RedShoulder

Harlan Ellison once said that the universe didn't care about us.  It was, in his words, "too busy creating the Coal Sack".

I respectfully disagree.  I'd say that the universe cared about us because Ellison was here for 84 years.  A brief time, yes, but enough for him to make one hell of an impact.

Ellison, who died on June 27, was a true force of nature.  "Titan" seems too limiting a word to a man who wrote novels, screenplays, comics, essays and short stories (for which he was known) and won numerous awards.  Stories such as "I Have No Mouth, And I Must Scream", "Repent, Harlequin!  Said The Tick-Tock Man", and "The Cheese Stands Alone"--a story whose ending left me weeping--were just some of the incredible output of this man over a 60+ year writing career.  

And the people he knew!  Robin Williams, Patton Oswalt, Richard Matheson, Neil Gaiman, Dean Koontz, Stephen King....the list goes on.  He also mentored and kickstarted the careers of writers like Octavia Butler (Parable of the Sower) and Dan Simmons (The Terror). But he had no truck for stupidity and foolishness--he railed against the dumbing-down of society and cultural amnesia.  There were many tales about his clashes with film studio producers, but one incident sticks with me--when, after he gave a lecture at a college in New York, a woman in the audience raised her hand and asked what Dachau was (Ellison had mentioned the name in his lecture).  Ellison, with rage building in his voice, reminded her what Dachau was and also why no one should forget the name--ever.

In his later years he was critical of the Internet--back in the 1990s he argued that every crazy bit of thinking could now find a voice online and attract an audience.  Considering the rise of Infowars, the dozens of YouTube stars pushing conspiracy theories, the abuse of Twitter by Pizzagate and QAnon nutballs, and the fact that Americans were exposed to Russian propaganda back during the 2016 elections...it does appear that Ellison was sadly proven correct.

Even if you have no idea who Ellison was, perhaps you've seen his work--if you're a fan of Star Trek, then you know of the classic episode "The City On The Edge Of Forever".  Plus there was The Outer Limits episodes "Soldier" and "Demon With A Glass Hand", and his chilling adaptation of Stephen King's short story "Gramma" for the 1980s reboot of The Twilight Zone.  Ellison was also the creative consultant on the 1990s SF epic Babylon 5 and even appeared on The Simpsons.  And there's his screenplay for I, Robot--it was never filmed (it's not the Will Smith film) but was released as an "illustrated screenplay" that remains one of the best SF movies never made.

Plus he wrote one of the best Batman stories ever--"The Night Of Thanks, But No Thanks!".

Finally, Ellison was a constant defender of the rights of the artist. 

As John Clute said of Ellison years ago--"...His work is full of a rage for authenticity, an urgency about being human and real in a world of deranging impersonality and evil."  Considering where we are now, it's pretty prescient.

Harlan Ellison lived a full, amazing 84 years.  He will be sorely missed--but his work remains with us.

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More on Harlan Ellison:





variety.com/2018/tv/news/harla…

www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/h…

www.theguardian.com/books/book…

fortune.com/2018/06/28/harlan-…

www.bleedingcool.com/2018/06/2…

boingboing.net/2018/06/28/rip-…

www.washingtonpost.com/news/mo…

www.vulture.com/2018/06/harlan…

www.latimes.com/books/la-et-jc…