Harlan Ellison, 1934-2018

[Vince W]

Another giant has passed. RIP.

RIP, Harlan Ellison

 

[BAYLOR]

One of the greatest of all. Very sad news .

 

[Cat's Cradle]

Wow...just, wow. RIP to an innovative thinker and writer, and a man who took great pleasure in (lovingly) pestering Isaac Asimov at SF conventions.

 

[clovis-man]

If you haven't seen the Netflix bio on him, now would not only be a good time, it could serve as an homage.

https://www.netflixmovies.com/dreams-with-sharp-teeth-2008

 

[Victoria Silverwolf]

I saw Mister Ellison speak several times, and spoke to him briefly when he was sitting in the window of A Change of Hobbit bookstore writing a story each day. (Despite all those "Harlan Ellison stories," he was very pleasant to me.) I have been waiting for "The Last Dangerous Visions" since 1972. Alas.

 

[Droflet]

He hooked me with Deathbird stories and I've been a fan ever since. Indeed, another giant has fallen.

 

[2DaveWixon]

A few years back Harlan gave me permission to take back -- that is, for the estates of Cliff Simak and Gordy Dickson to take back -- the stories each of them had written for THE LAST DANGEROUS VISIONS.
Harlan still had hopes that somehow, the anthology would come out at last -- but he acknowledged that the estates of both men had rights to their stories; so he returned the rights, and I got the Simak story published a few years ago.
In that Simak collection, I acknowledged Harlan's generosity, giving him profuse thanks.
I'm glad I did.

 

[Danny McG]

Sad news indeed RIP

 

[johnnyjet]

RIP Harlan Ellison - One of my early favorite authors and one of the most notorious as well. But certainly one of the greats. I've been waiting for The Last Dangerous Visions for a long time myself.

 

[dask]

Now it seems like they're really all gone. Like John Wayne I never thought it'd happen. Extremely saddened by this extreme loss. Farewell Mr. Ellison.

 

[Rodders]

RIP Harlan.

 

[M. Robert Gibson]

Another obit from The Register Science fiction legend Harlan Ellison ends his short time on Earth

And here's his fantastic rant about paying writers

 

[Brian G Turner]

JMS always speaks highly of Harlan Ellison and his encouragement in getting B5 off the ground - here's a tribute JMS wrote for him:

https://www.facebook.com/officialjmspage/posts/1999083533459833

Along with a post and pic of them both:

J. Michael Straczynski - Hang with JMS

(As it's linked from Facebook I'm not sure if it will be widely visible?)

 

[Jo Zebedee]

I’m going to sound like such a grouch here. But to read all the eulogies without also recognising the more challenging side of Ellison feels odd. The Hugo incident with Connie Wills, for instance. He was irascible and challenging (as well as brilliant) and yet these eulogies seem to belong to someone different from who he was...

 

[Cat's Cradle]

You're right Jo. I greatly admire his writing, but irascible-challenging should be remembered right along with brilliant. He was a complicated, whirlwind of a person. I'd never read of the Willis incident - that's pretty darn offensive.

 

[dask]

What is the Willis incident?

 

[Victoria Silverwolf]

What is the Willis incident?

From Wikipedia:

Ellison was presented with a special committee award at the 2006 Hugo Awards ceremony. His onstage behavior was bizarre, including sucking on a microphone and culminating in his groping Connie Willis' breast. Ellison subsequently complained that Willis refused to acknowledge his apology.

Here is an account of the incident, with Ellison's response quoted at length.

At Long Last, Harlan, Have YouLeft No Sense of Decency?

 

[dask]

Thank you for that Victoria. Bizarre. Maybe they were all drinking some really strange wine or something.

 

[Hugh]

Times change and I change.

Back in the early 1970s when I read “Dangerous Visions” I hung onto the brilliant Harlan Ellison’s every word. Forty five years later, I read "Again Dangerous Visions" and found most of it exceptionally poor, and I particularly disliked Ellison's own introductions and his apparent constant need for drama. I'm afraid the same goes for those short stories of his that I've read: I found them impressively powerful and shocking at the time, but now prefer not to read them

While we all have our struggles of one kind or another, I do think it must have been particularly difficult being Harlan Ellison.

 

[BAYLOR]

Times change and I change.

Back in the early 1970s when I read “Dangerous Visions” I hung onto the brilliant Harlan Ellison’s every word. Forty five years later, I read "Again Dangerous Visions" and found most of it exceptionally poor, and I particularly disliked Ellison's own introductions and his apparent constant need for drama. I'm afraid the same goes for those short stories of his that I've read: I found them impressively powerful and shocking at the time, but now prefer not to read them

While we all have our struggles of one kind or another, I do think it must have been particularly difficult being Harlan Ellison.

In my case, I can reread all of stuff with no issues . What I liked most about his stories is they made for uncomfortable reading , they made you think about things . Make the reader think and I think that I can safely assume that was one of his motivations for writing. He was a teacher and that was how he taught. I learned a great deal from reading his stories,introductions and essays. Harlan Ellison was one writer that im glad I discovered.

The intro in Dangerous Vision with him and Asimov still cracks me up every time I read it . He played gotcha on Asimov and Asimov nailed him with his own gothcha the next day . They ended up becoming very good friends.