# Samuel Delany named Grand Master **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [December 4, 2013, 8:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/samuel-delany-named-grand-master/675506 "2013-12-04T20:10:19Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Amateur\_Barbarian](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/59ef9b/32.png) [@Amateur\_Barbarian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Amateur_Barbarian)\ **Post date:** [December 5, 2013, 2:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/samuel-delany-named-grand-master/675506/21 "2013-12-05T02:32:43Z")
> [@Biffy\_the\_Elephant\_Shrew](#): > > \ > What about Ray Bradbury? If he’d written any sf, he’d be eligible. Fabulous writer, one of the most evocative of the 20th. But not sf. I think the \ bracketing means we’ve been whooshed, here… ---
**Author:** ![RealityChuck](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/realitychuck/32/195_2.png) [@RealityChuck](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RealityChuck)\ **Post date:** [December 5, 2013, 2:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/samuel-delany-named-grand-master/675506/22 "2013-12-05T02:40:56Z")
Ever hear of **The Martian Chronicles** of **Fahrenheit 451**? Or, for that matter, “There Will Come Soft Rains”? You may not like the work, but by any sane definition of science fiction, they qualify. And, of course, many grandmasters, like Zelazny, also wrote fantasy. The two genres are not mutually exclusive. ---
**Author:** ![Andy\_L](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/c67d28/32.png) [@Andy\_L](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Andy_L)\ **Post date:** [December 5, 2013, 2:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/samuel-delany-named-grand-master/675506/23 "2013-12-05T02:44:44Z")
> [@RealityChuck](#): > > It actually wasn’t officially announced until the Nebula banquet that year, which was after Bester had died. However, the decision had been made previously and Bester had been notified. They decided to go through with it, since he had been named while alive. Thanks. ---
**Author:** ![Andy\_L](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/c67d28/32.png) [@Andy\_L](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Andy_L)\ **Post date:** [December 5, 2013, 2:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/samuel-delany-named-grand-master/675506/24 "2013-12-05T02:47:26Z")
> [@Biffy\_the\_Elephant\_Shrew](#): > > \ > What about Ray Bradbury? > \ ObSimpsons: I’m aware of his work. \ ---
**Author:** ![Andy\_L](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/c67d28/32.png) [@Andy\_L](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Andy_L)\ **Post date:** [December 5, 2013, 2:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/samuel-delany-named-grand-master/675506/25 "2013-12-05T02:50:46Z")
> [@Exapno\_Mapcase](#): > > Lets give him his due credit then. My personal opinions only, of course. > > He did five enjoyable but minor short novels for Ace from 1962 to 1966. Then came _Babel-17_ and _The Einstein Intersection_, both of which won Nebula Awards. They are very much New Wave books and if you don’t like the 60s New Wave you probably won’t like these much either. (In the famous quote from James Blish, who was very old school, “when his _The Einstein Intersection_ won the same award in 1968, I stepped quietly out into the kitchen and bit my cat.”) > > His growth as a writer was remarkable and the following year he put out _Nova_, which is a major novel by any standard and tremendously influenced the entire cyberpunk movement, though he shouldn’t be blamed for it. > > At this point, after nine novels, he started writing short stories. (From the timing there was some overlap towards the end, but still.) Nobody else ever had a career progression quite like that. Or had such jaw-dropping success. 1971’s \*Driftglass \*collection (later expanded as _Driftglass/Starshands_) contained his first 10 short stories. They picked up four Hugo and three Nebula nominations spread over five stories, winning both for “Time Considered as a Helix of Semi-Precious Stones,” one of the finest stories in the history of the field. Period. And I’ve argued that “The Star Pit” is even better. > > As with Zelazny, his genius dimmed once the 60s were past. I didn’t care much for \*Triton \*and \*Dhalgren \*is an unreadable blockbuster that sold a million copies in an era when you could count the number of million-selling sf books on one hand. The Neveryon series (add accents to taste) was interesting if eventually pedantic, but the novel \*Neveryóna \*was one of his best. And I have to admit that I never finished anything of his since. > > Admiring Delany is like one of those baseball arguments between peak power and career value. At his peak in the 60s, he was simply awesome. I prefer Zelazny, but Delany was better at times, in the same way that I prefer The Beatles but the best 60s Stones were unbeatable. Then he simply stopped caring about his readers and wrote for himself and you either accepted it for what it was or rejected it completely. > > He also gave the single best lecture on science fiction I’ve ever heard. > > It’s also true that I haven’t reread much of his work in decades. Maybe I’d dismiss most of it today, or maybe I would have matured as a reader to understand it better. You can’t reread everything all the time; there’s too many new books being written every year. I’d still defend Delany as an automatic, no-argument candidate for the honor. One late work, Stars in My Pockets Like Grains of Sand is of note. I didn’t always understand it, and it took me a long time to read, but somehow I still enjoyed it. I should reread it. ---
**Author:** ![Meurglys](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/258eb7/32.png) [@Meurglys](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Meurglys)\ **Post date:** [December 5, 2013, 12:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/samuel-delany-named-grand-master/675506/26 "2013-12-05T12:32:01Z")
He wrote some wonderful books and stories, although I’ve not read much that he wrote since the early 80s. And not just sf; I wish I still had his book of essays about sf, _The Jewel-Hinged Jaw_. And his autobiographical _Heavenly Breakfast_… Actually, I’m sure I do still have that one - should re-read it. I’d certainly have had him as a Grand Master before one or two of the more recent inductees. Minor nitpick; there are now four GMs born later than Niven, not three. ---
**Author:** ![Andy\_L](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/c67d28/32.png) [@Andy\_L](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Andy_L)\ **Post date:** [December 5, 2013, 12:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/samuel-delany-named-grand-master/675506/27 "2013-12-05T12:43:15Z")
> [@Meurglys](#): > > Minor nitpick; there are now four GMs born later than Niven, not three. Oops. I missed Michael Moorcock. ---
**Author:** ![The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/the_other_waldo_pepper/32/12370_2.png) [@The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Other_Waldo_Pepper)\ **Post date:** [December 5, 2013, 12:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/samuel-delany-named-grand-master/675506/28 "2013-12-05T12:55:12Z")
> [@RealityChuck](#): > > Ever hear of **The Martian Chronicles** of **Fahrenheit 451**? Or, for that matter, “There Will Come Soft Rains”? > > You may not like the work, but by any sane definition of science fiction, they qualify. And, honestly, if _A Sound Of Thunder_ didn’t exist, we’d have to invent it. ---
**Author:** ![Meurglys](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/258eb7/32.png) [@Meurglys](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Meurglys)\ **Post date:** [December 5, 2013, 12:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/samuel-delany-named-grand-master/675506/29 "2013-12-05T12:58:07Z")
> [@Andy\_L](#): > > Oops. I missed Michael Moorcock. Not so easy to do! 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Amateur\_Barbarian](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/59ef9b/32.png) [@Amateur\_Barbarian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Amateur_Barbarian)\ **Post date:** [December 5, 2013, 3:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/samuel-delany-named-grand-master/675506/30 "2013-12-05T15:06:43Z")
> [@RealityChuck](#): > > Ever hear of **The Martian Chronicles** of **Fahrenheit 451**? Or, for that matter, “There Will Come Soft Rains”? > > You may not like the work, but by any sane definition of science fiction, they qualify. > > And, of course, many grandmasters, like Zelazny, also wrote fantasy. The two genres are not mutually exclusive. If you regard _Martian Chronicles_ as sf, there’s not much more to say. 🙂 Yes, it has rockets and aliens and ray guns in 1940s/50s writing… but it’s pure fantasy from cover to cover. It was called sf only because of the limited number of slots for literature in that era; fantasy was Lewis Carroll. Bradbury certainly wrote a number of sf stories, but then, so did hundreds of writers not generally known as “sf writers.” The vast bulk of his work is somewhere between fantasy and mainstream, and that’s how I see him. His best work - and I admire all but a small handful of his output - is far more at the fantasy and mainstream end than sf. “There Will Come Soft Rains” is in the very short list of what I would call my favorite short stories, as is “Kaleidoscope” (recently filmed as “Gravity” 🙂 ). (ETA: Zelazny would be a ghod if only for “Lucifer” and “Divine Madness,” IMVHO.) But barring less than one percent of his prolific output, none of it was sf except by the most inclusive, adamant argument. There have been many mainstream novels far more “sf-y” than _Fahrenheit 451_ - see _The Handmaid’s Tale_ or almost anything Crichton wrote. It’s lightly fantastic mainstream. Despite its belovedness by many, probably because it’s been anthologized in a thousand junior high readers, I think “A Sound of Thunder” is a lumpy, simplistic and badly-written story. Fabulous idea that’s been stolen a hundred times, but far from even the middle of RB’s writing quality. ---
**Author:** ![Thudlow\_Boink](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/thudlow_boink/32/320_2.png) [@Thudlow\_Boink](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Thudlow_Boink)\ **Post date:** [December 5, 2013, 3:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/samuel-delany-named-grand-master/675506/31 "2013-12-05T15:39:50Z")
> [@Andy\_L](#): > > ObSimpsons: I’m aware of his work. > > \ I’m pretty sure this is what **Biffy** was looking for. > [@Chronos](#): > > Ray Bradbury was a great author, and a science fiction author, but he was not a great science fiction author. I agree. For those of you arguing that Bradbury wasn’t a science fiction author: you may have a point, but he _was_ the [tenth Grand Master](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Damon_Knight_Memorial_Grand_Master_Award#Grand_Masters). This thread prompted me to check the list of Science Fiction Grand Masters. None of the names were at all unfamiliar to me, and most of them I’ve read. By contrast, the [Mystery Writers’ Grand Master list](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mystery_Writers_of_America#Grand_Master_Award) includes quite a few names I’m completely unfamiliar with. ---
**Author:** ![Amateur\_Barbarian](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/59ef9b/32.png) [@Amateur\_Barbarian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Amateur_Barbarian)\ **Post date:** [December 5, 2013, 3:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/samuel-delany-named-grand-master/675506/32 "2013-12-05T15:42:49Z")
> [@Thudlow\_Boink](#): > > For those of you arguing that Bradbury wasn’t a science fiction author: you may have a point, but he _was_ the [tenth Grand Master](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Damon_Knight_Memorial_Grand_Master_Award#Grand_Masters). Which might say more about the nature of the award than the recipients. 😃 > [@](#): > > This thread prompted me to check the list of Science Fiction Grand Masters. None of the names were at all unfamiliar to me, and most of them I’ve read. By contrast, the [Mystery Writers’ Grand Master list](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mystery_Writers_of_America#Grand_Master_Award) includes quite a few names I’m completely unfamiliar with. Next up, Nobel Prize for Lit winners. If you recognize even 50% of the names, you are well ahead of the pack. ---
**Author:** ![Exapno\_Mapcase](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/exapno_mapcase/32/1051_2.png) [@Exapno\_Mapcase](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Exapno_Mapcase)\ **Post date:** [December 5, 2013, 6:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/samuel-delany-named-grand-master/675506/33 "2013-12-05T18:02:50Z")
> [@Exapno\_Mapcase](#): > > \*Dhalgren \*is an unreadable blockbuster that sold a million copies in an era when you could count the number of million-selling sf books on one hand. This made me think about justifying that statement. So I went to the shelves and pulled off _70 Years of Best Sellers 1895-1965_ by Alice Payne Hackett. She did one more in the series, 80 Years 1895-1975, which would be better for the purpose, but I don’t own that one. (Wait. There’s a book I don’t own?) There’s a listing of every book that had reported sales of 1,000,000 or more covering 18 pages, close to 500 titles. It’s a fascinating slice of social science: I hope some dissertations have been done on it. Would anyone like to guess who has by far the most books on the list, more than the next half dozen names combined? Erle Stanley Gardner, with 61 Perry Mason books and another 13 under the pseudonym A. A. Fair. Fair alone would rank third, with the now mostly forgotten mystery writer Richard A. Prather in second with 16 titles. Mickey Spillane, Ian Fleming, and Ellery Queen had 12. Erksine Caldwell had 11. There were also a bunch of Dennis the Menace books. Charles Schulz? A nobody, who sneaked one onto the bottom of the list. Anyway, no genre book of fantasy or science fiction made the list. None. _Brave New World_ and \*1984 \*were on it, though not _Animal Farm_. A handful of techno-thrillers like _Fail-Safe_, _Seven Days in May_, and _On the Beach_ were there. _The Wonderful Wizard of Oz_ if you want to count that. Even Hackett notes the absence: > [@](#): > > Just as the science fiction of Jules Verne became later reality, it is safe to predict that novels dealing with new techniques, both scientific and political, will no longer be considered unbelievably fantastic. The distinction between science fiction and the traditional suspense story is rapidly becoming less rigid. It’s not science fiction: it’s about people! ---
**Author:** ![Biffy\_the\_Elephant\_Shrew](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/e47c2d/32.png) [@Biffy\_the\_Elephant\_Shrew](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Biffy_the_Elephant_Shrew)\ **Post date:** [December 5, 2013, 6:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/samuel-delany-named-grand-master/675506/34 "2013-12-05T18:49:05Z")
> [@Exapno\_Mapcase](#): > > Charles Schulz? A nobody, who sneaked one onto the bottom of the list. _Happiness Is a Warm Puppy_? ---
**Author:** ![Exapno\_Mapcase](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/exapno_mapcase/32/1051_2.png) [@Exapno\_Mapcase](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Exapno_Mapcase)\ **Post date:** [December 5, 2013, 7:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/samuel-delany-named-grand-master/675506/35 "2013-12-05T19:42:53Z")
> [@Biffy\_the\_Elephant\_Shrew](#): > > _Happiness Is a Warm Puppy_? Yep. ---
**Author:** ![RealityChuck](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/realitychuck/32/195_2.png) [@RealityChuck](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RealityChuck)\ **Post date:** [December 5, 2013, 8:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/samuel-delany-named-grand-master/675506/36 "2013-12-05T20:01:28Z")
> [@Amateur\_Barbarian](#): > > If you regard _Martian Chronicles_ as sf, there’s not much more to say. 🙂 > > Yes, it has rockets and aliens and ray guns in 1940s/50s writing… but it’s pure fantasy from cover to cover. It was called sf only because of the limited number of slots for literature in that era; fantasy was Lewis Carroll. How is Bradbury’s Mars any less science fiction that Heinlein’s in **Stranger in a Strange Land**? Both postulate a civilization on Mars (as did nearly all SF writers of the 40s – Clarke did, too) and a breathable atmosphere. And **Fahrenheit 451** is SF by any measure. They are his two most famous works, and both are SF. Bradbury was not interested in hard sf, because it barely existed when he was writing **The Martian Chronicles**. He self identified as an SF writer, and was considered one by professionals in the field (who are far less dogmatic in their definition than most fans). His stories weren’t dealing with the nuts and bolts and world building; it was dealing to how human beings react. Like all great SF, they are works of imagination, not of how things are. But he’s clearly a science fiction writer, and he’s a writer who others in the field tried to emulate, which is a pretty damn good reason for making him a Grand Master. ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [December 5, 2013, 9:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/samuel-delany-named-grand-master/675506/37 "2013-12-05T21:03:07Z")
Didn’t Bradbury also say something to the effect that _Fahrenheit 451_ was the only one of his works that was science fiction? ---
**Author:** ![Amateur\_Barbarian](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/59ef9b/32.png) [@Amateur\_Barbarian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Amateur_Barbarian)\ **Post date:** [December 5, 2013, 9:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/samuel-delany-named-grand-master/675506/38 "2013-12-05T21:05:29Z")
> [@RealityChuck](#): > > How is Bradbury’s Mars any less science fiction that Heinlein’s in **Stranger in a Strange Land**? Both postulate a civilization on Mars (as did nearly all SF writers of the 40s – Clarke did, too) and a breathable atmosphere. I wouldn’t class **Stranger** as sf, either. Heinlein didn’t. I’d encapsulate the tedious and unwinnable argument as this: including nominally stfnal elements does not make a work science fiction. Bradbury’s writings about Mars, at least, those included in Chronicles, are only incidentally and passingly about Mars, Martians, rocket ships and ray guns. Those are window dressing and making-strange for some beautiful, luminous and thoughtful stories about the nature of humanity. Even the “hard” elements are fantastical. But the argument about sf-v-fantasy-v-mainstream has been going on a while, is unlikely to be settled any time soon, and contains about one and a half as many viewpoints as there are observers. I see Bradbury as a mainstream fiction writer, leaning towards fantasy and magicalism, who dabbled in sf themes just as did Shelley, Twain, Poe and (if I’m remembering the right story) Faulkner. Not to mention Thurber, Atwood and about half of today’s novelists. You see him as a stalwart of sf? Okay. I’d be curious who\*\* in sf \*\*you think was strongly influenced by Bradbury, to the degree that there are scores obviously and openly influenced by RAH. ---
**Author:** ![Exapno\_Mapcase](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/exapno_mapcase/32/1051_2.png) [@Exapno\_Mapcase](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Exapno_Mapcase)\ **Post date:** [December 5, 2013, 11:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/samuel-delany-named-grand-master/675506/39 "2013-12-05T23:15:55Z")
> [@Amateur\_Barbarian](#): > > I’d be curious who\*\* in sf \*\*you think was strongly influenced by Bradbury, to the degree that there are scores obviously and openly influenced by RAH. Every person in sf who grew up wanting to write a beautiful sentence. I admit that the followers of Heinlein outnumber them. ---
**Author:** ![Amateur\_Barbarian](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/59ef9b/32.png) [@Amateur\_Barbarian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Amateur_Barbarian)\ **Post date:** [December 5, 2013, 11:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/samuel-delany-named-grand-master/675506/40 "2013-12-05T23:48:37Z")
> [@Exapno\_Mapcase](#): > > Every person in sf who grew up wanting to write a beautiful sentence. Tad general, there. I can’t think of anyone who is an obvious acolyte of Bradbury. And no, you won’t catch me defending Heinlein’s writing style. “Workmanlike and literate” is all I will ever say. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/samuel-delany-named-grand-master/675506.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/samuel-delany-named-grand-master/675506.md?page=3)