Talking About Fantasy With Storm Constantine 
 

GJ:	You're a confirmed-and-out fantasist. But
	doesn't everyone have a fantasy life, a
	tissue of lies that's going on in their head
	all the time?

SC: 	I believe we all live in a very subjective
	reality, that there is no true 'realness'. Yet
	I've met people who do not appear to have a
 	teeming capacity for fantasising in quite
	the same was as other people I know. I am
	constantly enacting dialogues in my head -
	little mind-screen plays- as I wash up, as
	I Hoover, as I walk down town. It's
	automatic, and only sometimes do I
	actually use any of this stuff in my work. I
	feel this ongoing inner-soap opera helps
	me practise making my fictional
	characters more realistic. Other writers
	I know do this and so does my husband who
	is neither a writer nor an artist -someone
	you might say is not extravagantly
	creative minded. Mark (my husband) tends
	to act out situations in his head involving
	people he knows -arguments, saying what
	he really wants to say to someone and
	their response. Whereas my fantasy
	dialogues usually involve invented people
	and situations. Yet one person I know
	looked completely blank when I talked
	about this once. They did not know what
	I meant by these little fantasy 'sketches'.
	This surprised me, because I thought
	everybody did it. Perhaps they do,
	generally, and this person was just
	abnormal.

GJ: 	Did you have a bookish background?

SC: 	As soon as I learned to string simple
	sentences together I wanted to use them to
 	tell stories. I wanted to communicate my
	fantasies to others from a very early age.
	My mother read me tales about Ancient
	Greece and Egypt, and I was drawn to those
 	worlds. To me they seemed so much better
	than the one I was inhabiting. I was a
	romantic even as a child -something I've
	not grown out of!
	So I made up stories about those ancient
	worlds, embellishing on the existing
	myths. I was very lucky in that I was
	encouraged in this at school and by my
	family -despite the fact that I told
	whoppers occasionally. From my father and
 	his mother I acquired my interest in the
	'supernatural' and science fiction. I can
	still remember my grandmother saying to
	me, "I don't believe in ghosts, but I am
	afraid of them." My great aunt also had
	some spooky experiences when she was
	young and I used to make her tell them to
	me whenever she came up to visit. They
	would scare me stiff, I couldn't sleep for
	thinking about them, but I just had to hear
	them again and again. Even now, whenever
	I meet someone new, and if we're in a
	situation where everyone's relaxed (read,
	slightly merry) I ask them for their
	Fotrean-type experiences. Nearly everyone
	seems to have had one, and those that
	haven't know people who have and can tell
	their stories to me. The novel I'm working
	on now actually stems from a friend's
	experiences as a child. Her stories were so
	mind-stopping, I interviewed her
	thoroughly when we were sober, and wrote
	them all down!

GJ: 	Everyone said to me, you can't just be a
	writer, you'll have to have a job as well.
	Did you get that?

SC: 	Not until I gave up my day job! The only
	people who have said it to me were agents
	and editors. I don't know whether it's
	because they're anxious that writers might
 	go absolutely peculiar if all they did was
	write, or whether it's based on sound
	common sense. I think it's best to have
	more than one string to your bow, as it 
	were, so I do several other things as well
	as write. Now, I don't resent it, but when I
	was working full time for local
	government, I loathed it passionately.

GJ: 	You went to Art College. Does that mean
	you had artistic career plans -other than
	writing- at the time?

SC:	I went to Art College because I was very
	good at art at school. Strangely enough I
	didn't consider writing as a career, then.
	That was something I did for pleasure, just
 	for my friends. I wasn't much of a forward
	planner, and never thought in terms of how
	I would support myself in the future. This
	was the early seventies, after all! My
	family were pretty laid-back about what I
	did, and never tried that desperately to get
 	involved in my decisions. I suppose they
	were rather bohemian.	As a teenager, I ran
	a bit wild, and education went out of the
	window. I never pursued art as a career,
	because college disillusioned me. I and a
	couple of my friends there were very much
	into fantasy art -that was all we wanted
	to do- but of course it was frowned on. So,
	I rebelled again, and got an office job. I
	continued to write, and to produce art-
	work, and also set about educating myself,
	although this was not a conscious decision.
 	I'm just naturally curious, but balk against
	being told what to do. When learning was
	my choice, I was avidly into it.

GJ: 	What's your view of genre classification?
	Did you think about where your work fitted
	in?
 
SC: 	When the Wraeththu books were first
	accepted by MacDonald, I felt strongly that
	I didn't want them to be marketed as
	science fiction or fantasy. To me, the
	fantastical side of the books was
	incidental. It wasn't as if I'd chosen to
	write in that genre. The stories were there
 	inside my head, irrespective of
	classification. To me they were about loss,
 	passion, obsession, grief, learning,
	growing, lust -the gamut of human
	experience. I still believe I'm writing
	alternative myths, metaphors for
	twentieth century life, rather than fancy-
	dress soap opera.

GJ: 	My image of the typical genre fantasist, is
	of someone who lives entirely in their
	head: and when you meet them, there's
	nothing to see on the outside. But not you. I
 	have to comment on this, because your
	appearance, your attitude, in a gathering of
 	British sf writers, is so outstanding. The
	wild black hair, the goth regalia...

SC: 	In actual fact, I'm not often aware of my
	appearance being that different to anyone
	else's. My regalia, my image, is something
	I've built up since I was a weird little kid
	into horror and sf. I was into the Gothic
	scene before it was called that simply
	because it embraced all the subjects I was
	interested in: occult, beguiling, hopelessly
	romantic. I'm still surprised when people
	point my appearance out to me, and to be
	honest I'd rather not think about it.
	Perhaps rather naively, when I'm in a
	social situation, I forget completely what
	I look like and believe I blend in with the
	crowd. I prefer to keep thinking that,
	otherwise I'd be desperately paranoid. I'm
	not happy being labelled a 'Goth writer'
	because it implies I'm a fashion victim,
	which I'm not. I shall probably be a batty
	old woman with dyed black hair, being
	avoided by people in the street, when I'm
	older. It's just me. It's true I do have a
	fulfilling and varied life outside of
	writing. I manage a band, and work for a
	couple of other bands, writing for their fan
 	club publications, and doing desk-top
	publishing for them. I also write training
	material for a company who produce
	course-ware for Windows applications -a
	very different kind of writing. I feel that
	does me good, helps discipline me. At
	present I'm also the Finance Officer for the
 	county branch of a charity, dealing with
	their accounts and also organising their
	computer equipment, training etc. I work
	out twice a week at the local recreation
	centre, to keep my brain cells alive and my
	body active (still hasn't got rid of writer's
	bum, though), so I don't have a minute when
 	I have nothing to do.
 
GJ:	Your books are full of wonderful names,
	not least your own. How did Storm
	Constantine evolve?

SC: 	I think everyone should be given the chance
 	to change their name whenever they want
	to, whatever their age. At the moment,
	you're looked on as a bit strange if you
	take the step of changing your name by
	deed poll, as I did. Why? I really don't think
 	it's fair that we have to be saddled with
	names that our parents liked, and which
	are not really us. It's okay if you happen to
	like your given name, of course, but I hated
 	mine. When people embark upon a magical
	path, it's customary for them to 'find' a
	new name for themselves, which they use
	when they're working magic. This name
	represents their spiritual self, and should
	have significance. Why can't this apply to
	the names we use in everyday life? I can't
	remember exactly how I 'found' the name I
	have now, but when I made the choice, it
	was as if I stepped free from invisible
	constriction. It was like a casting away of
	unwanted baggage from the past, a
	sloughing of skin. Very therapeutic. I think
	I have become 'Storm' thoroughly now,
	because even my father calls me by that
	name, which I never thought he would. The
	fact that he does so means a lot to me,
	because it shows me he has respect for me
	as an individual, and does not regard me as
	simply 'his daughter'.

GJ: 	'Gwyneth' means 'blessing': I don't like it
	much, but I rather like arbitrary conditions
 	-this is the name that fell on me, out of
	my control. Do you still reinvent yourself
	occasionally? Or have you settled down?
 
SC: 	I don't reinvent myself, but there are minor
 	changes to my appearance since I last saw
	you. I got a bit sensitive about the way my
	body was changing as my thirties galloped
	past, so I tend to wear more flowing
	clothes now. The skin-tight mini dresses
	are out! I care more about the body beneath
	the clothes than the clothes themselves
	and ageing does not agree with me at all. I
	wish I'd kept myself in shape when I was
	younger, but I didn't appreciate my body
	then. Now, I try to look after myself more,
	pamper the machine that houses my
	personality, keep it running smoothly. It's
	a shame I only realised this fairly
	recently. I have to work harder to keep fit
	now because I neglected such things when I
 	was younger. I don't want to be
	incapacitated when I'm older. The charity I
	work for is involved with the welfare of
	older people, so I see enough to frighten
	me. My story, 'The Green Calling'
	(Interzone 73 July '93) was inspired
	by my fear of ageing. Have I settled down?
	I hope not! If anyone said to either Mark or
	myself that we had, we'd both be very
	depressed, I think. Perhaps most people
	reach an age when they feel they need a
	sense of security, which they either didn't
	need or didn't realise they needed, in youth.
 	Although marriage does provide a sense of
	security, it's not easy getting used to the
	constraints that living with someone
	entails. Marriage in some peculiar sort of
	way seems to amplify them. Being married
	has probably made me more political, more
	aware of women's place in society, so I am
	more of a feminist now. The fact that I'd
	always been independent, even when I was
	in a relationship, blinded me to the truth
	of how other women live -have to live- 
	their experiences and how they are viewed.
 	Now, I know. Or at least I have a wider
	perspective. 
 It's small, subtle things that
	make me angry, the fact that as Mark's
	wife, I'm still seen as his chattel by
	building societies, insurance companies,
	etc. The fact that Mark's always called Mr
	Constantine by people who know we are
	married and have never bothered to find
	out his own name: they just assume I've
	taken his! 

GJ:	Can you say something about the Wraeththu
 	trilogy? (to paraphrase, for people who
	haven't read it, the Wraeththu are a new
	kind of transgendered human: the product
	of a sexual and physical and painful
	transformation, which happens to beautiful
 	young men.) 
 
SC: 	Although I hate to admit it, I am getting a
	bit fed up of talking about the Wraeththu
	books, as I feel I've moved on a long way,
	gone on to new things. As I said earlier, I
	hope my perspectives have widened.
	Perhaps I can talk about things that I've
	discovered recently, as I've re-read those
	books, that I wasn't conscious of at the
	time I wrote them. It is all to do with my
	views on ageing in relation to gender, but
	some of this is quite personal and I've no
	desire to externalise it. These things have
	only become apparent to me since talking
	about it with close friends. If people want
	to extrapolate further from the novels
	that's up to them. A writer expects that. I
	am interested in the ageing process, and
	how it appears - physically- to affect men
	less than women. The Wraeththu looked
	like physically beautiful immortal young
	men, and I indulged my female fantasy in
	that aspect, but psychologically women
	have much more to interest me. Maybe
	that's because women are often more
	interesting than men. But like I said, men
	seem to suffer less cruelly from the
	passage of time. Now, I see other things in
	the books which I didn't see when I was
	writing them. As to where it all came
	from, this is a question I have answered
	many times. It's a compilation of all sorts
	of things I was into at the time. It was on
	a slow-burn for years, so it was pretty
	much all written in my head by the time I
	came to write it. 

GJ: 	This transformation: this ruthless tearing
	apart and rewiring of human sexual
	identity. Is this real for you? I mean, is
	this something you've decided the human
	race needs?
 
SC: 	I did think so at the time, but I'm not so
	sure now. As I intimated earlier, I feel I'm
	thinking about all these issues in much
	wider terms -social and political- now so
	in a way maybe I'm readdressing the same
	issues in more recent work, trying to look
	at them from slightly different angles. For
	example, I'm beginning to feel more and
	more uncomfortable with prejudice. I know
 	some people who on the face of it are
	politically right-on, proud to number
	among their friends other people who don't
	fit easily into sexual/gender stereotypes:
	and yet their actions and comments betray
	the most deep-seated prejudice. I myself
	try to respect 'otherness' because as you've
 	probably gathered, I do kick against the
	traces of convention, but at the same time
	I realise I am conventional too. I admire
	people who are open-minded and brave,
	thought they might look very conventional,
	twinset and pearls types. As for rewiring
	or rewriting human sexuality, maybe it's
	more important for all of us to begin just
	by practising tolerance.

GJ: 	The Wraeththu are all young men. I found
	this aspect of Wraeththu refreshing: a
	woman talking about men, as gorgeous
	sexual beings. That's rare in sf. But don't
	women need to change?
 
SC: 	Wraeththu was a timely women's fantasy,
	untypical of the genre. I like men. As I've
	said, I'm interested in the way they appear
	to age differently. They seem to escape or
	delay the physical ravages of time more
	easily than women. That's physiologically
	and socially. Maybe there was some kind of
	transference going on. And the Wraeththu
	were a means of at least jumping the
	sex/gender traces. Do women need to
	change? The short answer is, I think we all
 	need to change.
 
GJ: 	It's a change for beautiful men to have
	dreadful physical things happening to them.
 	It's as if they have periods, and childbirth
	to cope with: all the messy things. And of
	course rape. Was there an element of
	conscious irony in all that?
 
SC: 	Not conscious, no. I didn't intend there to
	be. But maybe unconsciously I thought 'Let
	men have some of what we have to put up
	with for a while, if only in my fantasy
	world'. 

GJ: 	Sex is important in your books, and often
	very weird. Does this reflect your personal
	opinions? 

SC: 	I don't think sex is weird -we've got the
	bits, they're functional, so why not use
	them? It's no more weird than eating food,
	which in fact I think is weirder. At least
	sex is designed to carry on the species,
	whereas the fuelling seems really
	primitive to me. However, again politics
	comes into sex, and rape is an abuse. I
	suppose I believe that sex isn't weird as
	long as it doesn't involve abuse. It if does,
	it's not just weird it's downright wrong. In
	the Wraeththu world sex was intrinsic to
	their religious beliefs, and therefore
	sacred, and rape was regarded as worse
	than murder. They had terminology to
	define different kinds of rape, rather as
	we have different terms for different types
	of murder. I feel that sex should be sacred,
	and that rape should be regarded as an
	abomination. I think that rape in fact is a
	kind of murder, because it can kill some
	part of the victim. Rape victims who
	survive their ordeals enough to walk in the
	world again are as brave, if not braver than
 	'war heroes'. But the heroism of rape
	victims is rarely recognised.

GJ: 	What d'you think about the way sex is
	treated in fantasy/sf? I think mostly it's
	dire. 
 
SC: 	I do wonder what some sf/fantasy writers'
 	lives, thoughts, experiences consist of,
	when I read some of the staid stuff they
	come up with. Isn't it an amazing irony
	that within the fantasy genre there's a
	whole bunch of self-sustaining
	stereotypes and cliches? Maybe this is
	something that's wrong with it today. I'm
	refering to the 'is fantasy/sf dead' debate

GJ: 	We should get back to that. But I want to
	know more about sex and magic first.
	There's Hermetech, when you have a story
	where sex is going to utterly transform
	the world. It seemed a bit harsh on your
	character, "Ari".She spends the whole book
	a virgin, wondering what it's going to be
	like. Finally it happens and that's the end
	of the story. The message seems to be that
	sex: both sex and passion, are a means to
	an end, things you pass through and leave
	behind?
 
SC: 	Girls are often lead to believe that when
	they eventually experience sex/orgasm,
	they will be changed and their world will
	change. Ari's story's a metaphor for any
	girl's journey towards womanhood. In the
	book, the apocalypse of her experience
	affects the world. I like to think that
	whenever a girl discovers her sexual
	identity the world feels the small
	explosion and subtly changes. Hermetech is
 	specifically about the power of female
	sexuality and the feminine sexual
	experience. Men can make women afraid of
	sex, and this is disempowering. I don't
	think we pass through sex, passion,
	romantic love and leave them behind. It's
	something that keeps on happening. It's a
	conceit for us to think much older people
	don't experience these things, because I
	know they do. Perhaps people become less
	obsessed with sex than they were when
	they were young, but I think there might be
 	gender differences here. Men seem to
	retain something of their youthful sex
	drive, and its utter compulsiveness, while
	women appear to move on. Their
	perspective on sex changes. As a woman
	friend once said to me: sex becomes both
	less important and more important.

GJ: 	Do you every feel sorry for your
	characters, for what you put them
	through? 

SC: 	I'm not aware of pitying my characters: I
	can be quite ruthless with them. But it's
	rare that anyone doesn't have a
	satisfactory resolution to their dilemmas
	in my work, because I do like to end on an
	'upper' as it were. When I first began
	writing, I hated the thought of killing any
	of my characters off, especially ones I
	particularly liked. Now, I've steeled myself
 	to that a little. The tragedies I see around
	me in the world sometimes make me
	despair, and it's these terrible things that
	often crop up in my work. I feel more sorry
	for the people who inspired the stories,
	that for the fictional characters.

GJ: 	What about cyberpunk? You know I've
	called your futuristic fantasies 'organic
	cyberpunk': what's your reaction to that?
 
SC: 	The majority of cyberpunk books seem to
	me like rock videos. I've read a few -quite
	some time after they came out- and the
	thing I admired most about them was the
	visual imagery. The writing, I felt, often
	left a lot to be desired. That, however, is
	my subjective opinion, coloured by what I
	do and do not like to read. I don't want to
	be dismissive of cyberpunk, because of the
	impact it made and the creativity it
	inspired, and I don't feel qualified to
	criticise because I haven't studied it
	deeply. I do feel it was rather a boys' club,
	though.

GJ: 	You've said you'd like to 'put more science'
	in your books, if you could handle it. But
	Hermetech has a lot of tech in it, lots of
	information technology, virtual reality,
	gene therapy, in a kind of apocalyptic
	meltdown with New Age beliefs. Is there a
	balance that you aimed at, between
	(magical) art and 'science'?
 
SC: 	I was spending a lot of time with people
	who were into the newest aspects of
	science and technology, and I learned a lot
	from them. All writers want to use their
	new knowledge and I'm certainly no
	different. Personally, I'm not sure whether
	I'd consider Hermetech to be science
	fiction. A friend of mine, who is more of a
	mainstream writer, read it and enjoyed it
	as a thriller, whereas some critics called
	it fantasy. But I hope the book showed that
	I don't dismiss technology. I am interested
	in new developments in science, and
	sometimes I will write about them. But I
	am not obsessed with them. I didn't
	consciously aim for a balance between
	science and magic in Hermetech, but
	perhaps I wanted to illustrate that the two
 	subjects are not as disconnected as they
	may seem.

GJ: 	D'you think it's harder, as a woman, to be 
	confident about the language of science?

SC: 	Despite the emergence of many women
	writers in the genre, sf is still a male
	enclave, and perhaps when women use the
	language of science they feel they have to
	convince the men that they know what
	they're talking about. I myself would be
	very reticent about flinging techno-speak
	about unless I could back it up with fact,
	even if those 'facts'; are fantasies cobbled
	together from various scientific theories
	etc. I think mistakes and inaccuracies
	probably are more tolerated when they
	come from men, whereas if women make
	these sorts of mistakes the criticism of
	them can become sexist.

GJ: 	Do you think artists who use high tech -
	like musicians, video- makers, are more
	creative, more genuinely experimental
	with these new tools and toys, than
	working scientists?

SC: 	Not really knowing any scientists, I can't
	comment and I don't wish to generalise. I'd
	like to think that techies live in their own
	imagination/fantasies as much as anyone
	else. My instinct is to reply, but yes of
	course artists are more creatively free
	than techies, but I recognise my own
	subjectivity in that.

GJ: 	What about you -I mean, with the new
	tools and toys? 

SC: 	I occasionally play computer games and
	yes I have a modem. My computer is a
	fairly thoroughbred animal, and I've bought
	her some bits and pieces to enhance her
	pedigree. Computers are worse than cars
	for making you want more speed, more
	power, more utilities. I'd like a CD ROM
	drive, a flatbed scanner, a bigger hard disk,
 	a tape streamer, oh the list is endless.
	Mark shares my craving for computer bits,
	so we encourage each other in a very
	unhealthy manner, drooling over the
	wishing-books of Computer Shopper and its
 	ilk. I've been involved in video work and I'd
	get involved again if I was approached by
	the right people. The last video I worked on
 	ended in tears when the people involved
	started getting nasty about wanting to
	earn money from what they were doing.
	They didn't seem to appreciate that in all
	the creative fields you have to do a lot for
	nothing to get recognised. I wouldn't
	particularly want to earn money from this
	kind of project anyway. I think it's
	something that should be done for the fun
	of it, the sense of achievement.

GJ: 	Do you regret that you chose to be a
	writer? It's a dying art, surely. Would you
	rather be a film director, a games
	designer?

SC: 	It wasn't a choice. I am an innate story-
	teller. I think it's a shame if books really
	are threatened as a life form, but to be
	honest I'm not convinced by the evidence
	that this is so. People are buying more
	books now than they ever did. I think it 
	only appears to authors that things are
	getting worse, because they now have to
	compete in a much larger market. If there
	were only three sf books coming out a
	month in the UK, it's likely an sf fan would
	buy them all. Now they might have to chose
 	from dozens of books. They also have to
	choose between books, videos, and
	computer games so its an economic
	conundrum. I'm sure if people had enough
	money they'd buy more books, more videos,
	more games. I do not have any aspiration to
 	be a games designer, and much as I like the
 	idea romantically of directing a film, I
	don't think my skills lie in that direction.

GJ: 	What about the spiritual side of your 
	writing? And your life? 

SC:	I was never a practising Christian, but I
	was pushed off to Sunday School by my
	family. Probably just to get me out of the
	way fro the afternoon! Spiritually, I've
	always been pagan in my heart, although I
	didn't realise this until I came across the
	literature associated with it during my
	teens. Even then, I didn't actively practise
	it as a religion. People who are heavily
	into religion, whatever it is, seem to be
	obsessive about it. When I finally joined a
	coven for a while, I learned that all
	religions are basically the same, and only
	the terminology differs. There are still
	power structures and hierarchies, people
	taking control. Often pagans scorn
	Christians because Christian belief is
	based on a book, the Bible, and the words
	of a 'great man', Jesus. Pagans, however,
	should admit that they have their own
	'great men' and 'bibles'. Because I
	discovered there are rules and regulations,
	despite the propaganda, I withdrew from
	the group side of things. I have my own
	belief system now, which I change
	according to my mood and circumstance.
	Basically, I believe that all god-forms are
	symbols that we use to get our heads round
 	impossible ideas about the universe. I don't
 	believe in discarnate beings floating
	around on clouds, booming out
	pronouncements against humanity or 
	actively interfering with our world. 
	Neither do I think we have to appease some
 	Great Being, through prayer or praise, in
	order to avert fates worse than death,
	after death! More often than not (depending
	on mood) I do think that there is
	intelligence behind the universe,
	multiverse, or whatever you want to call
	it. I think it is present in all of us too.
	What I've read in the popular science books
	on quantum mechanics has more in common
 	with my religious beliefs than what I've
	read in The Bible or books on witchcraft!
	Quantum physicists are possibly the new
	priesthood. Now, there's a prediction for
	you... I'm an sf writer after all.

GJ: 	Contact with this immanent intelligence is
 	achievable: not something handed down 
	from on high, but something we can do...
	Magic is in the future, not in the past.This
	is great as metaphor. But I have a problem
	with the concrete, the manifestations. I
	actively believe in God, yes, sometimes:
	you're right, belief is a such a fluid thing.
	But the image of divinity created by
	humanity, emerging from some newly 
	invented arcane ritual: I can't help it. I get
	an irrepressible image of Mr StayPuff The
	Marshmallow Man (you remember him? In
	Ghostbusters?) I know this is an 
	impossible question: but are you serious?

SC: 	How the hell am I going to articulate this?
	If you can suppose that we create reality
	through our perceptions, including our own
	futures, through the way we act and react
	in the present, and how we perceive the
	world around us, then it should be possible
	to effect changes in our lives through the
	the imposition of will. Simply put, this is
	positive thinking. If you have a bad self
	image, more likely than not life will often
	appear to be a barrel of shit. You can 
	become a victim, sucked into an ever-
	descending spiral of defeatism and 
	pessimism. If you can empower your self
	image, re-program yourself, then you
	should be able to cope with life in a much
	more positive frame of mind and the 
	knocks, when they come, are not so 
	debilitating. One way of doing this is by
	using the props, both physical and
	psychological, of ritual. When you create a
	god-form in your imagination, I think you
	are really creating a more powerful aspect
	of yourself (if you suppose that what you
	imagine comes solely from your own mind.)
 	Addressing this symbol, whether through
	prayer or celebration, means you are
	accessing a stronger part of yourself. This
	inner strength is what I see as 'Godness' in
	the universe, the cohesive and binding
	energy. I don't see god as being apart from
	us, but that god- energy is within us. I read
 	somewhere that god is a verb rather than a
	noun. 

GJ: 	Magic, magus: it's a word for power. I think
 	the mystique that surrounds that word, our
 	mythology about 'magic', all springs from
	an awe and reverence for people who could
	manipulate language, for the invention of
	reading, writing; for storytellers. It is
	absolutely real and powerful, it changes
	the world. But the power has become so
	familiar we're no longer gobsmacked: just
	the way we're blase about aeroplanes and
	wordprocessors. We want the kind of
	special fx you only get in fantasy novels,
	whereas in fact the magic is happening
	around us all the time. Would you agree?

SC: 	There's very little I can add to that 
	because I think you put it so well, and I
	agree with you. Magic is all around us.
	Words are powerful, and can change the 
	world, especially if those words are
	believed in. Belief, I think, is a very strong
	force, and causes all kinds of spontaneous
	conceptions. Belief in oneself is the magic
	of self-empowerement, and we can use
	carefully chosen words to augment the 
	strength of that belief. 

GJ: 	After the Wraeththu, you wrote two books
	set in a world dominated by brutal
	matriarchy (Monstrous Regiment and
	Aleph). You've said that Monstrous
	Regiment was based on your experiences in
 	a consciousness raising group. Oh yes, I
	remember those days! In my CR group, we
	were infiltrated by the local lesbian
	community, looking for fun. I got a lot of
	attention because (and I quote) I looked so
	sweet and feminine. So much for escaping
	from being a sex object! It seems funny
	now but at the time I was furious. 

SC: 	Being in that group was one of those 
	cataclysmic learning times, when you
	wake up a little to reality. I believed
	wholly in the woman who was running it,
	in a very naive way. And yet as time went
	on, it seemed as if she was trying to
	undermine my self confidence and attack
	my personality, implying I was deceitful
	and selfish. I don't know whether this was
	deliberate or not, or whether she had a
	spiritual motive for what she did. It did
	help me grow, eventually, but at the time
	it hurt me terribly, because I have a very
	strong sense of justice and hate hurting
	other people. Also I am quite strict about
	honesty nowadays. Probably because, as a
	child, I found out that lies are always
	discovered and rebound on you relentlessly.
	The woman was also sarcastic about
	people who used 'pretty words' - which
	stung, because to me poetry and theatre
	were part of ritual work we were involved
	in and I took that as a personal attack. So,
	I spent a good few months agonising about
	myself, wondering if I really was this
	horrible, shallow thing the woman had
	implied that I was. Then, with the support
	of another woman in the group, I realised
	the problem was the group leader's not
	mine. I shrugged off the self-despising and
	realised I should just be myself, and not be
	cringelingly apologetic all the time. It
	seemed clear that the group leader had
	problems about jealousy, and considering
	people as threats, not just me but other
	women too. I began to look coldly at the
	way nobody stayed for that long in any of
	the groups this woman ran. One moment
	people were in awe of her, the next they
	just never bothered coming to the
	meetings. I suspect a few of them had
	experiences very similar to mine. Needless
	to say, in the face of this epiphany I left
	the group. I felt a lot stronger afterwards,
	and had the confidence to approach the
	subject of belief in my own way, not
	slavishly following what people had done
	before. Perhaps this was the woman's
	intention, her function, who knows?

GJ: 	I get the impression you were pretty
	disappointed with the rock chicks
	movement of your time as well. What d'you
	think of the Riot Girrls stuff: the 'girls are
	powerful' gigs...?

SC: 	I have always wanted someone to ask me
	what I think of Riot Girrls, and the answer
	is this: "I don't empathise with them. I've
	never had any trouble getting a boyfriend."
	That of course is a very bitchy response,
	and not exactly serious. I don't think this
	Riot Girrrl stuff is really politically
	motivated. To men it seems a pose, a lot of
 	girls-only groups have jumped on the
	bandwagon hoping to secure a record
	contract. It's so calculated. I've read about
	this new 'women-in-rock' think in the
	music press and haven't been impressed by
	what I've seen. The fact that Courtney
	Love, from the band Hole, was criticised
	for wearing makeup and so-called sexy
	clothes on stage at a women-only gig, for
	example, made me curl my lip. I can't stand
 	it when feminists get all high and mighty
	about women wanting to be feminine. You
	don't have to be a muscle-bound shaved-
	scalp brute to be a feminist, you can have
	relationships with men and even like them,
	and be a feminist. If I went to a women-
	only gathering, I'd still wear makeup and
	dress up. I don't do it for men, but for
	myself. If that's wrong in the eyes of some
	women, they should be tolerant about it.
	Wanting people to be all the same is a very
	dangerous idea.

GJ:	You seem to have more and more to say
	about women and female power. You do a
	really good mother and daughter
	relationship. I'm thinking of Ari and her
	mother in Hermetech, and SallyAnn and Mel
	in the Interzone story 'Built of Blood'; and
	a bleaker version in the story 'The Green
	Calling'. The older woman, disillusioned,
	whose life is full of secrets, (maybe her
	bad experiences). The daughter who has to
	look after her mother, and avoid getting
	burdened with all this debris... Did you
	decide you wanted to do mothers and
	daughters, or did it just happen?
 
SC: 	I didn't consciously decide to write about
	mothers and daughters...This seems to be
	the answer I'm giving all the time, I must
	be a very 'unconscious' writer. My own
	relationship with my mother was dreadful,
	and coloured my view of all women for a 
	long time. It was only when I discovered
	paganism, and had to get my head around
	the concept of a female god, The Mother,
	that I rid myself of all the baggage that my
 	early teens had dumped on me. I had a very
	negative image of The Mother as an
	archetype, and my mind resisted accepting
	it. Possibly, my interest in androgynes was
	the intermediate step between a deep
	suspicion of mother figures and an
	acceptance, I don't know. Now, my women
	friends supply me with the womanly
	affection and support that I felt I lacked
	as a teenager, and I have a very good
	relationship with my step-mother so I was
	lucky enough to be given a second chance at
 	having a mother figure. As one famous
	person said, "We can't choose our family,
	but thank God we can choose our friends."

GJ: 	I loved the language in Wraeththu. You get
	all sorts of literary experiments in sf, but
	you rarely find that kind of joy in beautiful
 	words. Did you enjoy poetry from an early
	age? I know you used to write poems, do
	you still? Had any published?
 
SC: 	I love words and enjoy browsing through
	old dictionaries to gather up new words. I
	don't think I'm a brilliant poet, although I
	have written a few dozen poems. I still
	read a Lot of poetry, and sometimes it 
	inspires short stories. There are plans for
	Inception, my information service, to 
	produce a chap book of my poems,
	illustrated by members of the service. I
	don't know when we'll get round to this,
	but probably soon. 

GJ:	You've said you devoured Michael Moorcock
	and Tanith Lee when you were a teenager.
	Do you still feel the same way about them?
 	What about other influences: musical,
	dramatic, figurative? 

SC: 	Tanith Lee is still up there on the highest
	throne of my autorial pantheon. I love her
	work because she too loves words. Her 
	writing is so evocative. I think the work
	she is producing mow is the best she's ever
 	done. When I'm feeling blocked creatively, I
 	generally watch some of the animated
	films of Jan Svenkmajer or the Brothers
	Quay: that gets the creative juices flowing.
 	I also like Peter Greenaway's films,
	because of his imagery. It's like a visual
	fix. 
 
GJ: 	After the Monstrous Regiment double, you
	did a kind of vampire book Burying the
	Shadow, about fallen angels. What made
	you want to do a vampire story?
 
SC: 	I wanted to write a book about angels and
	vampires that did not have the word 'angel'
	or 'vampire' in it. I thought it might be
	especially difficult to write about
	vampires without resorting to the cliche
	name, but in the even it wasn't that hard.
	The eloim in 'Shadow' are not traditional
	vampires, after all. The plot and 
	characters for the novel came to me before
 	I decided to attach the angel/vampire
	connotations. Originally the 'vampirism'
	was going to be a psychological
	phenomenon. Then an editor asked me if I
	could write a vampire novel and I sent a
	sketchy synopsis in. It wasn't accepted but
	I put the ideas in that together with the
	ideas for Shadow, and think that the result
	worked very well. It's still one of my
	favourite pieces of work.

GJ: 	And then there was Hermetech, which I've
	talked about; and most recently Sign For
	The Sacred. In Sign there's a messiah
	figure, a miracle worker. But what he
	actually does, and whether he does 
	anything, is left completely ambiguous.
	Instead of the world disintegrating, it's
	the apocalypse that seems to disintegrate.
	The utter transformation of reality that
	ends Hermetech, is diluted and diffused
	into a mild social revolution. Is this the
	end of that particular trail?

SC: 	Who knows? As I think we've established, I
	write very unconsciously for the most
	part. Things just come out in my work that
	I obviously needed to explore at the time.
	The 'climaxes' in my books are often anti-
	climactic because I feel that real life
	rarely witnesses massive events where
	suddenly everything changes. In the dramas
 	of our everyday lives, activity and
	tranquillity rise and fall like waves. There
	might be a few hours, or even days, of
	rapid information transfer, heated tempers
 	and feelings that Armageddon -in a 
	domestic sense- is nigh, but eventually the
 	tide ebbs and we carry on. When you expect
	something to be mind-blowing and
	cataclysmic, it often isn't. Then you can
	breath a sigh of relief and address the next
 	crisis. 
 
GJ: 	How do you feel about your career so far?
	Are you pleased with what you've done?
	Any regrets?
 
SC: 	Like all writers, I wish I earned more from
 	my writing. It's hard not to feel bitter
	when you see 'sex and shopping' novels
	attracting six figure advances, and you
	know the only reason they'll sell is
	because of the massive publicity 
	campaigns behind them and the fact that
	publishers damn well make sure the books
	are available in the shops. Sometimes, I
	can't help feeling that publishers look on
	their sf/fantasy lists as tax writeoffs.
	Still, there's no point in being sour about
	it. The only book I'm not satisfied with is
	The Monstrous Regiment. If that was ever
	reprinted I'd want to rewrite some of it,
	in the light of the way my perceptions have
 	changed Every other book I've written was
	me writing to the best of my ability at the
	time, so I have no regrets about them

GJ: 	Did writing short stories come after
	writing novels for you? It seems to me it
	did, though you've now clocked up quite a
	few, for Interzone, and the shared-world
	projects Warhammer and Midnight Rose;
	among others.

SC: 	I wrote my first short story "The
	Pleasure-Giver Taken", for David Garnett's
	Zenith Anthology. Since then I've written
	about thirty five and have sold most of
	them. I do find it harder to write shorter
	pieces. Most of the stories I've produces
	could easily have been novels, and I hate
	cutting out what I think is good stuff, in
	order to fit into a word limit. I would very
	much like my stories to come out as a
	collection, but I'm always told that
	collections don't sell very well, so my
	publishers have not been that keen. I keep
	mentioning it to my agent though.

GJ: 	You've talked about writing a magical-
	realist novel, is that in the offing?

SC: 	My next project is hidden beneath a veil at
	present, and I don't want to talk about it
	too much. By the time this interview is
	published, the details about this book
	might be old knowledge of course, but I'm
	feeling all superstitious about keeping it
	secret at the moment. It's all in the lap of
	the gods, I'm afraid, and bearing in mind
	what I've said about gods, I've got a lot of
	positive thinking to do.