zines, zines, the magical fruit…

yesterday, the much fretted zine program happened. i had four kids show up and i explained to them (to the best of my knowledge) what a zine is.* my greatest fear is that i would get done telling them about zines and they would look at me blankly and say, “i dont get it.” or “i dont know what to write about” and get all whiny. amazingly to me, they all pretty much just dug in and started putting paper together and collaging from magazines and writing down “articles” by hand or playing with the typewriter i had provided.*** only one of the three (the youngest) struggled to find a topic (after brainstorming with him, we finally decided on a zine titled “i wish i had a fox… or a dog.” then he went on to try his hand at illustration and ended up drawing some japanese cartoons and an asteroid. classic zine train of thought?) he was also the only one to really fret about typos, whether he was spelling stuff right and whether or not what he was doing was “the right thing” and i kept assuring him that with zines, anything goes. it doesnt matter if you cant spell or if your typewriter gets all inky, that just makes it look more authentic.

the most gratifying moment for me came towards the end of the program when one of the kids was looking though some of the other books about making zines that i had gotten from the library and commented, “these books make zines look like something really complicated and theyre not really.” that was exactly what i was trying to accomplish–making this form of self-expression accessible to them. hurrah!

*short version? a zine is a homemade magazine.
slightly longer version? a zine is a magazine that you write when you have something to say (or draw or express) and you dont** want to go through traditional publishing venues. zines are generally sold over the internet or by mail or by word of mouth for just a few dollars. there are also commonly traded with other zinesters. there are a variety of formats and the only limit to a zine is your creativity, your time and (to a certain extent) your budget.

**my apostrophe key isnt working right now. there should also be an apostrophe in front of the word zine.

***how do you put the paper in? how do you backspace? how do you go down to the next line?