Victor Koman, a veteran libertarian SF writer, had the honor of presenting the Best Novel category Sunday at the 44th Prometheus Awards ceremony.
Who better to fulfill that role than Koman, one of very few writers to win as many as three Prometheus awards for Best Novel?
Here, for the record, is the transcript of Koman’s speech.
Not one but two celebrity presenters will grace the 44th annual Prometheus Awards ceremony, set for Sunday Aug. 25 in a Zoom event set to begin at 2 p.m. Eastern Daylight Time (11 a.m. Pacific time) and open to the public.
We invite Libertarian Futurist Society members, their families and friends, science fiction/fantasy fans and all freedom lovers to watch the roughly hourlong awards show, which is expected to include interesting, entertaining and substantive speeches by celebrity presenters, LFS leaders and this year’s Prometheus Award winner for Best Novel.
The late great Ray Bradbury memorably dramatized the dangers of censorship and book-burning in Fahrenheit 451.
Bradbury’s Prometheus-winning 1953 novel, inducted in 1984 into the Prometheus Hall of Fame for Best Classic Fiction, is occasionally brought up as a cautionary tale in contemporary discussions about freedom of expression, censorship, school libraries and what books are appropriate for students of different ages to read.
Fahrenheit 451 is referenced anew in an interesting Thinkspot column that challenges common media reporting about “book bans” in government-run schools and libraries across the country.
But do the lessons of Fahrenheit 451 truly apply?
Is “book banning” tantamount to book-burning and other forms of State-enforced censorship?
Not all literary award-winners stand the test of time.
Most works of arts and entertainment fade – even winners of the Pulitzer Prize, the Oscars, Tonys, Grammys, Emmys, Hugo and Nebula awards. Yet when they last and take on the patina of a classic, they should be remembered and recognized.
For only the third time in the 45-year history of the Prometheus Awards, a former Best Novel finalist is being inducted into the Hall of Fame for Best Classic Fiction.
The Dragon Awards, presented annually at Dragon Con in Atlanta, have announced their 2024 finals – and one of this year’s Prometheus Best Novel finalists is among them.
Plus, among its finalist competitors is an author and her series previously recognized as a Prometheus Best Novel finalist.
So congratulations to Devon Eriksen and Martha Wells!
The Libertarian Futurist Society is pleased to announce that prominent libertarian policy expert and lifelong SF fan Robert (Bob) Poole will be a presenter at the 44th annual Prometheus Awards ceremony.
Poole, a veteran LFS member and consistent Prometheus Awards voter for decades, co-founded the Reason Foundation, a leading libertarian think tank that publishes Reason magazine.
Wil McCarthy’s novel Beggar’s Sky is a first-contact story.
The actual contact, though, is more picturesque than philosophical in this sequel to Poor Man’s Sky, itself the sequel to Rich Man’s Sky, McCarthy’s 2022 Prometheus winner for Best Novel.
The 2024 sequel – which has been nominated for the next Prometheus Award for Best Novel – takes place within the larger context of an ongoing space race sparked by four Earth billionaires pushing to expand space industry and humanity to new frontiers beyond our solar system.
Now retired but with some important life lessons and insights to share, Rick Triplett has worked for the cause of liberty in many ways over many decades – including as a Prometheus judge, reviewer and board member in the Libertarian Futurist Society.
Here’s the fifth and final part of the Prometheus Blog interview with Rick, recently honored by the LFS board as the LFS’s first Emeritus member:
Q: What role can fiction play in helping to form the future or inspire people with new visions of a free-er future?
A:I think fiction is where big ideas are popularized and gain broad acceptance. We’ll always need intellectuals and polemicists to lay the theoretical groundwork of the movement, but we need novelists, screenwriters, and lyricists to get those ideas into the popular culture.
Continue reading The Rick Triplett interview, part 5: On the value of science fiction and education
Here is part 4 of the Prometheus Blog interview with Rick Triplett, a lifelong science fiction fan, decades-long libertarian, a veteran Prometheus Awards judge and recently honored as the Libertarian Futurist Society’s first Emeritus member.
Q: You’ve practiced aikido for many years – and have even demonstrated the martial art at area festivals. What attracted you to aikido and does it have any relevance to your libertarian views?
A: Aikido is a non-aggressive martial art (virtually the only one).
Its strategy is to de-escalate rather than resort to fighting; its tactics are to avoid and restrain, rather than to damage the opponent. Although its techniques can damage or kill, they are applied in a measured way that at least attempts allowing an attacker to shift from domination to negotiation.
It respects human agency including one’s own right to self-defense.
Rick Triplett, 79, has seen the Prometheus Awards from the inside.
Recently recognized by the Libertarian Futurist Society board as the organization’s first Emeritus member after decades of service, Rick has served as a judge in all three categories of the Prometheus Awards – chairing the Special Awards committee and serving as a finalist-selection judge on the two committees that help whittle down candidates and nominees to a short list in the annual Best Novel and Best Classic Fiction categories.
So Rick’s views about the challenges of judging the Prometheus Award are worth sharing, as well as his insights about the pros and cons of various ideologies.
Here is the third part of the Prometheus Blog interview with Triplett.
