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EDITORIAL 

Our title The Crazy Oik was a brave attempt to attract and display new stuff from unknowns. Worthy perhaps but now, twelve years, later, one begins to wonder if The Magpie wouldn’t have been more appropriate moniker.

Many of our 100 plus contributors have distinguished records. I’m grateful for their warm support (and will always wear it) but I guess they need the Crazy Oik like a dose of covid. Much of what’s in it is available elsewhere but finding it would be hard work and some of it is undeservedly long out of print. Then again there are entertaining unknown nutjobs out there to whom we’re proud to give space. Surely it’s a scandal that one as gifted as, say, Tanner is denied a regular column in Woman’s Weekly. And Ron Horsefield’s submissions to Mind are regularly returned – perhaps, he suspects, even unopened.

Our sister organ Penniless Press Publications has a similarly low profile. A couple of its hundred or so titles have been reviewed in the TLS with no noticeable effect on sales We plunder its productions unashamedly and reckon this kind of advertising – or more accurately drawing to the reader’s attention – will be a welcome distraction from their authors’ isolated hebetude. You are not alone.

Actually I’m agin all attempts at marketing thinking they’re a snare and a delusion. If the writer’s aim is to be rich and famous I suggest they first gain prominence in some other field. Just think how Joe Public would queue up to read Harold Shipman’s novel or the thoughts of Peter Sutcliffe or the autobiography of Dennis Nilsen.

It’s the respect of the literary community that counts – like-minded souls striving for aesthetic excellence or possibly just a larf in a mag where no punches need be pulled. We’re unshockable. If you want to have a pop at God or the PM or the Queen we’re available. And if you are Dennis Nilsen you’ve also got to be funny. We do have standards after all.

Ken Clay Oct 2022