Donna Kossy


Donna J. Kossy is a US writer, zine publisher, and online used book dealer based in Portland, Oregon. Specializing in the history of "forgotten, discredited and extreme ideas", which she calls "crackpotology and kookology", she is better known for her books Kooks: A Guide to the Outer Limits of Human Belief and Strange Creations: Aberrant Ideas of Human Origins from Ancient Astronauts to Aquatic Apes. Kossy was also the founder and curator of the Kooks Museum, and the editor-publisher of the magazine Book Happy.
Described by Wired as "an expert on kooks has a genuine, if sometimes uncomfortable, affection for her subjects", Kossy wrote books reviewed in publications ranging from Fortean Times to New Scientist. Journalist Jonathan Vankin named her "the unchallenged authority on, well, kooks", and writer Bruce Sterling noted that she "boldly blazes new trails in the vast intellectual wilderness of American writers, thinkers and philosophers who were or are completely nuts".

Life

Early life

Donna J. Kossy was born in 1957. She started doing zines in sixth grade, co-editing Kid Stuff with a friend: "It had gossip, fashions, poetry, jokes and even movie reviews. It sold for 5 cents. My mom typed it up and Xeroxed it at work!" After graduating college in 1979, Kossy became involved in punk culture via collage art, color xerox postcards and mail art.
Kossy eventually became a computer programmer, but also published zines because "Publishing is power, pure and simple", and turned "author and folklorist."

Adult life

At one time, Kossy was the housemate of fellow zine maker Pagan Kennedy. She attuned Chicago writer Dan Kelly to cult "kook" Francis E. Dec. In the early 1980s, she was part of the Processed World magazine, then romantically involved with anti-PW and ex-SubGenius anarchist Bob Black until 1987, moving with him to Boston in 1985.
In 1989, research for her Kooks Magazine led Kossy to abandon much of her other work. She is now married to Ken DeVries, also a member of the Church of the SubGenius and contributor to their books, who provided some illustrations for her books and some articles for her website.

Works

''False Positive'' (1984–1988)

In 1984, Kossy started publishing False Positive, a Xeroxed zine which ran for eleven issues. Each issue focused on one topic and featured related book excerpts, satire, collages, drawings, etc.
The zine and Kossy were quoted by Discordianism co-founder Kerry Thornley in his 1991 foreword to the 5th edition of the Principia Discordia, reprinting the "Manifesto of the Artistic Elite of the Midwest". Kossy said that her "career as a crackpotologist" started there with the "Kooks Pages" within each issue and the two special all-kooks issues.

''Kooks Magazine'' (1988–1991)

In 1988, Kossy started publishing Kooks Magazine, now using offset printing and running for eight issues. A spinoff of the kooks pages of her zine, it was in line with the 1988 book High Weirdness by Mail by SubGenius co-founder Rev. Ivan Stang and featured obscure "kooks" as well as some better-documented "cranks" such as reclusive Spider-Man co-creator Steve Ditko in its final issue.
In Factsheet Five, the zine magazine, founder-editor Mike Gunderloy described it as "A collection of bizarre literature and semi-scholarly research on kooks: those folks who have all the answers that science and the authorities have been trying to suppress. This issue features progress towards a theory of kookdom." then reported one year later that it "keeps getting better; you can spend hours lost in the worldviews here." SubGenius and writer Richard Kadrey described it as "indispensable for anyone interested in the real bleeding edge of thought." Research for the topic even led Kossy to attend a recruitment meeting of Heaven's Gate, the group that ended in a 1997 mass suicide.

''Kooks'' (1994)

In 1994, Feral House published Kossy's first book, Kooks: A Guide to the Outer Limits of Human Belief, an anthology containing updated articles from her zine along with articles written exclusively for the book, with the cover illustration painted by her husband. Organized into seven parts, it documented the rants and ravings of "kooks" such as Richard Brothers, Charles E. Buon, Ray Crabtree, the first biography of Francis E. Dec, Professor Arnold Ehret, Joe Gould alias Professor Seagull, Jim and Lila Green, Hillman Holcomb, Les U. Knight, alien abductee artist Paul Laffoley, Alfred Lawson, David Linton, Emil Matalik, the MIT's crank files, Rose Mokry, Dr. Cyrus Teed alias Koresh, black supremacist Dwight York alias Malachi Z. York et al., etc.
The book was praised as "a rich compendium of looniness" by the Los Angeles Times, "indispensable for anyone interested in the real cutting edge of thought" by the San Francisco Chronicle, and a "delight" by Fortean Times. In Factsheet Five, the new editor R. Seth Friedman recommended it with, "I've been anxiously awaiting this book ever since Donna Kossy told me about her plans several years ago. Don't miss out on this book." Jay Kinney, publisher of Gnosis Magazine, found it "Compulsively readable. The 'kooks' collected in this volume are our true American originals and Donna Kossy chronicles their jaw-dropping messages with a rare mix of objectivity, sympathy, and wit." And a 1995 Wired review described Kossy as "an expert on kooks has a genuine, if sometimes uncomfortable, affection for her subjects."

''Kooks Outtakes'' (1995)

In 1995, Kooks Outtakes followed its namesake, being a 36-page supplement of material Kossy had left out for reasons of space; it was later merged with the second edition of the book in 2001, which the editor of Ink 19 praised, noting that "Kossy's style is direct and surprisingly unjudgemental. Kossy is quite systematic in her research, and margin comments abound, along with a lush bibliography. This is serious stuff."

''Kooks Museum'' (1996–1999)

In 1996, Kossy founded and curated on her web site the Kooks Museum, explaining: "As curator and founder of the first Kooks Museum in history I am fulfilling a half-life-long goal of housing kook ideas from all over the world under one crumbling roof. The point of all this excess is neither to debunk nor to proselytize. Rather, my intent is to document and study the vast cornucopia of forgotten, discredited and extreme ideas, with all due consideration to social and cultural context. Nor do I think all ideas are equally valid. Rather, I try to be both open-minded to and skeptical of them."
The Museum was listed in the MetroActive guide to "the most interesting, unusual, weird or otherwise alternative sites on the World Wide Web" by journalist and writer on conspiracies Jonathan Vankin, who named Kossy "the unchallenged authority on, well, kooks."

''Book Happy'' (1997–2002)

In 1997, Kossy started editing and publishing Book Happy, a printed magazine which ran for seven issues. Written by Kossy and others, it was dedicated to reviewing "weird and obscure books".
The magazine was complemented by her web site and the formation of Book Happy Booksellers an online used book business specializing in unusual and hard-to-find items, with inventory listed on various book listing sites including Abebooks, Biblio, Alibris, Choosebooks and others. Book Happy was reviewed positively by English artist Mark Pawson in a 1999 review for the British cultural magazine Variant.

''Strange Creations'' (2001)

In 2001, Feral House published Kossy's second full-length book, Strange Creations: Aberrant Ideas of Human Origins from Ancient Astronauts to Aquatic Apes. As of August 1998, Kossy had already announced the manuscript for her second book as being finished and its publication at Feral House scheduled for "Fall, 1999"; it would however be two more years before the actual release.
Organized into seven parts, the book documented the fringe and pseudoscientific theories of "crackpots" such as David Barclay, Helena Blavatsky, Darwin's cousin Francis Galton, Henry H. Goddard, Madison Grant, Finnvald Hedin, Brinsley Le Poer Trench, slave trader Edward Long, Oscar Kiss Maerth, Alfred W. McCann, Elaine Morgan, Raël, B. H. Shadduck, Zecharia Sitchin, Lothrop Stoddard, Stanisław Szukalski, the Urantia Book, George Van Tassel, Erich von Däniken, etc.
The book was praised from Fortean Times to Booklist and from the Washington City Paper to Counterpoise. In a mixed review, the New Scientist noted that "Donna Kossy's Strange Creatures is about people who have spent rather more time on these problems than most, visiting some of the weirder reaches of the human imagination". And Rev. Ivan Stang remarked: "To write entertainingly for 'nonkooks' about so-called kooks, crackpots, and possible visionaries requires walking a tightrope between tolerant understanding of 'outsider' psychology and graceful sarcasm, balancing both a solid grounding in the mainstream scientific paradigm, and a healthy distrust of the status quo."
Science-fiction writer Bruce Sterling, who also touched upon online cranks in his essay "Electronic Text", commented that "Donna Kossy boldly blazes new trails in the vast intellectual wilderness of American writers, thinkers, and philosophers who were or are completely nuts. Kooks ranks with such sociological classics as Mackay's Extraordinary Popular Delusions and Dudley's Mathematical Cranks. This, for obvious reasons, is a book which every science fiction writer should possess." In her own words, Kossy has stated, "I seek not to debunk strange ideas, but to present them as a necessary segment of the full spectrum of human thought."
Kossy is currently focused on her bookselling business and from November 2007 to September 2008 wrote a blog, "The Cutthroat World of Book Scouting" , which chronicled her experiences in the book trade.

Magazines