I can safely say I never expected to share an anthology with Sappho & Oscar Wilde!
So I’m thrilled my story ‘You’ll Do’ is featured in ‘Queer: LGBTQ Writing from Ancient Times to Yesterday’ edited by Frank Wynne.
https://headofzeus.com/books/9781789542332

Queer is an unabashed and unapologetic anthology, drawing together writing from Catullus to Sappho, from Rimbaud to Anaïs Nin, and from Armistead Maupin to Alison Bechdel, translator Frank Wynne has collected a hundred of the finest works representing queer love by LGBTQ authors.
Queer straddles the spectrum of queer experience, from Verlaine's sonnet in praise of his lover's anus and Emily Dickinson's exhortation of a woman's beauty, to Alison Bechdel's graphic novel of her coming out, Juno Dawson's reflections on gender and Oscar Wilde's 'De Profundis'.

Here be Tygres – fanzines and my life underground

I’ve been thinking about the impact fanzines have made on my life – and the result is this blog! Enjoy…

For someone who really was a Teenager in Devon (the poem isn’t an exaggeration http://www.rosiegarland.com/news-and-events/item/53-i-want-to-be-a-teenager-in-devon.html ), it’s hard to overstate the impact on a fifteen-year old geek girl of a let-off-the-leash long weekend in London.

Mid 1970s. Mum sets a friend and me up in a vicarage beyond the twilight zone of the North Circular. Every morning we take two long bus journeys into central London. My mate smokes cigarettes and swills cider like any normal teenager. I haunt Dark They Were And Golden Eyed, Atlantis Bookshop and the innumerable second-hand bookshops around Soho. It’s a four-day sojourn in a tatty oasis for the starved mind and spirit. As well as the books and comics I expect, I also discover fanzines.

They flick an entirely different switch in my imagination.
I’ve been making magazines since I was a kid, but now see I’m not the only nerd in the world to spend evenings with glue and a stapler. Even more groundbreaking, the zines cover interests I’ve learnt to conceal in order to limit my bullied isolation: horror movies, vampires, sci-fi, punk, weird illustration, weirder literature. The Gothic, in short. For the first time in my life, I see myself reflected. I encounter an underground community of the imagination. I know I’ll never meet any of these fellow-weirdoes, but I am not alone.

I return to the mix of beauty and soul-death of rural Devon (miles north of the artsy bit around Totnes), grit my teeth, make it to 18 and escape. In my new home, Leeds, one of the first things I do is check out the 2nd-hand / radical bookshops (a tip ‘o the pen to Austicks & The Corner Bookshop). As well as reviews in mainstream music papers such as Sounds, Melody Maker & NME, I now feature in fanzines that interview my band The March Violets (eg Rendezvous, Attack on B-Zag, The Angels are Coming, Whippings & Apologies – best zine name ever IMHO). We even produce our own Violets zine. High production values, or handwritten, it doesn’t matter. It’s all part of the vibrant build-your-own record label / indie scene of the early 80s.

Another hiatus follows when I quit the UK to work in Sudan from 1984-1986. In 1987, semi-fanzine independents Shocking Pink & Spare Rib inspire my move to Manchester where I find a thriving LGBT scene. However, it soon becomes apparent that being a dyke AND a Goth is a step too far. I have no problem making the connections between goth, punk and post-punk, fetish, feminism, queer, vampires and weird literature but I’m damned if I can find a queer pal who’ll go to The Banshee with me. As for my penchant for leather trousers, the less said about that the better. I can come out, but not about everything. However, late 80s feminism is a different blog.

It seems I can still feel isolated in a massive city, and I learn what it’s like to be marginalised within a marginalised community. I need help, and once again find it in the fanzines of the late 80s / early 90s. One particular pleasure is Dominic Regan’s graphic Dom Zombi story in AARGH (Artists Against Rampant Government Homophobia ) which drew everything together so succinctly. Others include: For the Blood is the Life, Bats and Red Velvet, The Velvet Vampyre, Udolpho and early issues of Skin Two (produced on Tim Woodward’s kitchen table). Listings of penpals, society meetups and clubs provide me with a flesh & blood community, not simply one of the imagination. All of it pre-internet, off the map, under the radar. I even meet a bisexual Goth.

Jump cut to the present day.
I’m excited and encouraged by the rebirth / renaissance of Xeroxed, glue-and-collage, passed from hand-to-hand zines. There’s a fresh new family of folk learning the liberating impact of turning off search engines so your keystrokes can’t be tracked in order to tailor more bloody advertising into your feed. To quote Keith Lowell Jensen: “What Orwell failed to predict is that we'd buy the cameras ourselves, and that our biggest fear would be that nobody was watching” https://twitter.com/keithlowell/status/347741181997879297

Only last year I met a woman in Athens, Georgia, who knew my work because she’d come across Pink Bomb, a CD fanzine produced in Manchester by the radiant Ste McCabe . Our words don’t need wifi to span the globe. And if you can’t hold something in your hands, it doesn’t really exist.

Fanzines are still there when the battery runs out on your phone. When some yellow-haired dictator decides you can’t Google ‘that’ article any more. Fanzines can’t be deleted at the swipe of a button. So - Buy that ancient typewriter. Get stapling.

© Rosie Garland 2017‏

Really pleased to have an interview & feature in The Skinny this month!

It's free to pick up in venues round Liverpool & Manchester during October, or click on the link below and go to 'current issues'.

The Skinny - main website

Discovering a Comet - Leaf Books 2008

Includes my flash fiction "Sadie Jones Took Me Line Dancing"

http://leafbooks.co.uk/leafs-books/books/products/view/5/8.html

Wolf-Girls: Dark Tales of Teeth, Claws and Lycogyny, Edited by Hannah Kate (Hic Dragones 2012)

Feral, vicious, fierce and lost… the she-wolf is a strange creature of the night. Attractive to some; repulsive to others, she stalks the fringes of our world as though it were her prey. She is the baddest of girls, the fatalest of femmes – but she is also the excluded, the abject, the monster. The Wolf-Girls within these pages are mad, bad and dangerous to know. But they are also rejected and tortured, loving and loyal, avenging and triumphant. Some of them are even human…

Seventeen new tales of dark, snarling lycogyny. Features Rosie Garland’s short story ‘Cut and Paste’

Order here -  http://www.hic-dragones.co.uk/#/wolf-girls/4565397194

Lesbian Lives Conference 2017: Lesbian Love/s

http://www.lesbianlives.org/conference-2017-1/

Saturday 25th February 2017
The LGBTQ Life Research Hub is please to announce that the 2017 International Lesbian Lives conference will be held at the University of Brighton, UK, 24-25 February 2017.
..and I’m delighted that I have been invited to present a paper on ‘Vixen’, with a separately-programmed reading from the novel. Both Sessions are scheduled for the morning of Saturday 25th February.
The theme for the 2017 Lesbian Lives Conference is Lesbian Love/s. The 23rd edition of this conference is hosted by the University of Brighton LGBT and Queer Life Research Hub in conjunction with feminist scholars from University College Dublin.
http://www.lesbianlives.org/

Location:
Sallis Benney Theatre
University of Brighton
58-67 Grand Parade
Brighton
BN2 0JY
Conference programme:
http://www.lesbianlives.org/conference-2017/conference-programme/
For directions, please see the link below:
http://arts.brighton.ac.uk/whats-on/gallery-theatre

An evening of light entertainment and education with a genderbending, cabaret twist!

 Brought to you by Wotever World, who run Bar Wotever every Tuesday night at the RVT.

Tonight's topic is: ForePlay. Crimson Skye's Silvertongue Society presents Aural Text with erotica read by Pretty Miss Cairo, Rosie Lugosi and Crimson Skye herself. There will also be sexy dance moves from The DreamBears and Pants People, tongue exercise from poet Jay Walker, and advice on how to be a man from cabaret darling, Lolo Brow.
More acts to be confirmed!
Show starts: 19:00
Doors open 30mins before the show
Venue: Royal Vauxhall Tavern, 372 Kennington Lane, London SE11 5HY
Tickets £8
Click to buy advance tickets

Click for RVT website

Polari Literary Salon

Tickets - £5

13 November 2013, 7:45pm

Southbank Centre is a short walk away from Covent Garden and Westminster and minutes from the Waterloo, Charing Cross and Embankment London Underground and British Rail stations.

Charlotte Mendelson introduces her new novel Almost English. She is joined by poet Dean Atta, authors Rosie Garland and Patrick Flanery, Helen Lederer and singer Dee Chanelle. Also tonight, we announce the winner of the Polari Prize.

Described by The New York Times as 'London's most theatrical salon', Polari returns for the autumn, showcasing the best in established, new and up-and-coming LGBT literary talent and performance.

'Always fun, always thought-provoking - a guaranteed good night out.' Sarah Waters

'Lively, funny and inspiring - a gay-themed salon of interest to anyone remotely interested in literature, whatever their sexual bent.' Patrick Gale

To go to Polari site - click this link

To go to Southbank Centre site & buy tickets - click this link

One World, One Heart, One Pride

Saturday 27 July 2013

Rosie Lugosi and Claire Mooney host Oldham's 9th Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Trans Pride – One World, One Heart, One Pride.

Oldham is committed to stamping out homophobia, transphobia and biphobia.

After the fabulous parade there's a great Oldham Pride day lined up at Gallery Oldham – including headline acts X Factor's Kitty Brucknell and Britain's Got Talent's Showbears, some great live music, some dance, sporting and circus activities too - so come along and join in the fun.

Blender! Trans* Performance Showcase

All Ages

Hosted by The Notorious OMG and Midwest GenderQueer

• Music by DJ Evil V
• · Featuring performances by:
• · Liberty City Kings and Burlesque, of Philadelphia, PA
• · Midwest GenderQueer, of Cincinnati, Ohio
• · ScrewSmart, of Philadelphia, PA
• · Lydia Neon, of Oshkosh, WI
• · Johnny Blazes, of Boston, MA
• · Koomah, of Huston, TX
• · Alaya Richmond, of Philadelphia, PA
• · Rebecca Kling, of Chicago, IL
• · Rasta Boi Punany, of Philadelphia, PA

· Plus special guest, Rosie Lugosi, Vampire Queen of London, England

Produced by Midwest GenderQueer and Lascivious Jane

• Don't miss out on the After Party happening 11pm-2am After party at in the balcony at the Troc http://www.thetroc.com/

Blender! Trans* Performance Showcase is a diverse show of trans* centered performance art, spoken word, song, drag, and burlesque, and more! Blender! hosts performers with a wide variety of identities from all over the country, and the world, presenting stories of the trans* experiences, diversity, queerness, and community. Don't miss this amazing show, the official show for the Philadelphia Trans-Health Conference!

This venue is physically accessible and smoke free. There will accessible seating for anyone who may have specific needs. For more information please contact organizers at blender(at)trans-health.org