss the town’s drug and prostitution problems with the locals in Brugge. And finally, really accepting that.
Q: Is there anything you’d like to add to the story “Amsterdam” now?
A: That story is part of a larger one, in which I learned how to travel and be around people, part of my lifelong project to figure out how to be alive. Life happens everywhere, including inside museums, but I prefer places where you can laugh aloud without disturbing anyone.
Q: Have you had another morbid experience that would make a good story?
A: Loads.
Q: What are you up to these days?
A: Working way too hard, trying to keep body and soul together. And writing more than ever. I’m writing an apocalyptic novel right now, and having so much fun! You can read updates, more stories, and my thoughts on life at http://soundofrain.net.
- Mood:overjoyed
Q: What does morbid curiosity mean to you?
A: Morbid curiosity is that bit of raw over-sharing. You know, like when you are sitting around at a family dinner in a fancy restaurant and your grandfather chooses that moment to announce that he has a new penile implant. Morbid curiosity is that moment after the stunned silence when you say, “Tell me more, Pap.” Not saying this was a Broaddus family experience or anything.
Q: How did you discover Morbid Curiosity magazine?
A: My friend Simon Wood introduced me to it. I had recently regaled him and several other friends with tales of medical procedures gone horribly, horribly awry. He piped up in that droll British accent of his: “You know what? That would make a great story for Morbid Curiosity.”
Q: Your only piece in the magazine was “Man-O-Gram: Guys Shouldn’t Give Milk” in issue #8. Do you wish there had been others?
A: I only had the one piece in the magazine, which was my loss. Though I must admit that after my piece was published, I started putting myself in odder and odder situations in order to have something happen to me that I could turn into another story. So maybe it was for the best that the magazine closed when it did.
Q: What was your favorite story in the zine?
A: I come back to Simon Wood. I’ve probably learned more about him through his various stories in the magazine than in all the years of just casually talking to him. But his tale of crashing a plane: classic. (Editor’s note: That’s “Plummet,” which was also in Morbid Curiosity #8. That issue is, unfortunately, out of print.)
Q: How did the piece you have in Morbid Curiosity Cures the Blues come to be written?
Q: Is there anything you’d like to add to that story now?
Nicholas Kaufmann and Maurice Broaddus at WHC San Francisco.
- Mood:elated
Q: What does morbid curiosity mean to you?
A: For me, it's a sort of fascination and sense of wonder about the darker side of things folks don't normally discuss in polite company. I believe, however, that when they are brought out into the light (like they are in Morbid Curiosity magazine and now the book), it makes the darker things a little easier to bear, a little easier to talk about.
Q: How did you discover Morbid Curiosity magazine?
A: One of my reader friends sent me a copy of the magazine a couple years ago. I was hooked from page one!
Q: How did the piece you have in the book come to be written?
A: A matter of conscience. I felt it was important to share my experience concerning anesthesia awareness with others.
Q: Is there anything you’d like to add to that story now?
A: Yes. Since my experience, most hospital operating rooms now use brainwave monitors. If someone does wake up during surgery, the surgical team knows about it immediately and can put the patient back under.
Q: Do you have a tale to tell about your involvement with the magazine or the book?
A: Not really, except it's been a great experience.
Q: Did you have a favorite story that wasn’t your own?
A: I can't choose a favorite. Loved them all.
Q: Have you had another morbid experience that would make a good story?
A: Don't we all? I hope to share another morbid experience someday.
Q: What are you up to these days?
A: Still writing. I have two non-fic books to be published next year, but can't say any more about them at the moment. I am working on a new novel. My website is: www.tmgray.tk and I'm sometimes online at Facebook, although I don't really blog much there.
- Mood:pleased
Q: What does morbid curiosity mean to you?
A: According to the Catholic Church, all curiosity is morbid and bad. I've been a fan of curiosity in all its forms all my life. After all, what is life? It's a discovery process. When you are not discovering, you are merely existing. Existing is not enough.
Q: How did you discover Morbid Curiosity magazine?
A: I told these experiences to a few people -- including Jeff Dauber -- at my table at lunch at Apple. Jeff introduced me to you.
Q: You had two pieces in the magazine. Which was your favorite?
A: "Capturing a Flying Saucer" represented a seminal moment for me. It was an eye-opener, since it showed how easily a person can interpret an event based on his own preconceived ideas, then lock onto it.
Q: Do you have a tale to tell about your involvement with the magazine or the book?
A: Morbid Curiosity got me to do a lot more writing. A recent fictional piece called "The Possessor" is partly based on a dream had by my son-in-law.
Q: Have you ever been involved in one of the live events?
A: I participated in two of the zine events at Borderlands Books. I didn't read my stories but rather told them, because I felt I wasn't that good a reader. Since that time, I attended a play workshop at Stanford in which I had to read. I wasn't all that bad.
Q: Have you had another morbid experience that would make a good story?
A: Yes, one I also sent to you way back, "The Man From Tau-Ceti." In the meantime, I've realized that there are a couple more experiences that I've lived through that might have been worth putting into print. One is the story of Reggie and Sally, two cockatiels out of 17 we had when we lived in Berkeley. I also have two Boy Scout experiences that left very vivid memories. One was skiing down the post-one ski trail when the snow had frozen over. Another time, I attempted to take a picture of a waterfall from the top looking down.
Q: What are you up to these days?
A: Still struggling to create a multimedia internet enterprise (www.umakeitcool.com) at Tamago. Also writing some, programming some, painting some, and helping my wife get elected to the Belmont City Council. (She has been re-elected.) My writing site is www.kaliferdeil.com. I'm on LinkedIn as well as FaceBook and Twitter. And of course I'm on www.umakeitcool.com as well.
Some of the readers for the Morbid Curiosity #6 reading: M. Parfitt, Lilah Wilde, Kalifer Deil, and M. Christian, with Borderlands owner Alan Beatts in the back.
- Mood:amused & curious
Q: What does morbid curiosity mean to you?
A: A willingness to ask hard questions and to look at the world from different angles, even if those views aren't the ones you're most comfortable with. I don't think a healthy 'morbid' curiosity necessarily needs to be dark, but a dark sense of humor definitely helps.
Q: How did you discover Morbid Curiosity magazine?
I had just the one piece in the magazine. That said, it brought me to learn about so many other stories and their effects on people's lives, that I don't really regret it was the only one. Plus, I made a lot of friends through being in the magazine.
Q: How did “The Bomoh” come to be written?
A: I guess I was trying to understand why people in my family were looking for solutions to these big personal problems in these really unexpected, completely fantastical ways. When I wrote the story, it was a really dark time in my life, to use that cliché. I was often angry that the people close to me would rather face their issues through magic rather than reasoning.
Writing the experience down really helped me understand their motives. When people are under that much emotional stress, reasoning your way through your troubles just doesn't hit the right buttons to satisfy you. The magic at work wasn't about chanting a spell, but about giving yourself up to a ritual, to a belief that things could be better in a very simple, even illogical way. Sometimes we need that to move on.
Q: Is there anything you’d like to add to that story now?
A: My uncle got his daughter back and they've managed to build a quiet life together. As far as I know, his wife never bothered them again. We've lost contact with the bomoh and Auntie Em, but I firmly believe they're still out there, still driving around the country, making life a little more magical for people who need them. My mother still practices some of the things Tok taught her, like sweeping out new homes with rough salt before moving in, in order to drive away potential problems. I finally found out what a chicken's penis looks like. A member of the audience at the MC reading in Berkeley came up and described the whole package after I read my story. I'll spare folks the details.
Q: How did you like being involved in the live events?
( The interview continues... )
- Mood:happy
Leilah Wendell is America’s best-known necrophile and the world’s foremost researcher of personifications of and encounters with Death. Author of fourteen books, she was also proprietor of The Westgate Museum in New Orleans, the only gallery devoted exclusively to “Necromantic Art and Literature.”
Leilah’s support and encouragement was crucial to Morbid Curiosity. Leilah reviewed the magazine for The Azrael Project Newsletter and then the Westgate Necromantic web site -- and I could predict whether or not she would like an issue relative to the number of stories about dead folks inside. I told my story about attending the 20th Anniversary of the gallery to introduce issue #6 and close Morbid Curiosity Cures the Blues.
Q: What does morbid curiosity mean to you, Leilah?
A: Morbid curiosity seems to be an instinctual part of human nature. People love rubbernecking at an accident or crime scene. Even as children, we poke at dead animals in the woods. We are both curious and fascinated. Why? We really don't know until we get older and realize that "living" this "life" often removes us from a basic part of human nature.
Q: How did you discover Morbid Curiosity magazine?
A: You sent me the very first one to review in The Azrael Project Newsletter. I thought it was the best thing I'd seen and read in a very long time. It was very rare to find a publication that dealt in true stories of a macabre nature. That was refreshing!
Q: Did you have more than one piece in the magazine? Which was your favorite?
A: I had four: “Love Among the Tombs: Adventures in Forensic Anthropology” and “Selected Cross-Cultural and Historical Personifications of Death” in Morbid Curiosity #1, “Ars Moriendi” in issue #2, and “Cold Rapture” in issue #4. I think my favorite was “Love Among the Tombs.”
Q: How did the piece you have in the book come to be written?
A: It was actually an excerpt from a very limited edition book of mine called Love Never Dies: The Journal of a Necrophile. Westgate published the book as a hand-made hard cover because I didn’t want to only be known as that crazy chick who sleeps with corpses. That’s only a small part of me, after all.
Q: Do you have a tale to tell about your involvement with the magazine or the book?
( The interview continues... )
- Mood:awed
Q: What does morbid curiosity mean to you, Bill?
A: We're all born capable of feeling 8 primary emotions: joy, trust, fear, surprise, sadness, disgust, anger, and anticipation. Unfortunately, I was born with heightened feelings of fear and disgust, which, from an early age, manifested as a morbid fascination with death. In retrospect, by embracing death, disease, and decay I probably sought to emotionally inoculate myself against the fear of them -- like inoculating yourself against the flu with a shot containing a dead version of a living virus. Morbid curiosity compels me to watch the hypodermic needle penetrate my skin.
Q: How did you discover Morbid Curiosity magazine?
A: I bought my first copy, issue #6, at Borderlands Books in San Francisco in 2004. Loved the concept of a magazine devoted to true, twisted first-person essays. I had found my preternatural peeps!
Q: What was your favorite story in the zine, one that wasn’t your own?
A: “You Lock It Behind You” by Lee Smith. Heartbreakingly honest and powerful. (Editor’s note: That story comes from Morbid Curiosity #6 and is reprinted in Morbid Curiosity Cures the Blues.)
Q: Of your pieces in the magazine, which was your favorite?
A: I had two stories published: "Prelude and Fugue State for Roadkill (An Accident Report)" in Morbid Curiosity #8 and "Recalling Ralston" in #9. Of the two, “Prelude and Fugue State…” was more 'fun' to set to paper, since I feel grateful for having survived the incident. It's a great story with a true beginning, middle, and end. "Recalling Ralston," about my beloved pet bird, was one of the most painful things I’ve ever written, so I can't classify it as a favorite. I wrote it in a three-hour spurt, tears streaming the entire time.
Q: How did “Prelude and Fugue State…” -- the piece you have in the book -- come to be written?
( The interview continues... )
- Mood:highly entertained
Q: Wm., what does morbid curiosity mean to you?
A: The things I've seen and done just for the experience... oh, my.
Q: How did you discover Morbid Curiosity magazine?
A: Well, seeing that y'r a close personal friend: I remember when you started collecting and putting together the first issue many, many moons ago.
Q: What was your favorite story in the zine that wasn't your own?
A: Geoff Walker's first piece on his "vacation" in the federal prison system. (Editor’s note: “Prison: 1 in 137,” Morbid Curiosity #3. A later memory from the same trip appears in Morbid Curiosity Cures the Blues. It’s called “DIY Urology.”). Seeing Geoff read it, with an incredible amount of passion, at one of the earliest MC events really added a lot more weight to his writing and my enjoyment of it.
Q: How did your story in Morbid Curiosity Cures the Blues come to be written?
A: You asked me to contribute my story to the magazine. (Editor’s note: Actually, I begged him, over the course of several issues. If you’ve read the story, you understand why. What they did to him in the hospital was messed up!)
Q: Is there anything you'd like to add to the story now?
- Mood:amused
Q: What does morbid curiosity mean to you?
A: Morbid curiosity is both the intrigue and bravery to seek out truth in dark corners, to allow yourself to venture between the cracks of convention and comfort. A little fear, a little magic, the unknown, the forbidden: that's what makes us feel most alive.
Q: How did you discover Morbid Curiosity magazine?
A: If I recall correctly, a (now-ex) lover gave me some copies and I was hooked. Comforting to know ex-lovers are good for something.
Q: How did "The Keeper of the Shop" -- the piece you have in Morbid Curiosity Cures the Blues -- come to be written?
A: When I uncovered the two-dollar bill years after Jeff's death, it brought back such a rush of emotion, memories, and obviously many unanswered questions. The story documents such a poignant time in my life. It's not about death per se, but the celebration of his life, his friendship.
Q: Did you have more than one piece in the magazine?
For more mystery and musings by the minute, please follow Jill Tracy on Twitter. http://twitter.com/jilltracymusic. Other points of contact are Jill Tracy MySpace (http://www.myspace.com/jilltracymusic) and the Jill Tracy YouTube Channel (http://www.youtube.com/jilltracymusic).
- Mood:honored
Illustrator Jim Wiz came late to the magazine, providing ten illustrations for the final three issues of Morbid Curiosity magazine. One of his pieces from the last issue appears on a t-shirt and a journal at the Morbid Curiosity Café Press shop (http://www.cafepress.com/morbidzine).
Q: Jim, what does morbid curiosity mean to you?
A: From the time we are children, we are taught not to recognize such dark thoughts, but that's like telling Galileo not to recognize other worlds. Dark worlds. A healthy sense of morbid curiosity is a defining human characteristic. It cannot be denied. It is a threshold to the enigmatic, the inexplicable, and sometimes the terrifying. Some of the children who decided to ponder the dark thoughts are Marie Curie, Salvador Dali, Isaac Newton, Dante, and Pasteur.
Q: How did you discover Morbid Curiosity magazine?
A: From an artist friend, who was a contributor.
Q: Of your pieces in the magazine, which was your favorite?
A: I did a "Ken Doll" type of guy sitting behind a computer, tearing off part of his face to reveal the corpse beneath. The story was about such an entity actually emailing the author. It’s actually my favorite story in the zine, too. (Editor’s note: Aldyth Beltane’s “Ghost in the Internet,” Morbid Curiosity #8.)
Q: How did the piece you have in the book come to be made?
A: Primarily, I'm a storyboard artist who does comic art in his free time. The piece in Morbid Curiosity Cures the Blues was pretty E.C.-Lovecraft inspired.
Q: What was your favorite artwork in the zine that wasn’t your own?
A: Suzanne Dechnik’s. When we were in art school, she couldn’t meet an illustration deadline. I said, “No problem, I'll do yours and mine both. The instructor will never know.” “Hers” got an A; mine got a C. She is obviously the greater illustrator.
Q: Do you have a tale to tell about your involvement with the magazine or the book?
A: We live in a world without art anymore. Without illustration, at least. Pick up any magazine from pre-1980 and flip through from front to back. Illustration is everywhere, on every page. There’s none of that today, which is why I was delighted to do something for MC. Storyboards are the used Kleenex of the Art World. To get to do printed editorial art was a privilege.
Morbid Curiosity, as a magazine, is really missed by me. It never got to evolve to the Next Level. What magazine can?
Q: Have you ever been involved in one of the live events?
A: No. Chicagoan. Time. Money. Wah. Poor me.
Q: Have you had another morbid experience that would make a good story?
A: I would have to sift through those memories sometime. They are there.
Q: What are you up to these days?
A: I decided in art school that I was going to do advertising work so I could pay a mortgage. [Herein lies a Morbid Curiosity tale or a bad joke.] In that process, the untalented vampiric Ad People sucked away years of my talent. After a couple decades of that, I’d done little art for myself. Now I'm working on my own graphic novel and it's way marketable. Cinematic, too. I’m making a living in the Ad Biz simultaneously, but happy to feel somewhat absolved by my own project. Check me out at www.jimwiz.com.
There are eight million stories in the Naked City. This has been one of them.
Copyright 2009 by Jim Wiz.
- Mood:flattered
People keep asking me how the book is selling. The truth is that I don't know. I could get the numbers, but I'm not sure what difference knowing them will make. I've done just about everything I could think of to sell this book. I have a few more tricks up my sleeve, but nothing that will shake the world. They will just be fun: more videos on youtube, some podcasts, the Borderlands art show. I'm doing them because I want to see them.
All I know is that I've been on this book tour since the last weekend of September, which started with two radio interviews one day. Since then, there have been 13 radio interviews and 14 live events. I'm tired. I'm ready to start writing again.
If you find yourself in Petaluma tonight, come by Copperfield's Books to say hi.
- Mood:putting my game face on
Erik discovered Morbid Curiosity in a shop called In the Shadow of the Gargoyle on San Francisco’s Haight Street. He was still a college student when he submitted his linoleum prints and watercolors to the six issues of the magazine.
Q: What does morbid curiosity mean to you?
A: Morbid curiosity means an interest in the macabre or unsavory, unorthodox or unordinary. My art reflects this, as most people are interested in death but try to not personalize it. Due to society's norms, they don't want to admit the appeal.
Q: How did you discover Morbid Curiosity magazine?
A: That is a great question! I met Loren through a friend who owned a store in the Haight-Ashbury area. They both came to my art show at Cal State Hayward. Afterward, we kept in touch. I kept contributing to the magazine and of course attended the readings at Borderlands.
Q: Since you had so many pieces in the magazine, which was your favorite?
A: My favorite is the skeleton couple embracing. It was a linoleum block print, which was fun to create. I enjoy the old art of carving and printing; it really brings the bare bones approach to a dead art form. (No pun intended!) “Eternal Embrace” was taken from a memorial plaque in a church in Poland. In the U.S., we think that skeletons and skulls are evil, that they don't belong in a church. At the beginning of our arrival in the United States, we used skulls on our tombstones, but attitudes changed and the skull became an angel. In Europe's cemeteries and cathedrals, skeletons are acceptable.
Q: Do you have a tale to tell about your involvement with the magazine?
Copyright Erik Quarry 2009.
- Mood:amused
Suzanne Dechnik worked first in advertising and then for several comic book companies. She finished her art degree at OSU and is now making public sculpture while following her true calling: necromantic art. She showed lots of work at the Westgate Gallery in New Orleans before Katrina put the kibosh on that.
The bulk of Suzanne’s work as published in Morbid Curiosity dissected her relationship to Catholicism. From a fanged Christ offering his blood to a mass card custom-designed to illustrate a story about growing up with birth defects in Catholic school to saints martyred by the needle, the techniques she employed ranged from pen and ink to oils to colored pencils to the “stained glass” piece included in the show at the Museum of Death in October.
Q: What does morbid curiosity mean to you?
A: Jeez, this one could take a book in itself! I have always been intrigued by the macabre. When I was eight years old, my four-month-old brother died. He was a Down’s baby and had bad respiration. At the funeral, my best friend told me that when the undertakers embalmed the body, they had to drain the blood. I imagined that the way they did it was to suspend the body by the feet over a baptismal font (with a cross on it, natch) and slit the throat. I knew that the spurting blood would make a moaning sound. This was before I'd read or seen much horror stuff, right after the big EC scandal in the '50s about horror comics rotting young brains. So I guess you could say I come by my morbid curiosity naturally.
A: I have my older brother to thank for that -- and I did thank him, by sending him copies of the magazine and Morbid Curiosity Cures the Blues. I had gotten a grant to go to Europe and look at art for six weeks (lots of cemetery art, of course!). My brother met me in Vienna so we could spend the last two weeks of the trip together. He brought me a copy of the magazine, which I devoured! It was wonderful to read it in the same city that had that fabulous Burial Museum, as well as all of those strange reliquaries. Nice little touch of home, too, which was very much appreciated after not being able to read the papers for a month!
Q: Do you have a tale to tell about your involvement with the magazine or the book?
A: Morbid Curiosity certainly did give my life a whole new direction! I enjoyed picking out stories to illustrate and experiencing other peoples' weirdness, but when you make art, most of your time is at the drawing board. All the excitement is in your own head.
Q: Did you have more than one piece in the magazine? Which was your favorite?
A: I had several drawings. My favorite is the "Death and the Maiden" on the back cover of issue #10. I did a couple of book reviews, which I enjoyed, as well as an article on the aforementioned Vienna Burial Museum (Morbid Curiosity #6).
- Mood:entertained
Q: What does morbid curiosity mean to you?
A: To be interested in things which society wishes to avoid: reminders of our mortality and vulnerability, the depths to which human behavior can descend.
Q: How did you discover Morbid Curiosity magazine?
A: We purchased a copy of issue #1 on our first visit to the great Westgate Gallery, in its New Orleans location.
Q: Do you have a tale to tell about your involvement with the magazine or the book?
A: Somehow, Loren decided that we might have something to contribute to Morbid Curiosity and asked if we were interested in doing do.
Q: Since you had more than one piece in the magazine, which was your favorite?
A: My favorite illustration accompanied my autobiographical "Child of Darkness" essay. (Editor’s note: Mike’s essay appeared in Morbid Curiosity #5. The illustration is reprinted in Morbid Curiosity Cures the Blues, alongside Mary Ann Stein’s “Halloween Hell” essay.)
Q: Is there anything you’d like to add to "Child of Darkness" now?
A: Only that the likewise fond-of-darkness artist-lady whom I told of getting together with at the end of the story and I have been happily together for over fourteen years now. Our home is filled with fantasy and dark fantasy art. We have two black cats living inside with us and a third who stays outside.
Q: Have you ever been involved in one of the live events?
A: No, unfortunately. We live too far away from where all the cool things happen. (Editor’s note: Two of Mike’s pieces hung at the Museum of Death’s Chaos Gallery in October. One of them was requested for the Museum’s permanent collection.)
Q: Have you had another morbid experience that would make a good story?
A: On my last night (I'd already given my notice) at my first and last bartending job, a customer -- peeved over a minor slight -- bashed a car jack into the skull of a customer at the bar. (The chap survived, albeit with a metal plate in his head.)
Q: What was your favorite story in the zine, one that wasn’t your own?
A: Leilah Wendell's tale of sleeping with a corpse (Editor’s note: “Love Among the Tombs: Adventures in Forensic Archaeology” from Morbid Curiosity #1, reprinted in Morbid Curiosity Cures the Blues.)
Q: What are you up to these days?
A: I’m working at the same commercial art job I've been in since I fled Miami for Tallahassee twenty years ago -- and hoping it survives this slump in the economy. No blogs, no web site; I hang about "The Comics Journal" message board, where the art of comics and other subjects are discussed. I post at interminable length and frequently create collage illustrations and cartoons inspired by various threads. One on Ayn Rand's fawning infatuation over the brutal killer of a twelve-year-old girl may be seen at http://www.tcj.com/messboard/viewto
Copyright Mike Hunter 2009.
- Mood:proud
Victoriana, Art Nouveau, Neo-Burlesque, tribalism, and ancient mythology all influence Kimberlee’s rapidograph pen & ink creations. Presently she works in graphic production during the day and conjures illustrations for custom tattoos, indie publications/music labels, Gothic fashionistas, and a variety of alternative events by night. She has a small line of collectibles as well as prints and original art for sale at http://www.kimberleetraub.net.
Q: What does morbid curiosity mean to you?
A: It’s a beautiful and intelligent way to indulge my darker interests.
Q: How did you discover Morbid Curiosity magazine?
A: I don't really remember, but at the time that MC came into being, I was already established in the zine world. I probably connected with you through mutual contacts involved in publications for which I was doing art.
(Editor’s aside: I probably still have your original letter around here someplace. I ought to add that to my scrapbook. We were both in Implosion, back in the day. Maybe that was the beginning.)
Q: Which was your favorite piece in the magazine?
A: My favorite would probably be "Asylum" or the Zodiac piece, both of which appear in Morbid Curiosity Cures the Blues. (Editor’s note: The “Asylum” artwork also appears on gear at http://www.cafepress.com/morbidzine
Q: How did the pieces you have in the book come to be drawn?
A: You would send me two or three stories to illustrate. You had a really good feel for knowing which artists would be intrigued by certain topics. I liked doing the Zodiac piece, because I have a little serial killer obsession. The code in that piece is an actual letter from the Zodiac.
Q: Do you have a tale to tell about your involvement with the magazine or the book?
- Mood:flattered
Timothy is a published illustrator, author, and photographer, and has released multiple albums with his bands Stone Breath and Crow Tongue. Timothy is currently working on a collection of his illustrations, many of which appeared in Morbid Curiosity over the years. Seek him at www.DarkHollerArts.com, www.LostGospel.org, or at MySpace.com/timothyrevelator.
Q: What does morbid curiosity mean to you?
A: I'm not sure I ever think about morbidity too much. I've been accused of being "dark" and morbid all of my life, but I shrug it off. I feel there's a point to make that darkness does not equal evil -- nor would morbid curiosity equal evil -- but beyond that, it is what it is. Having been associated with the magazine on a creative level as well as being an avid reader of it, I have sort of come to see morbid curiosity in the light of Morbid Curiosity. I mean, it's a driven curiosity to read about these true-life experiences and to have one’s own interesting true-life experiences as well. Does that make sense?
Q: Yes, of course. How did you discover Morbid Curiosity magazine?
A: I'm thinking I did artwork…if not from the first issue, then certainly from very early on. I worked with you on the Death's Garden book and, of course, knew Mason for some time before that.
Q: Which was your favorite piece in the magazine?
A: I think I had illustrations in every issue but one maybe?
Q: I don’t know how we missed the first issue, but you didn’t have anything in that one.
A: My favorite piece was actually the "Bone Library" logo I did for the reviews section. It had a real touch of 19th century illustration to it. Something about it just really worked, I think.
- Mood:honored
