RIP: Harlan Ellison

[Cygnia]

84 years old.

 

http://www.vulture.com/2018/06/writer-harlan-ellison-dead-at-84.html

[Andrew_A]

EDIT: For some f--king reason the damn forum won't let me post the Harlan Ellison video I wanted to post. It also won't let me delete this post. Any help would be appreciated.

 

[Pattern Ghost]

Condolences, Andrew.

 

I was never an Ellison fan, but it does suck to lose another of his generation of writers.

[tkdguy]

Sorry to hear about his passing. RIP.

[mattingly]

Alas, Ellison. We Harlan knew ye.

 

[Cancer]

Brilliant, abrasive, and a SF icon from my youth.  Rest well, and may you have no need to scream.

[slikmar]

I have to say, reading the short stories of Paingod and Strange Wine were the first time I have ever read a book like that and had to stop after each story just to digest what I had just read. I know he was paranoid, partly nuts (listening to him speak at the Portland Westercon in the mid 80s was amazing, and yes I was really there). I personally liked a lot of his writing and think this is a loss for the genre.

[Lord Liaden]

Innovative artist and compelling storyteller. Opinionated, acid-tongued curmudgeon. Not an unusual combination. But his legacy is undeniable.

[FenrisUlf]

He was definitely a man of his own mind and a talented writer. I loved his Jefty is Five. I do wonder what he was thinking with some of the things he did in his last few years, though.

 

I wonder who will replace him in SF fandom?

 

 

[wcw43921]

I halfway seriously thought Ellison would never die.  I figured he'd pissed off both God and the Devil, so like Jack Of The Lantern, he'd have to wander the Earth until Judgement Day.

 

He wrote, in the afterword of The Essential Ellison, the words that became his epitaph--

 

"For a brief time, I was here; and, for a brief time, I mattered."

 

Ain't that the truth.

[zslane]

I got to see both sides of his mercurial personality during a live reading of excerpts from Mind Fields that he did about twenty years ago at (what used to be) the Morphius museum in Los Angeles. He was not feeling well, suffering from the flu as I recall, but he was there regardless. Disappointing his fans was simply not in his DNA. He was soft-spoken, charming, and fascinating to listen to.

 

And then some folks who were standing outside the small room where he was reading (it was SRO and spilling out into the hallways) were carrying on a rather distracting conversation amongst themselves. Harlan stopped reading, gently took off his reading glasses, walked out to the hallway and let them have it. Everyone in the room giggled nervously and then cheered politely. He then calmly walked back into the room, apologized for the interruption, and resumed reading.

 

After the reading he signed autographs, and when I got to him I told him that I appreciated his never-ending efforts to be the voice of reason, to which he very humbly said, "Oh, I don't know about that, but thank you very much."

 

Harlan Ellison was most certainly a man who did not suffer fools and ogres gladly, but it was my experience that whenever he was in the presence of those who were kind, respectful, thoughtful, and intelligent, he was exactly the same.

[pinecone]

Dang, there are many writers I like, but only a few I admire. Harlan was one of them.

[Christopher R Taylor]

He was a very, very good writer with a huge array of work that everyone has enjoyed even if they aren't aware of it.

 

He used to take a typewriter to book signings, take a suggestion from the audience, and write a short story on the spot based on that suggestion.

[zslane]

He also used to do bookstore events where he would sit down at a table with a typewriter and write a story on the fly, having the pages passed around and then taped to the store window as he went (could be the same thing you're referring to Christopher).

[Christopher R Taylor]

Yep, each page he finished they'd be taped to the window so people could read the story as it was being done.  Dude wrote some of the most classic sci fi TV episodes ever, like City on the Edge of Tomorrow.  He was the science consultant on Babylon Five, too.

[zslane]

There was a very entertaining episode of Tom Snyder's late night talk show back in the late 70s featuring some of the original Star Trek cast and Harlan Ellison. The general slant of the conversation was all about how ground-breaking and intelligent Star Trek was, with the cast members all patting themselves on the back for being pioneers of fine science fiction storytelling (on television at least). Then after about 20 minutes of this, Tom turned to Harlan who had been utterly silent during all of this, and asked him his thoughts on the matter.

 

Harlan began by pointing out that Star Trek, for all its accolades, was an example of absolutely mediocre storytelling at best. He then proceeded to shred the previous 20 minutes of commentary, ruthlessly slaughtering all the sacred cows that Star Trek fandom had cultivated during the decade since the show had been cancelled. The look on everyone's faces was priceless. The cast members were suddenly and uncomfortably reminded of just how irascible Harlan could be, having experienced some of that during the production of City on the Edge of Forever (and if you really want to know what Harlan thought of that episode, you should read the book he wrote about it.).

[Cygnia]

My early exposure as to how much of an [bleep] Ellison could be was in an old Stephen King non-fiction book (Danse Macabre) that dedicated a section on his works.

[zslane]

For a short time during the SciFi channel's earliest years on the air, Harlan Ellison had a three-minute commentary segment on their weekly "sci-fi news" program Sci Fi Buzz. He got to pick the subject matter and he never pulled any punches. He quit when he decided that the channel's overlords had completely sold their souls to feckless commerce. But before he did that, I learned a few interesting/valuable things from him. Here are a few:

 

1. A viewer wrote in saying, "Everyone is entitled to their opinion, Harlan," to which he replied, "No, everyone is entitled to their informed opinion."

2. The actual saying is, "To eat their cake and have it too." (where "have it" implies having it in hand). Not the other way around.

3. The Disney Company is a shameless hypocrite when it comes to IP.

 

 

[wcw43921]

Is there anyone, in his opinion, who didn't sell their souls to feckless commerce?

 

Good of you to mention Tom Snyder--Ellison was a semi-regular guest on his show.  I remember the episode where he came on after winning a lawsuit against whatever movie studio stole his concept "Brillo" and turned it into the TV show Future Cop.  He was positively crowing over that victory.

[st barbara]

I found Ellison's work to be a bit hit and miss. Some of his best regarded stories left me a but underwhelmed, while I like some of his less well known stuff. He DID have a tendency to shoot his mouth off before engaging his brain however (if some of the remarks I have seen credited to him are correct)..

[Christopher R Taylor]

He was a huge curmudgeon but was always good to his fans.

[Cygnia]

https://archive.org/stream/Fantasy_Science_Fiction_v080n01_1991-01/Fantasy__Science_Fiction_v080n01_1991-01#page/n103/mode/2up