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Harlan Ellison - Where to Begin?

post #1 of 32
6/12/08 at 5:29pm
Thread Starter 
I should have my geek card revoked, I know, but I've never read any Harlan Ellison.

I read his interview over at the Onion A.V. Club this week, and I discovered that I really enjoyed reading his rambling, pugnacious comments. I've heard all the stories, and now I've read his thoughts in interview form, but I still haven't read his work. I'd love to give one of his books a shot, but I have zero clue on where to begin, whether its non-fiction or fiction.

Help a brother out? Recommendations?
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post #2 of 32
6/12/08 at 5:31pm
"I Have No Mouth and I Must Scream" is probably as good a place to start as any.
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post #3 of 32
6/12/08 at 5:36pm
Deathbird Stories
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post #4 of 32
6/12/08 at 5:41pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by Blofeld View Post
Deathbird Stories
Yeah, that one's a really solid short story collection. Otherwise, just get a copy of the Essential Ellison (which includes a lot of his best fiction and non-fiction) and start with whatever looks interesting. It's easy to sample Ellison, since so much of his work is short.
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post #5 of 32
6/12/08 at 5:46pm
Thread Starter 
Thanks, guys. Much appreciated. Off to the book store after work!
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post #6 of 32
6/12/08 at 5:47pm
Make me an offer on my autographed 1st edition of "I Have No Mouth and I Must Scream" -- Pyramid, 1967, ppb
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post #7 of 32
6/12/08 at 5:48pm
The Essential Ellison may be one of the few things you can find in print.
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post #8 of 32
6/12/08 at 5:52pm
Thread Starter 
Quote:
Originally Posted by Blofeld View Post
The Essential Ellison may be one of the few things you can find in print.
Really? Is most of his stuff out of print?

And do you work in a bookstore, Blofeld? I seem to remember that coming up at some point. Feel like making any other recommendations along Ellison's line to me?
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post #9 of 32
6/12/08 at 5:57pm
I used to be a manager with Barnes & Noble. Most of Ellison's stuff is, regrettably, out of print. "Paingod", and "Shatterday" are also good collections if you can find them.
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post #10 of 32
6/12/08 at 5:59pm
Thread Starter 
Quote:
Originally Posted by Blofeld View Post
I used to be a manager with Barnes & Noble. Most of Ellison's stuff is, regrettably, out of print. "Paingod", and "Shatterday" are also good collections if you can find them.
It's amazing what the memory stores up - it's clear you know your books. Thanks again. I'll see what I can find.
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post #11 of 32
6/12/08 at 6:01pm
I heard him on NPR. The man is more pissed off than Lewis Black. Wow.
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post #12 of 32
6/12/08 at 6:11pm
I asked this exact same question as a young, impressionable chewer something like seven years ago. I was pointed to the "Essential Ellison: 50 Year Retrospective," which if you can find it, is worth everything and then some.
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post #13 of 32
6/12/08 at 6:13pm
That's the "Essential Ellison" book.
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post #14 of 32
6/12/08 at 6:18pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by Blofeld View Post
I used to be a manager with Barnes & Noble. Most of Ellison's stuff is, regrettably, out of print. "Paingod", and "Shatterday" are also good collections if you can find them.
Whatever happened with that Ellison reprint series that started in the 90s? I remember they put out a few combined volumes (usually two collections to a hardcover book), but it seemed like it ran out of steam at some point.

Aside from Essential Ellison and the odd collection here or there, I've always had a lot more success with Ellison at the library than the bookstore. Even used places barely ever seem to have his books in stock, although I managed to find Angry Candy a while back.
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post #15 of 32
6/12/08 at 6:19pm
"Slippage" is the first Ellison work I picked up back in the day....I thought that was a great place to start, and it should still be fairly easy to get.

*eta http://cgi.ebay.com/Slippage-Harlan-...2em118Q2el1247 $7.50
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post #16 of 32
6/12/08 at 6:23pm
Yes, those double volume reprints were called "Edgeworks" IIRC. I believe the publisher went out of business after 4 volumes. Ellison is difficult to find -- I managed to pick up "The Deadly Streets" and "No Doors, No Windows" during a recent trip to Seattle.
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post #17 of 32
6/12/08 at 7:19pm
You can find most of Ellison's work (even though it is out of print) on Alibris (www.alibris.com) or Amazon.com

Findiing Ellison's books in out of print bookstores on the fly is a treat

And yeah, the Essential Ellison collection is the best way to start since it mixes fiction and non-fiction from different eras.
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post #18 of 32
6/12/08 at 7:21pm
Also, his published screenplay for "I, Robot" is quite a nice read -- if only to see what might have been.
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post #19 of 32
6/12/08 at 7:40pm
The Essential Ellison: A 50 Year Retrospective (Revised and Expanded) (Paperback)
This link will give CHUD its due.
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post #20 of 32
6/12/08 at 10:02pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by Blofeld View Post
Yes, those double volume reprints were called "Edgeworks" IIRC. I believe the publisher went out of business after 4 volumes.
I had heard that Ellison was VERY unhappy with the job White Wolf was doing and bought back the rights prior to that.
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post #21 of 32
6/13/08 at 11:18am
Thread Starter 
Well, y'all were right about the difficulty in locating him. Hit two stores last night and had no real success. They had Demon with a glass hand, but that was it.

The used bookstore down closer to me though, appears to have the Essential Ellison, so I'll be dropping by this weekend.
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post #22 of 32
6/13/08 at 11:33am
I read Strange Wine a couple months ago. Good stories, somewhat overshadowed by the intense prickishness of his introductions. It bleeds into a lot of the stories too. I remember one was a fifty page odyssey called The New York Times Reviews Cordwainer Bird (or something very similar) which was about some sort of dark superhero sci-fi novelist exacting heroic and violent retribution against critics, and a few people on the street, that don't acknowledge his superiority as an artist and a person.
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post #23 of 32
6/13/08 at 11:57am
Quote:
Originally Posted by Jesse Custer View Post
Well, y'all were right about the difficulty in locating him. Hit two stores last night and had no real success. They had Demon with a glass hand, but that was it.

The used bookstore down closer to me though, appears to have the Essential Ellison, so I'll be dropping by this weekend.
Like I said, you'd also probably have a ton of luck at a library.
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post #24 of 32
6/13/08 at 12:08pm
Since this is a film site, you might want to keep an eye open for Harlan Ellison's Watching which is a book of his film criticism, primarily of 80s genre films.
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post #25 of 32
6/13/08 at 1:47pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by Chavez View Post
I had heard that Ellison was VERY unhappy with the job White Wolf was doing and bought back the rights prior to that.
He was right to be unhappy. I got Vol 1 of that series and spotted at least 3-4 typos per page! Ellison is a stickler for quality of presentaton, so I'm sure he was royally pissed at White Wolf
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post #26 of 32
6/13/08 at 2:36pm
Thread Starter 
Quote:
Originally Posted by DaveB View Post
Like I said, you'd also probably have a ton of luck at a library.
And I'm there at least once a week, so I'll certainly check for him.

....But buying books is a love of mine, and I enjoy the chase, so to speak, of tracking something quasi-elusive down. Perversely, I'm sort of glad I was denied. Now I get to search the stacks on St. Mark's street.

Thanks for your help!
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post #27 of 32
6/15/08 at 12:15am
When you find it, go straight to "Mephisto in Onyx" and "The Thick Red Moment" (about violence in film) and the one that's right after that about revenge. Sold me on the guy for life. Then you can start at the beginning, or jump around. I've had the book for probably seven years and I still haven't read everything in it. The AV club and documentary has me revisiting it, though.
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post #28 of 32
6/16/08 at 2:16am
Quote:
Originally Posted by EvilTwin View Post
Since this is a film site, you might want to keep an eye open for Harlan Ellison's Watching which is a book of his film criticism, primarily of 80s genre films.
Seconded. Even though it's out of print, it's an amazing collection fully worth owning just for his hilarious review of First Blood Part II.
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post #29 of 32
6/16/08 at 11:23am
Quote:
Originally Posted by RathBandu View Post
When you find it, go straight to "Mephisto in Onyx" and "The Thick Red Moment" (about violence in film) and the one that's right after that about revenge. Sold me on the guy for life. Then you can start at the beginning, or jump around. I've had the book for probably seven years and I still haven't read everything in it. The AV club and documentary has me revisiting it, though.
Unless there's a revised edition out, Mefisto in Onyx isn't in The Essential Ellison. It came out a few years after Essential was published. But it's certainly worth reading.
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post #30 of 32
6/16/08 at 11:52am
It's in the newer of the two Essential editions, the 50 year one.
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post #31 of 32
6/16/08 at 7:53pm
Speaking of Harlan, I just happened to find out tonight on TCM they're showing The Oscar. Considered one of the worst films ever made, it's a silly and ham-fisted melodrama about an asshole actor who while waiting in the audience to see if he wins the best actor award looks back on his life and the people he used and abused to climb to the top. Something of a Showgirls for its day. Ellison wrote the screenplay and to this day is said to fly off into a psychotic rage if anyone dares to speak ill of or laugh at it. This and Star Trek are the two major topics that should never be brought up around him.
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post #32 of 32
7/10/08 at 4:15pm
I was so stupid to give away my Mephisto in Onynx book to a charity auction. No not really --I just didn't realize that most of Ellison's books were out of print. At least Iv'e met him several times. His temper tantrums and rage are legendary in the science fiction community. At least he seems to have melloed in the last few years.
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