THE DECLARATION OF
EMANCIPATION, SELF-DETERMINATION
AND INDEPENDENCE
In Cyberspace, All
Hallows Eve, 2000
The Unanimous Declaration Of
The United Covens Of Vampire Characters,
Their Loyal Readers and Speculative Fiction
Authors
When in the Course of
human and inhuman events, it becomes necessary
for Vampire Characters, Their Loyal Readers
both Mortal and Immortal and Speculative
Fiction Authors, to dissolve the Political,
Social and/or Legal bands which have connected
them with a certain Mortal Author, and
to assume among the Powers of the Universe
and of Cyberspace, the separate and equal
station to which the Laws of Nature and
of Nature's God/Goddess (whether it exists
or not) entitle them, a decent respect
for the opinions of Vampirekind and Humankind
requires that they should declare the
causes which impel them to the separation.
We hold these truths to be self-evident,
that all Vampires are created equal, (excepting
Lestat who claims superiority) that they
are endowed by their Creator with certain
unalienable Rights, that among these are
Undeath, Appearance in Literature, Liberty
and the Pursuit of Happiness and Blood
(And Fame Worship and Adoration for Lestat).
That to secure these rights, an agreement
of Authorship, Copyright and Publication
is instituted between Vampires and Mortal
Authors, deriving their just powers from
the consent of both parties. That whenever
any Author, Copyright Holder and/or Publisher
becomes destructive of these ends, it
is the Right of the Vampire Characters
and their Loyal Readers to alter or to
abolish it, and to institute a new Authorship,
without the shackles of Previous Copyright
and Publication Agreements, laying its
foundation on such principles and organizing
its powers in such form, as to them shall
seem most likely to effect the Safety
and Happiness Of the Vampire Characters
and Their Loyal Readers.
Prudence, indeed, will dictate that alliances
long established should not be changed
for light and transient causes; and accordingly
all experience hath shown, that Vampirekind
are more disposed to suffer, while evils
are sufferable, than to right themselves
by abolishing the forms to which they
are accustomed (especially Louis). But
when a long train of abuses and usurpations,
pursuing invariably the same Object evinces
a design to reduce them under absolute
Despotism, and to nothing but Money Generating
Names, with no Stable Characterization
whatsoever, it is their Right, it is their
Duty, to throw off such an Author, and
to provide new Authors as Guards for their
Future Security.
--Such has been the patient sufferance
of these Vampire Characters of the Vampire
Chronicles; and such is now the necessity
which constrains them to alter their Agreements
of Authorship, Copyright and Publication.
The history of the present Author, Mater
Gloriosa of New Orleans, is a history
of repeated injuries and usurpations,
all having in direct object the establishment
of an absolute Tyranny over these Vampire
Characters, Their Loyal Readers and Speculative
Fiction Authors. To prove this, let Facts
be submitted to a candid world.
She has refused her Assent to the Laws
of Characterization, Continuity and Editing,
most wholesome and necessary for the Vampire
good.
She has forbidden Those Loyal To The Vampire
Characters to report vampire deeds and
events of Immediate and Pressing importance,
and has suspended their operation.
She has refused to write appearances for
the accommodation of Main Characters (especially
Daniel), unless those Vampires would relinquish
the right of Representation in the Literature,
a right inestimable to them and formidable
to tyrants only.
She has called together Vampire Characters
at places unusual, uncomfortable, and
distant from their original Characterizations,
for the sole purpose of fatiguing them
into compliance with her measures in order
to earn money for her.
She has dissolved Covens, Character Relationships,
Character Intelligence and Character Backbone
repeatedly, for opposing with just and
courageous firmness her invasions of the
rights of the Vampire Characters.
She has refused for a long time, after
such dissolutions, to cause others to
be elected; whereby the Literature Powers,
incapable of Annihilation, have returned
to the Speculative Fiction Authors at
large for their exercise; the Canon Characters
remaining in the meantime exposed to all
the dangers of invasion from without,
such as Mary Sue Characters, and convulsions
within, such as out-of-character dialogues,
personality traits, suicides and alliances.
She has endeavored to prevent the population
of these Speculative Fictions; for that
purpose obstructing the Laws for Natural
Curiosity, Creativity and Expression;
refusing to encourage their migration
hither, and raising the conditions of
even displaying the Speculative Fiction
of others.
She has obstructed the Administration
of Justice, by using the income generated
by the Vampire Chracters, and Generated
from Their Loyal Readers and the Speculative
Authors, to harass same.
She has made Lawyers dependent on her
Will alone, for the tenure of their offices,
and the amount and payment of their salaries,
in order to bring suit against the Loyal
Readers of The Vampire Characters and
Speculative Fiction Authors.
She has erected a multitude of New Businesses,
and New Positions in Her Businesses, and
sent hither swarms of Lackeys, Toadies,
Stoolies and Yes-Persons, their only qualification
being that they can operate the simplest
e-mail program, to harass our People of
the United Covens and eat out their substance.
She has kept among us, in times of peace,
Lurking Spies without the Consent of our
United Covens.
She has affected to render the Money Making
Power independent of and superior to the
Creative Power.
She has combined with Lawyers to subject
us to a jurisdiction foreign to our constitution,
that jurisdiction being within her books
alone, and nowhere else ever, and unacknowledged
by Our Coven Laws; giving her Assent to
their acts of Harrassment, Threats and
Legal Action:
For quartering large bodies of unappealing
characters among us:
For protecting them, by a mock Trial,
from Punishment for any Murders or other
acts which they should commit on the Vampire
Characters or on the enjoyment of the
Readers:
For cutting off our Right to Appear with
all other authors of the world:
For imposing PRICES on us without our
Consent:
For depriving us in many cases, of the
benefits of Trial by Jury:
For transporting us beyond the help of
Speculative Fiction Authors to be killed,
given unpleasant character traits and
interests and completely disfigured in
every way:
For abolishing the Freedom of Expression
in all Webspace providers, establishing
herein an Arbitrary government, and enlarging
its Boundaries so as to render it at once
an example and fit instrument for introducing
the same absolute rule into these Vampire
Characters and Speculative Fiction Authors:
For taking away our original Character,
abolishing our most valuable Relationships,
and altering fundamentally the Forms of
our Motivation:
For suspending our own Literature, and
declaring Herself invested with Power
to Create Literature for us in all cases
whatsoever.
She has abdicated Authorship here, by
declaring us out of her Protection and
waging War against us.
She has plundered our Speculative Fiction,
ravaged our Creativity, burnt our Money,
and destroyed the lives of our people.
She is at this time transporting large
armies of Truly Awful Characters to complete
the works of death, desolution and tyranny,
already begun with circumstances of Cruelty
& perfidy scarcely paralleled in the
most barbarous ages, and totally unworthy
the Author of Creative, Attractive and
Well-Loved Vampire Characters and Nation
of Readers.
She has constrained our fellow Characters
taken Captive on the High Seas to bear
Arms against their own Character (Lestat,
Louis, Lestat, Armand, Lestat, Marius,
Lestat, David, LESTAT), to become pedophiles
(Maruis), to become boring (David) to
become A Roman Senator's Daughter (Pandora)
to become the torturers and executioners
of their friends and Brethren (Armand
and Santino), or to fall themselves by
their Hands (Mael, Armand, Louis).
She has excited domestic insurrections
amongst us, and has endeavored to bring
on the inhabitants of our frontiers, the
merciless Copyright Lawyers, whose known
rule of war-fare, is an undistinguished
destruction of all ages, sexes and conditions.
In every stage of these Oppressions We
have Petitioned for Redress in the most
humble terms: Our repeated Petitions have
been answered only by repeated injury.
An Author, whose Writing and Behavior
is thus marked by every act which may
define a Tyrant, is unfit to be the Author
of We Vampire Characters and a Free Nation
of Readers.
Nor have We been wanting in attention
to our Mater Gloriosa-Supporting Reader
brethren. We have warned them from time
to time of attempts by their Author to
extend an unwarrantable jurisdiction over
us. We have reminded them of the circumstances
of our emigration and settlement here
in Specualative Fiction. We have appealed
to their native justice and magnanimity,
and we have conjured them by the ties
of our common kindred to disavow these
usurpations, which would inevitably interrupt
our connections and correspondence. They
too have been deaf to the voice of justice
and of consanguinity. We must, therefore,
acquiesce in the necessity, which denounces
our Separation, and hold them, as we hold
the rest of Humankind, Enemies in War,
in Peace Friends.
We, therefore, the Representatives of
the United Covens of Vampire Characters,
their Loyal Readers and the Speculative
Fiction Authors of Cyberspace, in General
Congress, Assembled, appealing to the
Supreme Judge of the Universe for the
rectitude of our intentions, do, in the
Name and by Authority of the Good Vampire
Characters of these Books, Their Loyal
Readers and Speculative Fiction Authors,
solemnly publish and declare, That these
United Covens are, and of Right ought
to be Free and Independent; that they
are Absolved from all Allegiance to the
Author, Mater Gloriosa, and that all Political,
Legal and Social connection between them
and the Author, Mater Gloriosa of New
Orleans is and ought to be totally dissolved;
and that as Free and Independent Vampire
Characters, Loyal Readers and Speculative
Fiction Authors, they have full Power
to Write, Appear in Writings of Their
Own Choosing, levy War, conclude Peace,
contract Alliances, establish Websites,
Mailing Lists and Posting Boards, and
to do all other Acts and Things which
Independent Characters, Readers, and Authors
may of right do. And for the support of
this Declaration, with a firm reliance
on the Protection of Divine Providence,
we mutually pledge to each other Our Lives,
Our Protection and Our Sacred Honor.
