Am-Chau got recced! Yay, Am-Chau!

And SA, too, of course. But I feel proprietary for Am, because I got a theological toaster for converting her.

NUTTY! You rock like a rocking thing. You rock like Gibraltar. Thank you so much.

Okay, sources. The Mary Sue source material is in Bacon-Smith, Camille. Enterprising Women : Television Fandom and the Creation of Popular Myth. (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press) 1992. The entirety of the story that Bacon-Smith claims coined the term is quoted on page 94, and first appeared in the fanzine Menagerie in 1974. It is called "A Trekkie's Tale" and is by Paula Smith (collected by Johanna Cantor, in a 1980 publication). This actually contradicts standard myth about the phrase, which is that the first Mary Sue story wasn't intended jokily (as this one clearly is), and that the author of the first Mary Sue story was really named Mary Sue. So, make of it what you will.

For "K/S" and "slash", I found a quote in Jenkins of a 1977 essay by Kendra Hunter, which uses "Kirk/Spock" in the relationship, but not sexual, sense. (She is arguing against slashability.) That essay is marked in the Jenkins bibliography as Hunter, Kendra. "Characterization Rape". The Best of Trek 2, Irwin, Warren and Love, G. B., eds. (New York: New American Library) 1977.

The other source from Jenkins's bibliography worth mentioning is Leslie Fish. She wrote an essay in 1977 called "Warped Communications", in the zine Warped Space 25 (May): 13-14. She wrote other essays, and several stories, but that's the earliest citation and it's a discussion on "homosexual fiction", as it seems to have mostly been called in those days.

Camille Bacon-Smith has a web site: [link]

Looks like she's posted (not recently) to rec.arts.sf.fandom -- your friend might try just asking about history there -- and I think she's still on RATales and a couple of other Yahoo groups. (Last I heard, she was wandering around the Smallville archives.)

Actually, you know what? The Jenkins (Textual Poachers, 1992) bibliography will be a great source of chaining backwards to early citations, since he has record of Bacon-Smith's 1986 ethnography work, Lamb and Veith's 1986 work on Trek, and Joanna Russ's 1985 essay about K/S slash (she does use those terms, although her earlier sources and citations may not). I might also suggest chaining backwards through John Fiske (Television Culture, 1987, of which I have only excerpts here), because although his prose can be dense and boring -- I think he's an economist by training --, he's a thoughtful endnoter.

There's also reference to a tantalizing "The K/S Completist", by Khrys Nolan, in the zine Not Tonight Spock 3: 15-18, published in 1984. It's sure to have good fannish history, and equally sure to be practically impossible to find.

Am-Chau got recced! Yay, Am-Chau!

YAY! YAY! YAY!

And for the MASH story I'm happiest with. There's a good way to start the day. Thanks for pointing it out, askye.

And there was me, wondering if it was worth uploading stuff to Glass Onion, because I'd never had any feedback from there.

Whee! I've never been recced before, as far as I know.

This actually contradicts standard myth about the phrase, which is that the first Mary Sue story wasn't intended jokily (as this one clearly is), and that the author of the first Mary Sue story was really named Mary Sue. So, make of it what you will.

That interests me. I wonder if maybe it was already a slang term for that kind of story (possibly after a speciic author, possibly because it's such a Gee Whiz-y kind of name), and 1974 was just the first time someone wrote it down for the ages. A lot of slang takes a while to migrate into written form.

Right, Lyra. The story cited (the 1974 one) is schematic and brief, and seems to me to be a collection of existing cliches. (The story begins with Mary Sue saying something like, "Gosh, golly, Gee wilikers!", so I think that the author did intend it to be seen as a goof on something existing.) I sort of suspect that the term "Mary Sue" already existed, in gossip and letters and things, but maybe hadn't been put into a widely-published story until 1974.

Which is to say, somewhere, languishing in a moldy attic, there may be an obscure fanzine with an earlier story, also involving Mary Sue, that got passed over in the official history of the Mary Sue. Maybe it was a sucky story, or maybe it didn't hit all of the cliches, so there was no galvanizing movement around it so much as sparks for others to galvanize later.

Funniest author note I've seen in a long time. For an LOTR slash story that features Haldir and Legolas getting it on in a bathtub, the author adds a note warning about possible anachronisms - she's not a historian and doesn't know whether or not baths had been invented yet, so just go with it please. Heh.

She's writing slash and she hasn't even read the books. . . uh, no, can't really get upset by that.

Bathtubs date back to Roman times. At least.

And in medieval times, it was common to turn bathing into an event. I've seen several paintings of the time that show round wooden tubs with curtains around them and a shelf ont he edge holding wine and food while minstrels are playing nearby. And often the tub is shared, often with someone of hte opposite gender. Funny thing is, the people in the tub are generally wearing hats.