Interview with Oberon Zell

Al99

Well-known member
This link came across my alternate FB feed today - so passing it on. The link is to Alan M's coverage of a recent interview with Oberon Zell, co-creator of the word "polyamory".

https://polyinthemedia.blogspot.com/2018/10/oberon-zell-co-creator-of-word-on.html

There is a link in the article to the original article as well.

For those who may may be be familiar with Zell, here are a couple of paragraphs from Alan's article:

Oberon Zell-Ravenheart is a legendary figure from the beginnings of the modern poly movement. In 1961 as a college freshman, he discovered science-fiction author Robert Heinlein's new Stranger in a Strange Land and became the book's foremost evangelist, helping it to become a "bible for multi-love believers" by the late 1960s. In the 60s and 70s he helped advance and popularize Neo-Paganism with his Church of All Worlds, inspired in part by Stranger. And he became a practicing wizard.

His life partner Morning Glory Zell-Ravenheart is especially known for inventing the word polyamory. In a kitchen-table discussion at the home of Deborah Anapol and Paul Glassco in Mill Valley, California, around 1988, the four of them were trying to come up with a succinct word for their community's deep belief in, as Morning Glory later defined it, "having more than one sexual loving relationship at the same time, with the full knowledge and consent of all partners involved." "Polyamory" was what they settled on. Morning Glory first published the term poly-amorous in the Beltane (Spring) 1990 issue of the Church of All Worlds magazine Green Egg, and Oberon says they published polyamory in a glossary leaflet at a convention soon after. If you wonder why the early poly movement was so full of Pagans, Scadians, and science fiction fans as it started to take off, their influence is why.
 
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Oberon is an interesting man ... Morning Glory was an interesting woman ... Thanks Al for sharing that article.

That's a shame that he was treated so badly at that poly party in New York. Apparently as the poly movement has grown it has taken onboard some people who are rather judgmental. :( I'm happy to report that most of the people on this forum are not like that.
 
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