Shantell

City of residence: Moncton, NB, Canada

Age: 26

Length of time in the scene: Since mid to late 80's.

Occupation: "Currently, I'm the webmaster/on-line representative for Pine Glen Jewellery. I also model occasionally for fashion shows, commercials, and figure-drawing classes. I've done a little of everything, though."

Education: "Bachelor of Arts with a double major in English (drama)/Classics (civilization) and a minor in Fine Arts (creative writing). Certificate in advanced fashion modeling, completed various workshops in such topics as social work, adult literacy, performance art, fashion, handmade books, paper-making, playwriting, and screenwriting. I've had about a decade of equestrian training and taken various university courses above and beyond my degree requirements. I'm currently taking an introductory sociology course. I've also taken Women's Issues and a graduate creative writing class on fiction."

Musical taste: "I'm very much a rivet-head. I love Haujobb, Skinny Puppy, Download, X Marks the Pedwalk, and the ilk. I also listen to a lot of goth music, such as Tear Garden, Dead Can Dance, The Cure, Type O Negative, and the Sisters of Mercy. I was the industrial/goth music director for an alternative radio station for several years, and I maintained an award-winning industrial programme called 'The Erotic Tablesaw.'"

Distinctions in appearance: "I'm a piercing virgin. Not even my ears are done. I tend to wear dark lipstick and eyeliner, although I eschew pancake makeup (it looks far too heavy). I tend to wear a lot of dark clothes. My wardrobe is primarily black, brown, and bright silver. I wear a lot of velvet, PVC, silk, and slinky polyester blends. My hair is naturally dark, but I tend to colour it (mahogany, black, or plum, for example). I wear Celtic or Egyptian style jewelry. I love Celtic knotwork and, cliched as it is, ankhs."

Hobbies, activities, interests: "Athletically, I enjoy interprovincial bicycling, working out, rock-climbing, fencing, and kayaking. Culturally, I volunteer with various artistic organizations, i.e. music festivals, radio stations, and theatre. I love to read, and manage to forage my way through tons of dark fantasy, science books (a la Carl Sagan and Stephen Hawking), history texts (especially on the European witch trials), and literature. I collect and read a lot of small-press comics (Meatcake, Mythography, Poison Elves, Gon, etc.). In fact, I used to be a comic shop manager. I spend much of my time maintaining a vast web site. One of the main pages on it is called 'The Witching Hours'. It is a popular resource on the burning times, and the practical result of years of my personal historical research. I also breed chinchillas, maintain a houseful of plants, dabble in photography, and play chess, Vampire (the roleplaying game), Quake, Carmageddon, backgammon, and Magic: The Gathering (a collectable card game)." You can also go to her home page.

Spiritual, philosophical, religious affiliation: "I'm a devout agnostic. There may be a god, and there may not be. It can't be proven either way. I don't believe in the efficacy of spells, either. I remain an eternal skeptic."

Goals, dreams: "Eventually, I want to get my Masters and PhD. in either Fine Arts or English. I want to live in a big, old house, surrounded by lots of chickens, horses, goats, and books! I don't want to be stuck in any one career for the rest of my life, but want to sample a little bit of everything. So far, I've been succeeding in the career department."

Do you consider yourself gothic?: "Yes, I consider myself gothic. I'm an aging perkygoff, to be precise. Although I can goth myself up, I tend to tone it down when I'm at work. I'm interested in most of the stereotypical gothy things: dark music and dark clothes, the occult and vampires (although strictly from a skeptical outsider's point of view), witch history, sex and death, etc. Gothic is a very nebulous term. It is sometimes an adjective characterizing the darker side of existence, but it is also an architectural style."

10/26/97