{"id":13208,"date":"2013-02-25T09:00:50","date_gmt":"2013-02-25T09:00:50","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.badreputation.org.uk\/?p=13208"},"modified":"2013-02-25T09:39:22","modified_gmt":"2013-02-25T09:39:22","slug":"guest-post-lisa-tuttle-women-in-the-clubhouse-of-horror","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/badreputation.org.uk\/2013\/02\/25\/guest-post-lisa-tuttle-women-in-the-clubhouse-of-horror\/","title":{"rendered":"[Guest Post] Lisa Tuttle: Women in the Clubhouse of Horror"},"content":{"rendered":"

Next up in our Women in Horror Recognition Month series, we’re super stoked to welcome award-winning author Lisa Tuttle<\/strong><\/a> to the guest slot. (Wanna join the guest blogging fun? Send your pitches to badrepeditors@gmail.com<\/strong><\/a>.)<\/em><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n $\"womeninhorror2013logo\"$ <\/a><\/p>\n

In the dim and distant past, I edited an original anthology of horror stories called Skin of the Soul<\/strong>. Most of the stories were new (there were two reprints) and all of the contributors were women. What sparked my decision to do it was an all-male horror anthology published a couple of years earlier to much acclaim: Prime Evil<\/strong><\/a>, edited by Douglas E. Winter, was a showcase for \u201cthe masters of modern horror\u201d, and Winter\u2019s introduction was dedicated to the argument that horror is not a genre but an emotion, to be found throughout all literature,from high to low.<\/p>\n
$\"Skin$ <\/a><\/p>\n

I agree; I don\u2019t care much for generic \u201chorror\u201d, even if I prefer it to generic \u201cromance\u201d, and although I\u2019ve written a lot of horror stories, and most of my novels have some element of horror in them (one, Lost Futures<\/strong>, published as horror in the US, was nominated for a science fiction award in Britain) I\u2019m not that comfortable identifying myself as a \u201chorror writer\u201d.<\/p>\n
The writers Winter invited to contribute to his anthology included nearly all the big names of the time (Stephen King, Peter Straub, Clive Barker) but also lesser-known writers (Jack Cady and Paul Hazel). Even the introduction, pointing to the many sources of horror in the mainstream, gave a name-check to just one woman writer throughout literary history.<\/p>\n

Who was this paragon? You might guess Mary Shelley, Emily Bronte, Christina Rossetti, Edith Wharton, Patricia Highsmith, Shirley Jackson, Anne Rice, Joyce Carol Oates… but no, the solitary example the editor chose was \u201c…the best-selling novels of V.C. Andrews.\u201d (I did wonder if he knew her first name was Virginia rather than, say, Victor.)<\/p>\n

So I was horrified \u2013 not in a good way \u2013 by this compilation of horrors, and daydreamed about selling my own anthology, inviting a list of excellent writers to contribute, writing my own erudite introduction about great horror fiction of the past. If anyone pointed out that all of those writers were women, I\u2019d act surprised, pretend it was just the luck of the draw, these were the best stories submitted and naturally the examples I chose were my personal favourites.<\/p>\n
$\"Lost$ <\/a>
\nI certainly did not set out to deliberately exclude men; there were lots of good male writers, but now that I came to think about it, not many of them wrote horror. I mean real horror, genuinely well-written and original, not that childish gross-out stuff, not those tired generic clich\u00e9s, not dreary old male fantasies, but the kind of thing I wanted to read, because, after all, it only counts as horror in my book if it fits my definition… and I reserve the right to change the rules whenever I like.<\/p>\n

Over years of going to conventions, and reading and writing and reviewing (even teaching classes) in the fields of science fiction, fantasy and horror, I\u2019ve noticed how much time is devoted to definitions of genre. Any genre. Once you start putting labels on books, you must justify the inclusion of one and the exclusion of another. This is science fiction, of which I approve, while that is merely fantasy. (I remember Charles Platt defending his choice of interviewees for his first Who Writes Science Fiction?<\/strong> \u2013 Kate Wilhelm was the only woman, and she was interviewed in tandem with her husband \u2013 but, he explained, Ursula LeGuin had refused his request, and he couldn\u2019t think of any other woman who wrote what he considered to be proper science fiction.)<\/p>\n
$\"the-pillow-friend-lisa-tuttle\"$ <\/a>\u201cLiterary\u201d authors are given a pass time and again, not tarred with the genre brush (it\u2019s \u201cmagic realism\u201d or \u201cspeculative fiction\u201d) and it pops up in discussions and reader reviews all the time: \u201cI don\u2019t call this horror.\u201d \u201cThis is all about atmosphere and character and not scary at all.\u201d \u201cMaybe works as literature, but not as horror fiction.\u201d \u201cVampires wouldn\u2019t do that.\u201d Etc.<\/p>\n

Critics may praise authors who \u201cpush the boundaries\u201d or subvert expectations, but these are the very actions that can make the dedicated genre fan feel cheated, and respond angrily, as if when they ordered chocolate ice cream, they\u2019d been served a bowl of extra-hot chilli.<\/p>\n

When, more than twenty years after the publication of Skin of the Soul<\/strong> (\u201cwhich proves indisputably that horror fiction is not a male preserve\u201d, or so said Clive Barker in 1990) , I find that women are still fighting that old battle, still having their contributions to horror ignored or forgotten, I wonder if this isn\u2019t \u2013 at least partly \u2013 something to do with definitions and expectations of genre. And with who is defining it, and why.<\/p>\n
Myself, I\u2019ve never limited my reading to one type of fiction, and I don\u2019t write novels that fall neatly into a narrowly defined slot, either. (Maybe this is my problem!) There are some readers for whom genre fiction is comfort food, and they don\u2019t want any nasty surprises when they\u2019ve snuggled down to read \u2013 even in a genre celebrated as the purveyor of nasty surprises. Maybe, for some readers, it doesn\u2019t count as horror unless the author plays by certain rules, unless the story is purveyed via the male gaze, and the name on the title page does nothing to break the illusion that we\u2019re all boys together in this clubhouse.<\/p>\n
$\"Cover$ <\/a><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

\n
Lisa Tuttle<\/strong> is an acclaimed author whose achievements include winning the International Horror Guild Award<\/a>, a BSFA Award<\/a>, and most recently the Grand Prix de l’Imaginaire<\/a>.<\/em><\/em><\/li>\n
The novel The Silver Bough<\/strong> is just out in a new paperback edition from Jo Fletcher Books<\/a>.<\/em><\/em><\/li>\n
www.lisatuttle.co.uk<\/strong><\/a><\/em><\/em><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n

Twitter<\/span><\/a><\/li>
Facebook<\/span><\/a><\/li>
Reddit<\/span><\/a><\/li>
Tumblr<\/span><\/a><\/li>
More<\/span><\/a><\/li>
<\/li><\/ul>

LinkedIn<\/span><\/a><\/li>
Email<\/span><\/a><\/li>
<\/li>
Print<\/span><\/a><\/li>
<\/li><\/ul><\/div><\/div><\/div><\/div><\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Next up in our Women in Horror Recognition Month series, we’re super stoked to welcome award-winning author Lisa Tuttle on board.<\/p>\n

Twitter<\/span><\/a><\/li>
Facebook<\/span><\/a><\/li>
Reddit<\/span><\/a><\/li>
Tumblr<\/span><\/a><\/li>
More<\/span><\/a><\/li>
<\/li><\/ul>

LinkedIn<\/span><\/a><\/li>
Email<\/span><\/a><\/li>
<\/li>
Print<\/span><\/a><\/li>
<\/li><\/ul><\/div><\/div><\/div><\/div><\/div>","protected":false},"author":10,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"spay_email":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false},"categories":[4],"tags":[4142,982,1169,1257,1259,1378,4141,2549,4088,4118,3382,3383],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p2xLWb-3r2","jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/badreputation.org.uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13208"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/badreputation.org.uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/badreputation.org.uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/badreputation.org.uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/10"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/badreputation.org.uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=13208"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/badreputation.org.uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13208\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/badreputation.org.uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=13208"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/badreputation.org.uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=13208"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/badreputation.org.uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=13208"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}