GAFIA

Acronym for Getting Away From It All, pronounced GAA-fee-uh with a hard "G". The “it” which was being gotten away from did a quick 180-degree turn not long after the term came into popular use. Gafia means to leave/get away from fandom. Originally, as defined in the first Fancyclopedia, it was the motto of escapism and meant getting away from reality or the mundane while reading sf. A gafiate is someone who has gone gafia or is gafiating.

Contributor: Dr. Gafia (who should know).

See also FAFIA.

from Fancyclopedia 2 ca. 1959

(Dick Wilson) Get Away From It All. This useful phrase was originally an escapist slogan, meaning the intent to withdraw from the Macrocosm to indulge in some intense fanac, but has undergone a complete reversal of significance so that now "that flash of sanity known as Gafia" refers to a vacation from fandom back in the world of normalcy, where nobody reads that crazy Buck Rogers stuff. Diagnostic symptoms are sheer boredom while trying to read proz or fanzines, allowing correspondence to pile up unanswered, and wishing that half-finished fanzines could be forgotten for a while. Oh, and we should mention GAFIA Press, Redd Boggs' publishing house, the source of Skyhook and many another worthy serious publication. from Fancyclopedia 2 Supplement ca. 1960: (Belfrage:Wilson) Dick Wilson got the title from AFIA, a book by journalist Cedric Belfrage which he much admired. Redd Boggs believes that the withdrawal of "Getting Away From It All" didn't really refer to fandom, but to "seeking refuge from real life in the pages of books and magazines, especially [[sf]]] magazines" — a lively issue in pro-centered early stfandom; escaping into fandom wasn't debated much until the "Fandom Is A Way of Life" discussions int he mid-40s.

from Fancyclopedia 1 ca. 1944

(Wilson) - Get Away From It All; motto of escapism.