Karmen Ghia: What are you working on these days?

Jungle Kitty: My muse is almost always in a creative state of disarray and, as usual, I have several stories in progress. I'd like to get a little more done on "Gone With The Solar Wind" because so many people have requested that. And I may have broken through the block on the story where Spock comes back from Gol in the Kirk/Brandt universe. And I think my betas are going to shut me down if I force them to do anymore brain-storming.

KG: Okay, I'm sorry for the mundane questions but how long have you been in the Star Trek fan community?

JK: I've been a fan since TOS first started running in syndication, but I only became active in the fandom two years ago. AAMOF, this month (August 99) is my two-year anniversary. Just for fun, I counted up how many stories I've written. 83! And I've attended 5 cons. Sheesh! Get a life, JK.

Awwwww, Mom! But this non-life is so much fun!

KG: Have you stayed mainly in TOS or do you do other genres?

JK: Just TOS for me. A friend said I was a Star Trek snob. I told him I preferred the term "purist."

Although I may wet my toe in the TNG pond sometime in the future...

KG: What was your earliest story?

JK: Well, let's see. Up until sixth grade, I was a playwright. I wish you could have seen "Greta the Goat Girl," the finest play ever written by an 8-year-old, IMO. And the death of George Washington's first wife did not leave a dry eye in the house in fifth grade. My playwrighting career was capped with "The Judgment of Paris" (are you listening, raku?) performed by sixth-graders wearing sheets and pillowcases. I made the transition to fiction shortly thereafter with a story about mer-people. All I remember is that everyone's name had a hyphen in it. Puberty set in and resulted in some very slashy Beatles fanfic, not to mention the story where I had psychic powers and was married to Little Joe Cartwright of "Bonanza."

KG: Yeah, I had a thang for Little Joe, too.

JK: Do you remember the episode where he got kicked by a horse and got gangrene and almost cut off his own arm? Well, I guess we can discuss that later.

KG: Actually, I meant earliest slash type story.

JK: You didn't see that Beatles story. Oh. You mean more recently?

KG: Yeah.

JK: Published to the net?

KG: Yeah.

JK: In that case, "The Wedding Gift," a K/S story.

KG: I read that. I liked it. I liked it a lot. How did you decide to start writing what was in your head? What was your motivation?

JK: I guess my motivation was finding Treksmut on the web. I'd always been afraid to go looking for it, thinking it might be so awful that I'd be embarrassed that I even read it. And, yeah, I found some of that. No, I won't name names. But mostly it was a stunning surprise, especially Killa's "Surrender" and Tjonesy's "20 Questions." Those stories made me realize that you could take what seemed like a very silly obsession and turn it into something wonderful. I wanted to try my hand at it. And it didn't hurt that a good friend said very sternly, "Girl, write those stories down! You are insulting your muse!"

KG: How did your first story come about? Can you recall the decision to write it or did you just wake up one day, face down on the keyboard, and there was the first 3,000 words? (This happened to me, that's why I'm asking.)

JK: After being lectured on muse abuse, I got out the little Mac SE that we kept around for nostalgic reasons. I thought I was going to write what actually became my second story ("The Edge"), but when I started typing, something entirely different came out. A few weeks after I finished that story ("The Wedding Gift"), I realized it was actually about my best friend who had died the previous year.

KG: What writers do you feel have influenced your slash writing?

JK: In slash, I'd have to say I was initially influenced by the K/S I'd read. I'm kind of embarrassed now by how imitative my early stories were. And I put stuff in that I didn't much like at the time and like even less now, but I thought, "That's how Kirk and Spock are in K/S." So that's what I wrote.

If you broaden the question to include fanfic other than slash, I'd have to join with Killa in citing Guy Gavriel Kay and Anne Rice, but I'll also throw in Diana Gabaldon. And probably lots of others who just aren't leaping to the forefront of my mind at the moment.

KG: Who is your favorite character in slash to write about? Read about? And why?

JK: Kirk. He's the most interesting, the sexiest, the most dynamic, the most intriguing... Well, you know the song.

KG: Do you have some special technique for writing slash? (For example: I listen to really loud techno music. What do you do?)

JK: I need quiet. No music, no distractions. And I could use a more comfortable chair.

KG: What do you feel is the future of K/S?

JK: It may continue to grow as a fandom, but sadly, I see the breadth of the stories shrinking. There seems to be more redundancy and fewer surprises than there used to be.

KG: What's your thinking on chicks with dicks and Tupper Trek? I don't find it interesting, but my tastes are more, um, graphic. (I actually have trouble figuring what's going on [sexually] in much of K/S, it's way too subtle or something for me.)

JK: Since almost all slash is written by women, I think the "chicks with dicks" syndrome is practically inevitable. To me, the emotional and sexual responses feel female to some extent in most stories (and I include my own in that statement). It's the nature of the beast. I don't particularly care for that aspect of it, but *damn* it's hard to get away from! We write what we know.

Now "tuppertrek" is different, IMO. Out and out girliness in male characters squicks me in a big way. The only way I can read Kaki's delicious parodies is by constantly reminding myself, "It's a parody."

KG: I was recently reading an article in diary form about filmmaker Roger Nygard latest project. This 'feels' partly true to me (even I'm sure there's more to K/S than this) but I'm wondering if you have any reaction to this quote from the article: "March 22, 1997, Pasadena: Today we interviewed two writers of underground, homoerotic Kirk/Spock stories at the Pasadena Convention Center. These stories are typically written by and for heterosexual women - women who want to read sexual stories about Kirk and Spock but don't want to imagine them with other women." (LAT Magazine 6/20/99)

JK: I wonder who the two writers were that they interviewed.

I've heard that reasoning before, and it's probably true for some people, but I'm sure there are many other reasons for writing slash. I think much of its appeal may be simply this: There are women who are turned on by the idea of 2 men getting it on. Duh. After all, many men want to watch 2 women going at it. Since our society has never been very comfortable with the idea of women even having sexual wants, I guess it's not surprising that people are stunned by this.

I still don't know why I write slash, but when I entered the fandom, that seemed to be all there was in TOS and Kirkish stories. I just joined in, and I started writing K/f about a month after I started writing K/S. I really never considered myself a slasher. I'm a Kirkologist, and I'll write just about anything if I can get an interesting response out of him. And that man is *full* of interesting responses!

KG: What is the motivation to write slash? One can't sell it; one can't even eat it.

JK: I have no idea. What is the motivation to do anything creative? Very few creative endeavors result in financial payment or nourishment, other than nourishment of the soul.

KG: Do you have any thoughts on the future of Slash on the Web?

JK: I'm afraid that the web in general is becoming splintered. The newsgroups seem to be breaking up to smaller lists with topics and divisions that are much more sharply defined. In this way, we seem to be mimicking the history of print fandom. As I understand it, in the early days, K/S appeared in adult zines along with het and other pairings. Then it broke off, and a person who was exclusively K/S could easily avoid being exposed to anything else. I think that's part of why the print fandom seems ingrown to me. I really hope the newsgroups will stay healthy and the wide-open sharing across all boundaries of Trekfic will continue.

KG: You're very cool. Would you like to put your website address and/or recommended URLs here?:

JK: You're very cool, too. I think we both need sweaters. My web addy is www.invisibleplanets.com. I just updated it, so give it a visit.

KG: And one final question - in your opinion, who's bigger? Kirk or Spock?

JK: Kirk, of course! That is, unless Kirk wants Spock to be bigger. After all...who am I to question the captain of the Enterprise?

KG: Thank you, Jungle Kitty.

JK: You're welcome.