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Kipple

Entry updated 20 December 2011. Tagged: Fan, Theme.

Term originating in Fandom, denoting useless or unwanted household junk and ephemera which seems to reproduce itself at the expense of non-kipple possessions – a low-key, domestic manifestation of Entropy (which see). The word spread from Fan Language into popular culture via the novels of Philip K Dick: Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? (1968) discusses it at some length, and there is a fleeting appearance in A Maze of Death (1970). Ted Pauls (1942-1997) had introduced it as the title of his long-running Fanzine Kipple, launched in May 1960 and published frequently for several years (118 issues by February 1967). In his final issue #179 (1984), Pauls wrote that the original reference was to an old joke – "Do you like Kipling?" "I don't know, I've never kippled." – and that he believed it was Terry Carr who responded with the mocking "junk" definition (which has also been ascribed to Carr's then wife Miriam, née Dyches). This was adopted by local (Berkeley, California) fans including Dick, an early Kipple reader and correspondent, who also quotes the Kipling/kippled joke in Galactic Pot-Healer (1969). [DRL]

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