Self-discovery, crime, law, anarchy and the social compact: Robert Heinlein’s Coventry, the 2017 Prometheus Hall of Fame winner

Here’s the Prometheus Blog appreciation for Robert Heinlein’s Coventry, the 2017 Prometheus Hall of Fame winner for Best Classic Fiction:

By Michael Grossberg and Jesse Markowitz

What is the ideal society? Is utopia even possible?

How close has the United States come to an ideal society, even with the inevitable flaws that beset every country and culture?

These are among the perennial questions explored and dramatized in Robert Heinlein’s classic story Coventry.

Related questions also emerge: How do you build a utopia and who do you build it for? Is it possible, fair and just to build a utopian alternative for some, but not for others?

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A great and logical heterotopia, with libertarian insights into optimization: Donald Kingsbury’s Courtship Rite, the 2016 Prometheus Hall of Fame winner

Here is the Prometheus Blog Appreciation of Donald Kingsbury’s Courtship Rite, the 2016 Prometheus Hall of Fame winner for Best Classic Fiction.

By William H. Stoddard

As an opening epigraph in Glory Road, Robert Heinlein quotes some lines by Bernard Shaw that include the sentence “He is a barbarian, and thinks the customs of his tribe and island are the laws of nature.” One of the things science fiction can do for its readers is to jar us out of such complacency, by portraying worlds with customs other than ours – not utopias or dystopias, but heterotopias, “other places.” Donald M. Kingsbury’s Courtship Rite is one of the great heterotopias.

Continue reading A great and logical heterotopia, with libertarian insights into optimization: Donald Kingsbury’s Courtship Rite, the 2016 Prometheus Hall of Fame winner

Prometheus laureate Victor Koman inaugurates The Agorist Archives of Samuel Edward Konkin III

Prometheus-winning author and scholar Victor Koman is leading a new project to digitize the papers and publications of Samuel Edward Konkin III (SEK3) for posterity.

Konkin, a libertarian philosopher and activist who led the “agorist” wing of the libertarian movement in the 1970s and 1980s, influenced quite a few libertarians and libertarian science fiction writers, such as the Prometheus Award winners J. Neil Schulman, Brad Linaweaver and Koman himself.

Sam Konkin at a convention. Photo by Victor Koman

 

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Best Novel finalist authors gather for podcast discussing sf, fandom, publishing and the Prometheus Award

The authors of this year’s Prometheus Award finalists for Best Novel recently gathered for an online chat, which has now been posted publicly on the Eigenrobot podcast.

Sf writers Mackey Chandler, Karl K. Gallagher, Barry Longyear, Marc Stiegler, and Dennis E. Taylor discussed a wide variety of topics in their podcast – including the publishing industry, fandom, changes in science fiction, and the history of the Prometheus Award.

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Big Heinlein sale at Arc Manor

 

There’s a big sale of Heinlein books going on from the folks at Arc Manor.

You can pay anything you want for The Number of the Beast (even free), and the new alternative version of the novel, The Pursuit of the Pankera (preferred by many Heinlein fans) is offered at a sale price of $5.99, instead of the  usual $9.99. (The paper versions of Pankera also are on sale for a big discount).

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Sarah Hoyt pens new ‘Barbarella’

Sarah Hoyt, who won the Prometheus Award in 2011 for Darkship Thieves, has been hired to pen a new series of “Barbarella” comic books. Here is one of the articles (we were a little late in noticing):

“Barbarella is returning to comics with a new creative force.

“Dynamite Entertainment announced Friday that author Sarah Hoyt will write an upcoming Barbarella series with artist Madibek Musabekov, colorist Ivan Nunes and letterer Carlos Mangual. Hoyt is the writer of thirty-four novels ranging from science fiction, fantasy, mystery and more, including the fan-favorite Darkship Thieves.

More here. 

Issue No. 1 is out July 14; you can preorder the Kindle on Amazon. 

Continue reading Sarah Hoyt pens new ‘Barbarella’

London exhibit on Prometheus winner ‘V for Vendetta’

It isn’t every day that a work which has won one of our awards becomes the subject of a museum exhibition. But V for Vendetta, which won the Prometheus Hall of Fame Award in 2006, is the subject of a new exhibition at the Cartoon Museum in London, in Britain. 

The V for Vendetta: Behind the Mask exhibit will be available until Oct. 31;

“Presenting 36 original comic artworks alongside storyboards and costume designs from the hit Warner Bros movie, V for Vendetta: Behind the Mask charts the rise from comic to graphic novel, Hollywood film to iconic symbol of protest,” the museum says.

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Civil disobedience vs. repressive authority: Harlan Ellison’s subversive and satirical story “Repent Harlequin!’, Said the Ticktockman,” the 2015 Prometheus Hall of Fame winner

Here is the Prometheus Blog Appreciation of Harlan Ellison’s “Repent Harlequin!’, Said the Ticktockman,” the 2015 Prometheus Hall of Fame winner for Best Classic Fiction.

By Michael Grossberg

The ticking of a clock and a tight schedule controls the future world in “Repent Harlequin!’, Said the Ticktockman,” one of Harlan Ellison’s best and most iconic stories.

The satirical and dystopian tale, which opens with quotes from Henry David Thoreau’s classic work on Civil Disobedience, lampoons the excesses and absurdities of regimentation.

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A cyberspace, cyberpunk landmark: Vernor Vinge’s True Names, a 2007 Prometheus Hall of Fame winner

Here is the Prometheus Blog Appreciation of Vernor Vinge’s story “True Names,” a 2007 Prometheus Hall of Fame co-winner for Best Classic Fiction.


By Michael Grossberg   and Chris Hibbert

“True Names” is a seminal work of the cyberpunk genre.

A landmark when it was published in 1981, Vernor Vinge’s now-classic story gave the public their first glimpse of cyberspace and showed how the struggle for control might penetrate the new medium.

One of the earliest works of fiction to present a fully detailed concept of cyberspace, the story also explores themes of anarchism and trans-humanism that are of great interest to libertarian futurists.

The story follows the progress of a group of computer hackers who keep their true identities secret while being among the first to adopt a new full-immersion virtual-reality technology. They do so out of curiosity or an entrepreneurial desire to profit – both respectable and even laudable motivations from the libertarian perspective that appreciates the crucial role of innovation and free markets in advancing human progress, prosperity, well-being and knowledge.

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Free will, self-ownership and the essence of humanity: Lois McMaster Bujold’s Falling Free, the 2014 Prometheus Hall of Fame winner for Best Classic Fiction

Here is the Prometheus Blog Appreciation of Lois McMaster Bujold’s Falling Free,
the 2014 Prometheus Hall of Fame winner for Best Classic Fiction:

By Michael Grossberg

Falling Free is a Nebula-award-winning sf novel that explores free will and self-ownership, two important concepts at the foundation of our humanity and liberty that also happen to be at the core of modern libertarianism and classical liberalism.

Lois McMaster Bujold’s 1987 novel, part of her bestselling Vorkosigan Saga, considers the legal and ethical implications of human genetic engineering.

In particular, the story conveys the personal impact on the rights and liberties of “manufactured beings” owned by corporations – a theme also explored in F. Paul Wilson’s Prometheus-winning novel Sims.

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