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Brian Aldiss, British, Hugo Award winner, in memoriam, John W. Campbell Award winner, Nebula Award winner, science fiction
In case you hadn’t heard, Brian Aldiss passed away in the early hours of Saturday the 19th, having just celebrated his 92nd birthday with friends the previous day. That’s an admirably long life, though it’s still sad to see a noted grand master of science fiction pass away.
Aldiss penned over 100 novels and 300 short stories, many of them classics in the genre: Non-Stop (1958), Hothouse (1962), Greybeard (1964), and the Helliconia trilogy (1982-85). Aldiss was writing as recently as 2012-13 with Finches of Mars and Comfort Zone. His story “Super-Toys Last All Summer Long” was adopted by Kubrick and then Spielberg into the movie A.I., while his Frankenstein Unbound was the basis for the 1990 Roger Corman film of the same name. That’s not even counting the dozens of anthologies he edited, including Space Opera, Evil Earths, Perilous Planets, or the two-volume Galactic Empires. For his work, he was awarded two Hugo Awards, a Nebula, and a John W. Campbell Memorial Award. Plus, he was awarded the OBE for his services to literature in 2005.
That makes for an important body of work, a stepping-stone in the genre’s evolution that helped bridge the gap between “classic” science fiction of the 1950s with the more contemporary New Wave in the ’60s and ’70s. That’s reflected in his writing as well as his legacy; Aldiss corresponded with C.S. Lewis and Tolkien, went drinking with Kingsley Amis, and influenced many younger writers like Neil Gaiman and Adam Roberts. He was one of the most well-known and influential British science fiction authors in the era between Arthur C. Clarke and Iain Banks, alongside authors like J.G. Ballard and John Brunner.
What I loved most about his works were their charming, inventive weirdness; his best novels feature a pervasive feeling of overgrowth and decay. Non-Stop is set aboard a generation starship whose population had long ago regressed into primitive tribalism; Greybeard features a quiet apocalypse in the wake of an infertility plague, where the octogenarian characters traverse an overgrown England; Hothouse is set in a far-flung-future where humans have devolved into small, insignificant creatures in a much larger jungle world rife with carnivorous plants and insects. It’s all wild and crazy stuff, but it’s taken seriously and presented in such bold and vivid prose that it’s hard not to be swept up in it all. Non-Stop is one of my favorite novels of all time, and Greybeard would rank pretty high as well.
The passing of time has claimed many legends from the olden days of science fiction; Aldiss was one of the true remaining legends who started writing in the Silver Age of science fiction. Goodbye to a fine author; it wasn’t too long ago that I read my first Aldiss, Non-Stop, and after it blew my mind I made it one of my reading goals to track down more of his books to read. I did so, and enjoyed them as well, and I have many more of his books yet to read.
A few memorial posts:
gaping blackbird said:
Sad news. He was one of my favorite authors through the years.
Hothouse and Greybeard were my favorite Aldiss works, but Non-Stop, Life in the West and his collection Who Can Replace a Man? were also excellent.
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admiral.ironbombs said:
I wish I’d started reading Aldiss novels earlier, because he became one of my favorite authors quite fast. I have not read Life in the West or Who Can Replace a Man?, but I’m adding them to my list.
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realthog said:
I heard this news this morning and was, as you can imagine, pretty bummed. Oddly enough, on Friday I was doing something trivial in connection with Helliconia for a (hopefully) upcoming book and was idly wondering how he was getting on after all this time — the usual sort of half-focused thought you have when reminded of someone. As you say, he had a longer and far more productive life than most of us manage to achieve; for that we should be thankful. RIP
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admiral.ironbombs said:
I was also quite bummed myself. Odd, but I had a similar experience of reading through my old Aldiss reviews and reminiscing about his books, having read some essays/reviews about Aldiss that weekend. And I likewise was wondering how he was getting on, since he was up there in years. The next day after that, I hear about his passing. Somewhat solemn and foreboding to realize he’d already passed while I was sitting here, wondering how he was getting on… 😥
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Peter S said:
I had just started reading Helliconia this past Friday! I had just bought all three volumes on ebay and they had just arrived. Aldiss was one of my favorite authors.
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admiral.ironbombs said:
I have yet to read Helliconia, but I’m curious what you think — odd coincidence of timing, but it’s fitting to remember him by reading one of his more notable series.
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Peter S said:
Aldiss really went to town on the world building with the Helliconia books! The first book starts off with a prologue of about 100 pages or so describing the planet. I haven’t made my way much further yet!
For me, Aldiss is either brilliant or at least memorable. ‘Greybeard’ is one of my favorites, while I couldn’t finish ‘Report on Probability A’. That’s not to say that ‘Report’ is bad, it’s most likely just beyond the capacity of my tiny brain to fully comprehend. It is a unique book though, which I do want to try again at some point.
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admiral.ironbombs said:
Wow, I’ll have to keep that in mind when I start reading Helliconia — I’ve never been a fan of extended prologues, but I do love world-building, so I’ll see where it goes…
“Aldiss is either brilliant or at least memorable” — couldn’t agree more. At the very least, he would write such unique and brilliant big ideas that no one else could come up with.
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antyphayes said:
Sad to hear. I’ve not read enough of his extensive oeuvre. Non-Stop is, as you say, mind blowing.
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Guy said:
Hi
I had just completed post on Brian Aldiss’s passing when I found yours. I included a link. I hope you don’t mind.
All the best
Guy
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admiral.ironbombs said:
Yours is a very fitting tribute as well. Thanks for including a link. Have you read many of his books?
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fromcouchtomoon said:
Sorry to hear the news. Sorry I missed the news…
And I’m sorry I haven’t read any of his work yet–been meaning to–but you and Joachim talk about him enough to make me feel like I have. Need to make that a reality.
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admiral.ironbombs said:
I would very much recommend the aforementioned novels to you, especially since you like Simak. There’s a similar mournful-but-pastoral vibe to many of Aldiss’s works, along with a feeling of fecund decay and nature overrunning civilization/technology. Striking stuff.
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Richard Fahey said:
He was a seminal critic of the written genre,a major figure bringing recognition to modern SF as we know it today,as well as an author.He had the benefit of watching it evolve before his very eyes.He wrote the first comprehensive history of literary SF.He was a guiding light,who made me feel it’s worth and importance.
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admiral.ironbombs said:
So very true, Richard — I think his work as an editor and critic is underrated; between those roles and his work as an author, he truly shaped the history of science fiction in the 20th century.
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Richard Fahey said:
Yes,it is undervalued.He championed SF as a serious literay form against the ignorance and mystery that it was viewed with by the academic world,to whom it was virtually unrecognised.I’m sorry I can’t find any of his 1960s and 70s essays online.
Being an author and critic,gave him a unique insight into the written genre.
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transrealfiction said:
I knew he was frail and in his 90s, so it wasn’t unexpected but still a great loss to SF.
As I may have mentioned in comments here before, my favourite, and the first of his books I remember eading, was Non-Stop. Wonderful, and I’ve read it several times since.
On hearing the news, I thought it was finally time I committed to reading the Helliconia set; despite owning the first volume since it came out in paperback, I’ve never finished it. However, I checked to see which of his books I actually owned and found one my partner must have bought decades ago which I had never read.
It’s called The Shape of Further Things (1970, although our p/b is 1976) and looks like a very suitable book to read.
____
Earth is charged with a beauty we are destroying…’ So begins this unique book, in which joy and doom intermingle. It spans one month in the life of Aldiss and his wife Margaret and family, living in the peaceful Oxfordshire countryside. Here’s a tapestry of provocative meditations, theories of dreams, of the Moon as real estate, and the role of technology and pollution in our lives – all served up with soup and sausage rolls. Aldiss speaks of ‘The sheer delight of being alive’ – and captures that delight here.
____
I think Helliconia will have a wait a little longer.
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admiral.ironbombs said:
Turns out I also have a copy of The Shape of Further Things — indeed, looks like a fitting tribute based on that description, and even though I’ve never read it I can’t think of a better-sounding book to read in honor of his passing.
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kaggsysbookishramblings said:
Nice post and very sad news. I have only just begun exploring his work and the trouble I’m having is which one to pick up next…
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admiral.ironbombs said:
Thank you. I feel like I’ve only just begun exploring his works as well, though I’ve read four or five of his novels by now. Which ones have you read? If you haven’t read Greybeard or Non-Stop yet, they are very much worth reading. I also really liked Hothouse but it is a lot more “out there” in its science-fantasy setting, and since it originated as a series of shorter stories it isn’t as tightly-knit as the other novels.
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kaggsysbookishramblings said:
Very little so far – The Brightfount Diaries and some short stories, but I’ve just been rectifying that with a short novel which was quite magnificent.
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admiral.ironbombs said:
I have not read The Brightfount Diaries, but all of the novels I mentioned are pretty good (as other comments have mentioned). The only one I’d avoid is The Finches of Mars, which was… not his best work, somewhat jumbled and chaotic in my opinion.
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kaggsysbookishramblings said:
Thanks! I don’t have that one so I won’t rush out to look for a copy…. 🙂
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nikki @bookpunks said:
Big fan of Non-Stop as well. Got to meet him once, if briefly, at World Fantasy in Brighton I think it was. I had just found a few ancient copies of a few of his novels at a used book store, so I brought them by to the signing table. I think I had two. He signed them and said, “What? That’s it?.” Guess a lot of people show up with stacks of his entire life’s work to get signed. Anyway, a lot of interesting words have come out of that man. RIP.
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admiral.ironbombs said:
You actually met him?! That’s awesome, even if he was perturbed/surprised by your lack of books to sign.
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