The Merry Month of May

David Langford is never late, but I was in posting the link to the latest issue of Ansible!

Brian Aldiss OBE revealed his special relationship with Aung San Suu Kyi: 'Since my novel Forgotten Life has extensive passages concerning Burma in it, I sent a copy out to Burma when she was confined to her house. She wrote back, thanking me, saying "I loved the sex." (One entirely understands.)' (letter, Oxford Today, Trinity Term 2013)

It's Dead, Jim. 'I'm here to tell you that in a mere forty-five years the filmic genres of fantasy and science fiction have been wrung dry, have sprouted moss and ugly white squiggly things, and are no more. Gone. Done. Finis. Kaput...' (Harlan Ellison, The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction, January 1986) [BA]

Not Dead, Jim. '...if I have to masticate my manuscripture, I'll do it in as flamboyantly gourmandising a manner as was my original pronouncement. I herewith eat my words. The belief that sf is dead...was a precise and correct view of the universe except...I hadn't seen Brazil...' (Harlan Ellison, F&SF, March 1986) [BA]

Moreover, '...to the reader who accepted at face value my statement that sf was dead as a filmic gesture...this was a literary technique called engrossment. Sometimes referred to as satire...' (Ibid, May 1986) [BA]