I first came across the award winning writer Harlan Ellison some time in the 1980’s when a friend recommended him. At the time I thought his genre was sci fi but it’s now termed ‘speculative fiction’ and takes in horror, fantasy etc. He is not exactly a household name but his influence is far reaching and, as a short story writer, I consider him second to none. He is also one of the most controversial figures in US popular writing in the last 50 years.
Born in 1934 Ellison, who lost his father at an early age, grew up in Ohio. Always fancying himself as a writer he enrolled at Ohio State University at the age of 17. He lasted little over a year before being kicked out for twatting a professor who had slagged off his ability to write. After this he apparently joined a New York street gang in order to research and write about gang life. Then going to Hollywood he became a renowned screenwriter (credits include The Outer Limits and Man from U.N.C.L.E) and even managed to get into an altercation with Frank Sinatra who, for some reason, took offence to a pair of boots Ellison wore during a game of billiards. All the while he was writing some truly amazing short stories that were being published in a variety of US magazines. Check out ‘Repent Harlequin said the TickTock Man’ set in a future where being late for something has become a crime and the penalty for which is the lost amount of time is deducted from your lifespan. Or ‘I Have No Mouth and I Must Scream’ the story of a group of survivors from a world war tormented by the supercomputer that destroyed the human race. For me it’s not just the story, it’s the way he writes and the titles are intriguing. I’m no expert but it seems so unconventional. I heard a story that back in the 1960’s a teacher at a school in Texas added one of his books to the curriculum which so incensed the parents and the school authorities that she was run out of town.
His work as a screenwriter was also a mixture of genius and controversy. He apparently submitted a script to Gene Roddenberry for an episode of the original Star Trek which involved drug dealing on the Enterprise. Imagine how brilliantly bizarre that episode would have been had they made it. The eventual submission was City on the Edge of Forever, a time travel classic which also starred a young Joan Collins. I’m told Star Trek aficionados universally regard this as the best episode ever made. A number of his stories were dramatised for the new version of the Twilight Zone in the 1980’s and he even managed to get himself sacked as a screenwriter for Disney on his first day after being overheard (jokingly) saying that he intended to write an animated pornographic film featuring their best loved characters.
His unconventional style was also demonstrated when he temporarily hosted a US radio show during which he decided to write a short story on air complete with his trademark typewriter. He invited listeners to telephone in and put forward suggestions which he incorporated into the story while they were on air. That story when eventually published under the title ‘Hitler Painted Roses’ was the first Harlan Ellison story I read and it immediately got me hooked.
I’ve certainly not done Harlan Ellison any real justice in this piece as his body of work is so much bigger than my feeble attempt at an introduction. He is however a genius and although regarded by some who know him as abrasive and argumentative, I am so very pleased to have discovered and been able to read his work. He even recently voiced his own character in an episode of Scooby Doo. How cool is that?
