The Most Dangerous Science Fiction Writer: Harlan Ellison 'Greatest Hits'
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 21 ส.ค. 2024
- #booktube #bookcollecting #fictionbooks #fantasybooks #sciencefiction
The author of '100 Must Read Science Fiction Novels' examines the new Harlan Ellison 'Greatest Hits' collection in depth and critiques the trigger warnings contained therein....
Music: Steve Holmes (C)
PLEASE READ THIS BEFORE COMMENTING: As I mentioned on the Community Page, I am talking a break from YT for a week, so I will not be responding to comments for some time unless there are exceptional circumstances. Thanks for your views.
Thanks for the cool review, have a good week off.
Stephen, once you're back after your well-deserved break is there any chance of covering the (screen)writer Patrick Tilley?
@@PipBoykin Not really, to be honest. I read 'Fade Out' several times when very young, bu have never been drawn to return to his work.
@@pnptcnit gives us a bit of time to rest too I think. Been doing some reading and catching up on his back list.
There is some very nice stuff from 1 and 2 years ago.
He fomented whatever anti-establishment feelings I had as a teen, and he also got me into short form material. I read pretty much everything he wrote, both fiction and non. Thanks for promoting this writer to new readers.
SMDH @40:00 picturing the sheer hubris required for someone to assume they have authority to alter the words of a dead man or superimpose their own moral outlook as the leading interpretation of his text (while profiting from it), is enough to make one dry heave in disgust.
My Top 5 from this collection:
1. I Have No Mouth, and I Must Scream.
2. "Repent, Harlequin," Said the Tiktokman
3. Jeffty is Five
4. Chatting With Anubis
5. How Interesting: A Tiny Man
"I Have No Mouth and Must scream" is beyond viscerally disturbing. What you would expect from a man who sent a dead animal to his publisher 3rd class mail (so it sat in mailroom) after publisher pissed him off (put a cigarette ad in one of Harlan's books)..
@@Scottlp2 It is a great example of sci-fi horror in a short story format. Disturbing to the core.
I’ve just read all the sounds of fear a collection of Ellison stories that kicks off with (a short introduction then) I have no mouth . His work really lingers in the mind quite disturbingly he conjures up some truly nightmarish stuff . Brilliant 😱really enjoyed it.
Wasn't expecting this. I almost forgot there'd be a fresh video today
Harlan Ellison. Lovely. Thank you again. This is great!
Brilliant closing comments, i agree wholeheartedly.
Good review. I’ve been taking notes on this book after buying it last week. I’ve been collecting his books for 40 years and he’s been a huge part of my life. I was so excited about this book. I think the selection is a sensible one, given how subjective any selection could be. I’ll be doing my own video on this in July. It’s great and rare to have a new Ellison book over here!
They say opposites attract. Ellison's personality could not be more different from my own. He was tenacious, aggressive, confident, driven, and headstrong. I've never been any of those things but I was so attracted to his writing as a teenager that I consumed everything I could get my hands on. He has been described as an arrogant asshole, but I feel like he had a burning desire to inspire a better society and call out the bullshit limiting our growth as human beings.
I saw the documentary Dreams with Sharp Teeth (2008) a few years ago. I think the biggest issue people had with him is that Ellison had no patience for idiocy or idiots and he wasn't afraid of voicing his opinion. Extremely interesting guy.
@@PipBoykin true while that is one way to describe it, you could also say that he tended to have trouble with anyone who disagreed with him in any particular moment. While his ego helped define and make him famous I wonder what else we could have gotten with a sprinkling of humility
@@chocolatemonk Absolutely. I didn't mean to imply Ellison was always right. Except according to himself, maybe :)
Ellison WAS an arrogant asshole, at times. Napoleon complex, also known as Napoleon syndrome/short-man syndrome, was a strong feature of his flawed character. But he was also a kind of moral genius as well. And he was probably a damn good friend to have in your corner in a scrap. Especially if that fight was against the forces of cruelty, corruption or ignorance.
It’s disgusting the way they treat dead authors (Dahl’s posthumous censorship weighs heavily on me), but even the living ones get screwed over. R.L.Stine had his Goosebumps and Scare Street books changed and his publisher didn’t even bother to tell him…he had to find out from his fans…
Agreed on the trigger warnings. Slippery slope that. It wont be long before changing the text is seen as good thing for the same reasons - it gets it into schools, more people will read them etc etc. Great vid as always - Cheers.
Yes, I don't believe in that kind of compromise. It's a dangerous thing.
I just finished this collection and it was my first intro to Harlan Ellison.
There were five that really stood out to me.
That's wonderful, because this is really a mixed bag.
Which five?
@@waltera13 In order of my favorite to least:
1. I Have No Mouth, and I Must Scream.
2. "Repent, Harlequin," Said the Tiktokman
3. Jeffty is Five
4. Chatting With Anubis
5. How Interesting: A Tiny Man
Harlan Ellison is my favorite author. His style of writing really captured my attention and would suck me in for hours at a time. Even the introductions and forwards felt as though he were speaking directly to the reader.
Yes, his addresses to the reader are for me, actually among his best works alongside his greatest stories.
Thanks. Thoroughly enjoyable watch/listen. I’ll be looking to buy this, had no idea it was released. Totally agree on the trigger warnings.
Excellent! This is just what I have been waiting for: a detailed review of Ellison by someone who actually knows what they're talking about! I'm glad you dealt with the "trigger warning" issue, which is just... what can one say? Are they serious???
"If you want to read the great works of literature, from Homer to Shakespeare to Cervantes, you cannot be afraid of words!" is very well put.
I also can't believe that they got rid of the computer language in "I Have No Mouth..." There is no doubt that Ellison would have hated that.
While it is great to think that more people can now discover Ellison's stories, I very much share your concerns about creeping censorship, often driven by identity politics. I strongly suspect that this is why they have left out "A Boy and His Dog".
Yes, it's appalling. I'm very interested to see what happens now re '"A Boy & His Dog".
I have a lot of Ellison books already but I’ll buy this one just to show my support for keeping authors like Ellison in print. Great cover too.
Oh dear, there goes my productive morning. . .
Ellison was the writer who made me a science fiction freak. I can't imagine kids today being allowed to read his works the way I did. Thanks for talking about him: he's still dangerous, and is still my hero.
me too! loe h. e.
They actually made a computer game 30 years ago based on I Have No Mouth and I Must Scream. I didn't know about it until years later but purchased it right away. Unfortunately, due to it being an older game it struggled to run so I never was able to play it all the way through. It did seem like it was an honest attempt to capture the concepts of the story.
Yes, I hear about that at the time. It so obviously lends itself to a game.
I first heard of Ellison as a teenager in the 90s due to the game adaptation of "I Have No Mouth and I Must Scream"; that game is possibly why the story has become increasingly famous. It was extremely hard to find any Ellison books when I was younger; most of what I've read by him are ebook editions that were released in the 2010s. One of those ebooks was a Vic and Blood collection. I wonder if "A Boy and His Dog" is being saved up for a new edition of that.
I actually first read Ellison because of that game! Haha! It was a weird entry point, but -- given the author -- rather complimentary, I think.
Great review! This book arrived through my door yesterday and I'm really enjoying the stories in it. Agree with your comments on trigger warnings here. Given the author it seems very out of place!
Just bought that edition myself. I read some of his stories as a kid, but not enough. Now I can catch up!
Thank you for the great video! Very interesting and enjoyed learning about Ellison, whom I know virtually nothing about. Should be a nice, warm Saturday here in London for a change and I plan to get down to a Waterstones to pick this book up! EDIT: So I did go to Waterstones and bought the Ellison book and Alien Clay by Tchaikovsky. The clerk was friendly and started talking to me at-length about Tchaikovsky and Children of Time, etc. which was fine, no problem there, but it was notable to me that he did not say a single, solitary word, not even a peep, about the Ellison collection. I just thought it was amusing and made me wonder what Steve would have thought! It was a big Waterstones, though, not a mom-and-pop local bookshop.
Classic! Trade paperbook looks absolutely stunning
An excellent Review of Harlan's book,It's been a long time coming.Agree wholeheartedly with your comments regarding pros and cons.Context is everything.However any collection by this Noted Writer is to be Welcomed,warts and all.
Leave out the warnings no mature person needs them! are you listening Herald classics/Union square/Susan Ellison Foundation and JMS
He was a serious ass-kicker. Not only in his personal life, but also in his writing. He demanded no mercy and he gave none. What you read is what you got.
Brilliant and heartfelt look at a great writer and a good man. I am sad to see the trigger warnings on his book. I think Harlan would have had them taken out - or do not publish the book. Unfortunately he is dead so he can not do anything about it. Quite convenient for the publisher. Still and all it is a joy to see his stories reprinted for a new generation of readers. You did a find video, thank you.
Thanks very much Gary, coming from a REAL expert like yourself, this means a lot, I'm touched. Very pleased you enjoyed this and agree totally on where HE would have come from on these issues.
First read Ellison in an Ace Double in 1960. Dangerous Visions is one of the great anthologies.
I was going to buy this book in preparation for the release of The Last Dangerous Visions later this year. But I'm a tad iffy now because of the trigger warnings/caveats. I guess Straczsynki had to compromise with the publisher, but Ellison would have blown a gasket about that if he were still alive.
Sounds really interesting - have ordered. Thanks for your insight, very much appreciated !
I HAVE NO MOUTH...IS A CULT LEVEL STORY! FABULOUS!
"Approaching Oblivion: Road-signs on the Treadmill Toward Tomorrow" One of my all time favorite tittles / metaphors.
I don't quite know why, but my fav is The Beast That Shouted Love At The Heart Of The World. It left me speechless but I couldn't stop reading. He certainly was a crusty cantankerous curmudgeon, and it was his right to be. Nice take, Stephen, an excellent subject.
It's an amazing story, one of my favourites too.
Stephen - it’s worth mentioning that more recent research into the Kitty Genovese case has called into question most of that original reporting. Even at the time, there were, apparently, questions about the newspaper story but its author was reputable enough that he brushed them off.
Aware of this.
Got it. I know you value accuracy, so I thought it was worth mentioning.
That doesn't effect the fictional story Harlan was inspired to write. The moral he was at pains to communicate to readers remains - and remains valid. But you probably know this already.
@@stephenwalker2924 fair point!
@@wmeisel I admire your desire for accuracy. The inaccuracies that seemed (and still seem) to gather around this particularly gruesome case are disturbingly fascinating in themselves, I find. I feel a new work of faction, à la 'In Cold Blood', is required in order to understand it all. Thanks for replying.
While I liked a lot of Harlan Ellison's short stories and screenplays; Repent, Harlequin! is a favorite. The Outer Limits episodes Demon With A Glass Hand and Soldier are basically "The Terminator."
He wrote one of the most innovative SF stories ever published, "The Region Between." It appeared in the March 1970 issue of Galaxy and in the Keith Laumer "Five Fates" anthology of the same year. It is a wild ride and quite different from anything else I am aware of. The issue is on the internet archive, and if you use a cell phone, it could probably be read. Not so much on a PC. Ellison was a great role model in defense of all forms of SF and writers.
I should have mentioned 'Demon...' as you and someone else picked me up on it. As I'm sure you know, it is one of the Kyben stories, which are all favourites of mine, especially "Run for the Stars".
@outlawbookselleroriginal Have you heard anything further on "The Last Dangerous Visions" publication? Supposed to be coming in September. It has been a long wait.
"On November 13, 2020, the Ellison estate's executor J. Michael Straczynski announced his intention to publish it. In 2022 it was purchased by Blackstone Publishers and is planned for publication in September 2024."
Terminator was also inspired by “Demon With a Glass Hand.” One of his Earth-Kyben war stories. Great review, I’m curious about this new book. “Paladin of the Lost Hour,” Twilight Zone, is on TH-cam. Director is an Alan Smithee clause. There’s a great conversation on TH-cam between Silverberg and Ellison on a radio show “Robert Silverberg interview” is the title. It’s very entertaining.
yes, I mentioned 'Demon' online in this respect decades ago. Love the Kyben stories.
Thank you for this video- I'm going to try the short stories out. Currently reading PKD's short stories. I was wandering if you could do a video about your reading habits ( when, where you read, what influences your reading choices and also a bit of a timeline ( what you used to read in the past etc). I have been initially drawn to your channel because I could see your love of books and reading and that resonated with me 😊
I'll see what I can do, thank you!
Some comments on the Audio-Book version from the library that I consumed:
1- STRANGELY, it differs from the Audible version! The version on CD, like the one from the Library, has more of Harlan reading than professional readers. The Audible version (for example) has a different reader on "How's the Nightlife on Cisalda?" Probably because the recording of Harlan, live at what was probably a college, is of poor technical quality, but is AMAZINGLY performed.
2- Harlan's style fairly jumps off of the page, but is rarely captured by professional readers. NOBODY reads an Ellison story as well as Harlan did. These readers seem more carefully selected here than usual, do a better job, and seem selected, in part, for racial/gender sensitivity to stories written in a clear voice other than HE's own. That being said, "I'm Looking for Kadak" has to be played on at least 1.5X speed to get the performance authentically. It should sound more like Jackie Mason than it does if you don't know who Jackie Mason is. Seriously. No H8
3- It Contains 2 Bonus Tracks and some story commentary from Harlan that were from the original recordings. BONUS!
- "Shattered Like a Glass Goblin"
- “The Prowler in the City at the Edge of the World”
4- The producers of hard copy Audiobooks have created industry lows that are so unacceptable that they MUST be the norm for audio books. : No "contents" list on the box, no titles on the discs, no insert with contents/ lists, no track listings on the discs when loaded into a computers media player. Just 350 3 minute tracks across 14 discs - hope you bought a copy of the book to find your way through!
Lovely to see this discussion of Ellison from someone who knows. In the US, Ellison is famous for his writings, his association with Twilight Zone and Star Trek and giving outrageous interviews.
He wasn't obscure over here until the late 1980s- but since then he's been a cult figure in Britain.
Deathbird Stories and Hard Candy are on the short list of fiction that blew my mind open when I was young. The policing of language is an authoritarian impulse that should be resisted, thanks for standing up for artistic freedom.
Good point. Btw I think you mean Angry Candy.
@@PaliGap1 yeah that's the one, good catch
Great review and thanks for the head's-up about the vacuous trigger warnings. As far as I'm concerned, those trigger warnings are an insult to the reader and they can stick those warnings up their asses. I will not be purchasing this publication because of this. Anyway, I think I have most of those stories in other collections and would much rather hunt down older collections that feature these stories rather than contribute financially to a publisher who pulls this kind of nonsense.
Completely agree. Trigger warnings have no place in literature.
Harlan Ellison was a real character. From time to time I go watch that clip titled "Pay the Writer." Makes me laugh every time. I've only ever read one story by him. Repent Harlequin, and from the first paragraph or so I could tell he was a master of prose. The story was good, too. I need to read more, but I more into fantasy that sci-fi. What I like the most about Ellison is his writing style. Writes fast, hard, didn't rewrite. A real pulp writer, and a dang good one!
Ellison doesn't write science fiction. He writes speculative fiction.
Sounds like a good collection. Having only read the Paingod collection and a few other strays I may need to pick this up. But the JMS editorializing you mention at the end is disappointing.
I Have No Mouth And I Must Scream was adapted in the 90s as a PC game with Ellison's blessing. I have it, and have played it a few times, but I'm really not a gamer. One unique aspect of the game is that the decisions you make in the game determine your character's story arc. Apparently Ellison wanted that particular detail in the game.
Im just reading Dangerous Visions! 😃
Picked up my copy last week here on Novelty Island! I was surprised but pleased that my local(ish) book retailer had a copy; It was filed in the horror section though! 🙄 I’ll watch the video once I’ve read the book. It’s not like I haven’t read any of them before! Some of them are new to me and some haven’t been read in a heck of a long time so it’ll be good to go in sort of fresh! In the meantime, have a like!
It is categorised as 'Horror' on bookshop bibliographies that are at least partially drawn from Neilsen Bookdata- their categories tend to auto-populate to all major in-use computerised bibliographies, since NBD produce what we used to call 'British Books In Print'. Their former competitor, Whittaker's, was far more accurate but sadly NBD took over the latter and that was it in terms of standards. As I often say to my customers 'The art of bibliography is dead,'.
@@outlawbookselleroriginal So, a word of warning to our British chums, check the Horror section of your local bookshop if you’re looking for this book!
ps.. I can only find Harlan Ellison in audio book format, I'm listening the Boy Who Shouted Love At The Heart Of The World and other stories, read by Michael di Loreto, I think he does it justice.
Very good stuff... and the nice thing is some of these very old titles are gratis fir a short while..
As a Trekkie and being (just) in my 40s my only exposure to Harlan is with his episode City on the Edge of Forever.
I have also read the graphic novel which came out some time ago.
He always said he wasn't happy with the parts that were cut from his original story for the aired epsidoe so he worked with IDW to develop the graphic novel which follows his script almost exactly.
Very interesting.
I will pick this up as it intrigues me and I'd love to finally read more from him
This is a great video by the way.
I would myself however tell people to seek out a copy of Deathbird Stories, particularly if they can get an old Pan edition with its beautiful wraparound blue-silver cover.
I was recovering in hospital from a lung operation and those stories, for all their gloom and murkiness, helped me get by.
Seriously one of the best collections I’ve read by any author in any genre.
I love 'Deathbird' and have owned it in that edition since the early 1980s. It is - after 'Beast...' - my preferred Ellison collection.
Thanks!
You ARE my hero - No joke! I wish I could be slippin' Steve the Filthy Sweet Lucre he deserves!
Thank you!
@@salty-walt ZAR $175 is £7.62 in UK money. Don't go mad. Steady now.
@@stephenwalker2924 aye noted SW. I shall trim the sails a bit. Thanks again. Have a happy Tuesday 😊
@@stephenwalker2924 HAhaha - still, mighty nice of you. . . 😂
H. E. was the absolute best!
I don't think the warning is there so much for the "bad words" as some folk see them, as for the use of what is seen now as racist accents and characterizations. Accusations from a suburban middle class that does not interact with the genuinely different and exotic in any way in their safe, untraveled lives - let alone doing so in the 1960's or earlier. It really springs out when listening to the Audio book and Ellison's Twain like ear for accent and patois (to lend verisimilitude and characterizations to conversations) can be heard. I can see how these sections would scan as "racialized" to the uninformed, inexperienced ears of those coming from a place of comfort and cultural homogeneity .
And the Rape scenes are (intentionally) a bit rough.
I too would argue against the change in computer printouts to their translations. . . but I *get it* . We are SO FAR removed from punchcard programming that almost no reader under 40 would get what the image in the text is supposed to be representing, let alone that it is something that they could look up and translate. It takes one out of the story, in one way, as stated, and in another: Who would believe in a Sky-Net like computer that can do ANYTHING running on
Agreed. Whole sections of the contemporary audience need to look at what is being said- the depth- and worry less about how it is said -the surface.
I'd been looking for Ellison's books for so long, and to my disbelief last month I came across The Beast that shouted Love in a fairly new (opened about a year ago) used bookstore here in Athens. I didn't even look at the price, I just grabbed it immediately. (it was 12 euro) It is the same edition that you showed in your video a year or so ago. Good stuff!
EDIT: The really nice thing is there is little overlap between that book and this new one, so I can get the new one without feeling bad for paying for stories I already have, which is something that always annoys me, hah. It feels like buying half a book, if you know what I mean!
His stories are not forgettable...shock is not the word, I think he traumatizes the reader. I remember reading a short story he published in a science fiction magazine, I think it was Analogue about an alien invasion that attacked the sexual organs.
Thanks Steve 🫡
Thanks to you, ST makes all the difference here!
This feels like the warm up act for the Last Dangerous Visions, coming in th autumn
When wokeness was just starting to get a foothold, H.E. was having none of it. Like an old lion, he was constantly being nipped at by the endless packs of hyenas that came after him, mostly kids in their twenties, fresh out of university indoctrination. But he always stood his ground. No one could give a tongue-lashing like Ellison. The weird thing is, just about everyone who attacked him, had never read a word he'd written. They would always snidely refer to him as a "Star Trek" writer. Even though, butchered as it was, his City on the Edge of Forever stands as one of the greatest ST episodes. I own a first ed. of Shatterday, hardbound. It was one of my greatest treasures. I also own the orig MF&SF in which "Jefty is Five" is published; another treasure. I'm not sure what the Deathrealm award is. However, there was a small press horror magazine called Deathrealm; I know, b/c I was published in it. Its editor was Stephen Mark Rainey. He's an author and is still around.
Yes, HE was so obviously anti-censorhip that the trigger warnings in this book are an insult to his memory, I feel.
@@outlawbookselleroriginal Damn, that is insulting.
Love Ellison (have 22 of his titles on my bookshelf). Love the review. Agree entirely about the trigger warnings, and if the computer punched tape had to be changed and 'brought up to date', what's wrong with generic binary/ASCII? Don't they teach that in IT classes?
01100011 01101111 01100111 01101001 01110100 01101111 00100000 01100101 01110010 01100111 01101111 00100000 01110011 01110101 01101101
(so many do not!)
Oh, I don't know about a "Lighter Side Section." Would prefer the tone be managed the way Harlan tended to do it, by interspersing such material (DEATHBIRD notwithstanding).
"Chocolate Alphabet" is in STRANGE WINE, but it is probably included because it was published on its own in an illustrated edition.
I must have read that one, as I have 'Strange Wine' but it was read a long time ago....
just vlike the AUthor:M Jerzy Kosinski. He was sooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo difficult too! love him!
Even though his nonfiction on television and film is dated, it still reads well and can point you to things worth reading or viewing.
It is all good writing, yes. However, I'd say it is 'of it's time' as opposed to 'dated'. 'Dated' implies that everything that is happening Now is naturally superior to what happened in the past because Now is more 'Modern' - when of course the Modern ended in the late 1980s. All we have 'Now' is the endlessly contemporary, Postmodern eclecticism, where nothing is really fresh or new anymore...
Good point! Of it's time is a better fit.
Hi Stephen. Ah, somebody who appreciates the great man - good to see. Actually your mention of the cons have put me in two minds whether to buy this or not. Ellison would have been apoplectic at these editorial interferences, probably involving violence.
Having read all the stories and taking into account your reservations I really am on the fence here. Nice looking volume though.
Hey Kenny, great to hear from you. It is a nice-looking book, but I balked at purchasing because of those 'warnings', which as you say there is no doubt HE would have disapproved of. I received the new edition of 'Dangerous Visions' today- not keen on MJS's introduction, in which he says how Harlan would have disapproved of the would-be censors of today which is strange given that as editor of 'Greatest Hits' he must have had a say in the 'warnings'. It's a strangely produced book as well, very heavy- which is usually a sign of good paper- but the paper is sheeny and quite thin, making the book slimmer than any other edition and the case binding seems cheap to me. Not impressed really...and I have 'Again, DV' on order...still have the old paperbacks of course... hope you are well, mate.
@@outlawbookselleroriginal Thanks for the info, some serious hypocrisy there re DV I'm thinking. BTW was I hallucinating or did I see a pre-order for Last Dangerous Visions. Really !!
@@kennyrh9269 Yes, it's been on the cards for a while now. There is a contents list somewhere online but I'm not bothering to look at it until I can find my copy of Chris Priests' book on the subject.
@@outlawbookselleroriginal Best piece of journalistic writing I've seen in years. Great stuff but bloody hard to find at a decent price. Kept me entertained for hours. If "proper" journalists put in the effort that Chris Priest did then we wouldn't have to read so much tripe. Rant of the week.
@@kennyrh9269 Totally agree.
As commented in a previous video, yep I have everything in it - and yet I was still more than happy to buy this! 😁
Indeed, it's such a handsome paperback *I bought TWO copies* ! 👍 And from a bricks 'n' mortar bookshop no less! 😌
Is _Shatterday_ as a collection 'underrated' ? 🤔 I'm not sure. But as I was saying on Ira's latest video _Strange Wine_ is DEFINITELY underrated; that's a terrific "album". *A+++*
I’ve been wondering if I should pick this up. I don’t know the contents, but I’m willing to bet I already own 80% of this material. Ignoring all the paperbacks, I picked up the Essential Ellison once at a library sale (for $1 - envy me), so hopefully this covers a lot of post-1991 material.
I enjoyed re-reading much of it, though I have most of the stories many times over, but I don't regard it as as important as the key collections and 'The Essential Ellison', which I'd say is far superior.
Christopher Priest is not the only one who dosen't think much about Ellison. In his The History of Science Fiction, Adam Roberts is also pretty dismissive about his work. I like his stuff, some of it is really brilliant, some less so, but that tends to be the case with prolific authors.
Nat Segalof's biography of Ellison, A Lit Fuse, is terrific.
Agree about Hugo, by the way. For me it lost all meaning when they gave award to Paladin of Souls over Dan Simmons's Ilium.
Yeah, I read the Bio. The work by Harlan I love, I REALLY love, but I do feel he settled into a groove once the 1980s came along. And I have mixed feelings about what I'd have thought of him as a person- if I'd met him, I'd probably have melted, the good stuff had such an impact on me. As Chris P was a friend of mine, I had to be diplomatic about HE and Moorcock, didn't always agree with Chris, but I could always see where he was coming from. Adam is, of course, a great judge of almost anything.
*Heads up!* All of those who bought their copy from a UK bricks 'n' mortar bookshop rest assured you did the right thing! 👍 Amazon UK has gone from "this item will be released 25 June" [tomorrow] to *zip. Nada.* They don't have it. 😁
Me (of course). Amazon have really dropped the ball on this, we've been selling it steadily where I work for a good month.
@@outlawbookselleroriginal Yep, all three branches of said bricks 'n' mortar bookshop in Glasgow (Sauchiehall Street, Argyle Street and Byres Road) have been generously stocked. And they've made sure that, over the past month, ALL genre readers have seen a copy as it has been variously displayed on the 'Essential Horror', 'Essential Fantasy' and 'Essential Science Fiction' tables! 😌🤗👍😁
Bought it. Never heard of this author before but I've seen A Boy and His Dog in the early 90's during a Sunday afternoon SF state television show. I was very impressed.
I would be curious to know what does it mean to be difficult with publishers. Personally, I find the concept of the work of a writer being sold to a corporate publisher and owned by a corporation in perpetuity reaping the fruits of the artist's labour n-fold abhorrent. Stephen King mentioned, I believe in About Writing, how Carrie got him 200,000 $ which at the time he couldn't believe, but how the novel later earned a lot of money ( with the film, and becoming a horror classic) of which he has seen nothing.
Also, Isaac Asimov mentions in his autobiography, which is a great read, greater than his novels which didn't make much of an impression on me, how he refused the translation of, I believe, I, Robot, because the book was bringing him no money and how his new publisher fought with the I, Robot publisher in the court to recover his author rights.
Ellison was personally very difficult- argumentative, insulting, aggressive- and this was the problem. He was often right, but it did him no favours. This, more than anything, explains why his star dimmed in terms of fame. However, there was another factor; the success of 'Star Wars' in 1977 changed the game for media perception of SF and it dumbed down in terms of content just as improved SFX should have raised it up; sadly, films like 'Blade Runner' 'Alien' and 'The Thing' should have ushered in a new age of sophisticated SF films but this didn't happen. Short stories were too much reliant on quality of prose when measured against the gigantism of Cinema.
I've just seen that the story in A Boy and His Dog takes place after WWIII in 2024.
@@onehandslinger1475 The date and Blood's account of history have been revised a couple of times in revisions by the author. But yes, this has been remarked upon in several places online.
'From A to Z in the Chocolate Alphabet' was published as a comic book in 1978 with illustrations by Larry Todd. He wrote it in three days in the window of a bookstore. I agree that it is slight, even disappointing by Ellison standards. I also LOVE 'A Boy and his Dog.'
can someone please give Harlan Ellison credit for Boy and His Dog being the basis for the Fallout games and TV Series. i think boy and his dog was omitted from that collection because its politically unacceptable these days.
As I'm not interested in games, this is a new idea to me, nor do I know the TV series- as most games, TV series and films are derivative of numerous literary SF sources, they've always been of secondary interest at best to me. There is a possibility, I agree- as I said in the video- that " A Boy and His Dog" was excluded because of its perceived anti-feminist nature (an example of the stupidity of people assuming that a character's actions and attitudes reflects those of the author and forgetting what Fiction actually is) or it could be for licensing reasons as I suggested or because a separate reissue is planned. Personally, I feel it should have been in the book, being one of his two most famous stories.
We need to get a good wireless microphone Dad, maybe a hollyland lark m2 combo pack, a rode wireless go 2, something to make the audio better
The problem with Ellison now is, as with so many authors in his league, that there's no serious critical work about him (that I know of) ... the Gary Wolf book came out 30 years ago, and his biography was a non-starter. What other work is out there that takes a look at what exactly he was trying to do? His online fan base is largely simpering and sycophantic, which I imagine HE would have hated. Fandom can keep people from taking a real serious, critical look at the man and giving his work the attention it deserves. If you know anything like that, please lmk.
There is a book entitled 'Harlan Ellison: Unrepentant Harlequin' by George Edgar Slusser, which I bought in the late 80s and have not read since- your post has prompted me to dig it out-and without even checking, I think we can make the fair assumption that it is out of print.. You're right there is little critical work out there. I wasn't that impressed by the bio either, to be honest. And you are right about the fanbase to some degree, as well.
The Criterion Collection has started editing their movies to remove questionable scenes. . . The ironic hubris is fucking irritating. If some publisher has the balls to change the authors work, with or with out permission, you had better publish the original next to the edited portion or it is considered to be literally graffiti or trash at that point. The idea that we need to be saved from a book harming us is parallel to dragging knuckles
That's outrageous: you'd think Criterion would have more integrity. Time for an email...
Describing Ellison as 'a difficult character' is a bit like describing Arthur C. Clarke as 'slightly interested in the diverting company of striplings.'
I enjoyed "A Boy And His Dog" a lot.
Though "I Have No Mouth" is his absolute best work, I feel. It's actually my favorite literary work of all time, followed close by "Guts" (Chuck Palahniuk).
"Repent Harlequin" is a close second from Ellison.
I personally think "I Have No Mouth..." -although excellent- is overrated compared to many of his stories. It's obviously a matter of taste, of course. I've read and reread a lot of his works -especially those published before the 1980s- many times and some stick with you, while the immediate impact of others fades with time.
@@outlawbookselleroriginalI just ordered this book and am super excited!
The way I got into Ellison were his "The Voice From The Edge" audiobook sets.
So far, my least favorite of his I read is probably "Laugh Track". Interesting idea, mediocre execution, in my opinion.
He's gone on record saying "Grail" is one of his top five favorites (that he's written). I thought it was good, but not great.
"The Very Last Day Of A Good Woman" is a really great one. Check it out, if you haven't.😁
Let us all thank Stephen King's DANSE MACBRE (1981) for introducing scores of readers over the years to Harlan Ellison and his groundbreaking work. King was an obvious fan, and thus now so am I and countless others.
Well, yes, but Ellison was REALLY FAMOUS in the USA for at least a decade before King had anything published. The essay about his confrontation with a certain singer ("Frank Sinatra Has A Cold" by Gay Talese) was widely published and introduced him to those who were not familiar with his SF work, which had earned him a large number of Hugo and Nebula awards by the early 1970s. Not saying people didn't discover HE because of King, but HE had a large readership prior to 'Carrie'.
@@outlawbookselleroriginal You're right, of course. When it comes to HE's reputation in the States. I was thinking more about the general reader of Horror/Fantasy/SF in the UK in the early 80s, just starting to find their way in these genres and, like me back then as a dumb kid, who didn't even know what The New Wave actually was. I wanted to read HE because SK repeated the oft-quoted anecdote about how Ellison told the makers of Star Trek: The Motion Picture to, well, feck off, in so many words.
If you have a copy of King's DANSE MACABRE somewhere check out that very funny anecdote. You'll find it in 'the longest footnote in the world.'
Cheers.
@@stephenwalker2924 Good point well made. I must have read that, but a long time ago so I'll look again, thanks mate.
On the subject of trigger warnings, I have a copy of the H.G. Wells novel "The Sleeper Awakes", published in the early 2000s with an introduction by Gregory Keyes. In the introduction Keyes gives his description of what SF is and what SF is not. But towards the end he felt a need to warn readers about the way certain racial groups are represented in "The Sleeper Awakes", reminding us about the social conditions that influenced Wells in the 19th century, etc etc. I guess Keyes was worried about modern readers branding Wells as a racist? It was the first time I'd come across a warning like that.
Absurd, isn't it?
wtf... where's Eve Babitz? (looking forward to this one!)
She'll be back.
Terminator
Yes, it is mentioned in the video.
36:16 not a fan of NG also! he he
Mr. Ellison, himself, insists that he writes speculative fiction. Not science fiction, not fantasy, not weird fiction, but *speculative fiction.*
I know this, having been an Ellison reader since 1980. He wrote across the board, of course, However....
'Speculative Fiction' was coined by Heinlein, briefly used within the SF author community in the late 1960s and early 1970s by some authors to separate themselves from the assumptions that people generally make about 'Sci-Fi', the dreaded neologism (as Harlan said himself). Trouble with that is that Speculative Fiction became a way for the mainstream and cod-literati to use SF tropes and continue to look down on Genre SF while shamelessly stealing its tropes and presenting them as original to a general fiction audience who knew no better (pace Attwood and 'Handmaid's Tale' for example). It also muddies the water by allowing things to remain ambiguous in the borders around SF and Fantasy, when there is a clear line if you allow SF to be clear about Science (the natural and explicable) and Magic (the anachronistic and supernatural), which is the essence of Fantasy.
This is why I don't use 'Speculative Fiction'- it is unspecific and tainted by its use in mainstream fiction circles, used as it is to deny the validity of Genre SF. This is why I use SF - which can stand for Science Fiction, Speculative Fiction, Structural Fabulation and even Science Fantasy. But ultimately I use Science Fiction because the genre is clearly based on Post-Enlightenment belief in the Scientific Method, which authors indicate the value of even when they extrapolate imaginary science. Ellison, of course, did much of his best work in SF, no matter what he said- his SF is ultimately what he'll be remembered for.
I am of two minds on the content warnings:
My first thought is that Ellison would have RAGED against a content warning like Dylan Thomas!
Then I remembered talking to him personally about the content warning in "Deathbird Stories." Long Story Short, the publisher asked for it because the proof readers of that book could not get through the whole manuscript w/o falling to despair, and Ellison agreed. He WROTE it. It would've been unexpected at that time to have had to even THINK about warning adults that a book could f*ck you up, but he didn't want readers to be inadvertently suffering. He got so much shit from reviewers for that sincere concern - being called "arrogant" and "grandiose" for that warning, that he sometimes considered removing it. . . and later on figured "Nah, F@#K those Assholes."
When I think of the sallow delicate young readers who come to this book today, I KNOW that THEY are NOT ready for this. It seems fair to warn them in an age where one may find a trigger warning on a soda can. . .
It seems the obvious alternative would be to edit his words and I GUARANTEE you Harlan WOULD NOT have taken to that! This, given that JMS wants to get HE into the hands of the younger generation, seems the lesser of two evils.
I have to admit I always thought the 'emotion warning' in 'Deathbird' was- despite its directly stating the opposite- was arguably hyperbole, though the power of the stories themselves deny that. However, it is unlikely that many readers would read the book in a single sitting. It's quite a large book and if a reader did find it too much, they'd simply put it down: that's what people actually do if they can't take a book's content. Also, it's not all searing stuff - take "Along the Scenic Route"- for example: it's rough and tough, but not that harrowing.
My general feeling that anyone who is 'put off' by a book is beyond help anyway: already over-indoctrinated by the need for 'safety'. I care more about those who would spit such warnings and decide to use them as a tool of decision- and consequently not put them into young people's hands. Those are the ignorant people who are always 'banning' books in the USA- they are usually not very well read, as they always seem to be 'banning' well known books as opposed to the ones that are culty.
The main thing is this: Ellison is back in print in mass market and I'm delighted about this.
@@outlawbookselleroriginal I know what you're saying, but I found it sneaks up, lingers long and has a cumulative effect. I agree about "Along the Scenic Route" but in my personal experience, it had a "lulling "effect and got me to read more stories that day - and spent the rest of the day wandering about, distracted and despondent, unable to focus, lingered long, and that feeling returned with individual stories later on. Perhaps, not so much today.. .
I like that: "Emotional Warning" that about covers it.
In the States it was labeled "Caveat Lector" (a truly cool title heading.)
Enough psychic powers displayed in SF? I just perused the Ellison volume not one hour ago . . ⏰🪞
TESTIFY!!!
Thanks!
Many thanks Victor- ST is the lifeblood here, very very kind !