An Introduction to Rachel Pollack's
"Burning Beard: The Dreams and Visions
of Joseph ben Jacob, Lord Viceroy of Egypt"
and to
Interfictions: An Anthology of Interstitial Writing

By Delia Sherman

You are about to read "Burning Beard: The Dreams and Visions of Joseph ben Jacob, Lord Viceroy of Egypt." It was written by Rachel Pollack, and it appears in an anthology called Interfictions: An Anthology of Interstitial Fiction, edited by me, Delia Sherman, and Theodora Goss. Rachel describes "Burning Beard" as "midrash punk." It is a Biblical story told in a distinctly un-Biblical voice. It is biography and philosophy and theology. It is interstitial fiction.

Interstitial art is art that does not hew closely to any one set of recognizable genre conventions. It falls into the cracks between genres inventing itself as it unfolds, playing with your expectations, teaching you how to look at it or listen to it or read it while you experience it. Virtually all the nineteen stories in Interfictions deal in one way or another with process, journey, the space between life and death, certainty and uncertainty; what Heinz Insu Fenkl in his introduction calls liminality.

Traditional myths and fairy tales are frequently organized around journeys and thresholds. The spaces between child and adult, waking and sleeping, life and death, ignorance and knowledge, past and future are all fraught, to differing degrees, with danger and uncertainty. There is no map of those between places. They must be entered with humility and an open mind.

This is especially important because things in the spaces between are seldom what they seem to be. That arrogant old man at the crossroads might be your father. That smelly, raggedy old woman begging by the side of the road might know the answer to all your questions, or be your heart's desire in disguise, or a wicked witch or a hungry snake. You don't know, and you have no way of knowing. To find out, you need to keep your eyes open, your wits about you, and be ready to cope with what happens next with what grace and firmness you can muster. Journeys through those spaces are inevitably difficult and often frightening. But without them, change cannot happen. The widow's son cannot become a king without seeking the dragon in the wilderness. The cycle of the seasons cannot begin without Persephone descending into the Underworld. Art cannot grow without exploring the uncharted spaces between familiar genres.

"Burning Beard: The Dreams and Visions of Joseph ben Jacob, Lord Viceroy of Egypt"

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