Best Classic Fiction – Prometheus Blog

LFS President: Prometheus Hall of Fame honors reflect passages of time, recognition of merit

With the annual Sept. 30 deadline coming up soon for LFS members to nominate works for the Prometheus Hall of Fame for Best Classic Fiction, this is a good time to remind ourselves what makes this annual category special.

LFS President William H. Stoddard did just that when he presented the Prometheus Hall of Fame category for Best Classic Fiction at the recent 43rd annual Prometheus awards ceremony. Here are Stoddard’s remarks:

By William H. Stoddard

Unlike the Best Novel Award, the Prometheus Hall of Fame can be given to works in any narrative or dramatic form — short fiction, narrative verse, plays, movies, television and video episodes or series, graphic novels, songs, and so on.

It’s restricted to works that first appeared at least twenty years ago.

A great many of our award winners are older than that, often dating to before the LFS was founded.

Continue reading LFS President: Prometheus Hall of Fame honors reflect passages of time, recognition of merit

Final call for 2023 Prometheus Hall of Fame nominations (LFS members have nominated 6 novels, 2 stories, a song and a film so far)

With less than two weeks left until the Sept. 30 nominating deadline, Libertarian Futurist Society members have nominated ten works for the next Prometheus Hall of Fame for Best Classic Fiction.

Among the Hall of Fame nominees so far this year: six novels, two stories, a film and a song. That includes novels by Poul Anderson, Cecilia Holland, C.S. Lewis, Terry Pratchett and E.C. Tubb; both a novel and a story by Harry Turtledove; a story by R.A. Lafferty; a song by the Canadian art-rock group Rush; and, for the first time, a feature film written and directed by and starring Woody Allen.

Such varied forms of art and fiction reflects the broad scope of the Hall of Fame – an annual Prometheus Awards category that incorporates stories, novellas, novels, graphic novels, songs, albums, musicals, operas, plays, poems, films, TV episodes/series, anthologies or trilogies.

Read on to see the current list of nominees so far and how to nominate works (if you’re an LFS member) or submit works for consideration by members (if you’re an author, publisher or non-member).

Continue reading Final call for 2023 Prometheus Hall of Fame nominations (LFS members have nominated 6 novels, 2 stories, a song and a film so far)

“You can’t enslave a free man” – Heinlein Society acceptance speech for “Free Men,” the 2023 Prometheus Hall of Fame winner

John Tilden, president of The Heinlein Society, spoke Aug. 19 during the 2023 Prometheus Awards ceremony to accept the Prometheus Hall of Fame award for Best Classic Fiction for Robert Heinlein’s short story “Free Men.”

Tilden spoke eloquently about Heinlein’s legacy in general and about the setting and themes of his winning story in particular, while shedding some fascinating light on its provenance and place in Heinlein’s Future History series.

For the record, here is a transcript of Tilden’s speech:

BY JOHN TILDEN

It is my pleasure to provide a few remarks on this occasion of Robert Heinlein’s short story “Free Men” being inducted into the Prometheus Award’s Hall of Fame. I add my thanks to the Libertarian Futurist Society for this honor.

Continue reading “You can’t enslave a free man” – Heinlein Society acceptance speech for “Free Men,” the 2023 Prometheus Hall of Fame winner

43rd annual Prometheus awards ceremony set for Aug. 19 – Past winner Sarah Hoyt to present Best Novel to Dave Freer; Heinlein reps to accept for Best Classic Fiction

By Michael Grossberg

An intercontinental friendship between two prolific science-fiction writers will add an extra measure of celebrity to the 43^rdannual Prometheus Awards ceremony.

Sarah Hoyt, the 2011 Prometheus winner (File photo)

Sarah Hoyt, who won the Prometheus Award for Best Novel in 2011 for Darkship Thieves, will present the Best Novel category to Dave Freer during the live-Zoom ceremony, now scheduled for 2-2:30 p.m. Saturday Aug. 19 (Eastern U.S. time).

Continue reading 43rd annual Prometheus awards ceremony set for Aug. 19 – Past winner Sarah Hoyt to present Best Novel to Dave Freer; Heinlein reps to accept for Best Classic Fiction

The Prometheus Awards reach a notable milestone: 100 works recognized!

Before 2022 ends, it’s worth noting that the Prometheus Awards reached a pretty big milestone this year.

It involves a nice round number, too: 100 – the total number of works recognized by the Prometheus Awards in all three categories since the award was established more than four decades ago.

From 1979, when the very first Prometheus Award was presented to F. Paul Wilson’s novel Wheels Within Wheels, through 2022, 90 works of fiction have been recognized in the Libertarian Futurist Society’s two annual categories for Best Novel and Best Classic Fiction.

That includes 44 novels that have won a Prometheus for Best Novel, including this year’s newest winner: Rich Man’s Sky by Wil McCarthy.

And it includes 46 works – novels, novellas, stories, a graphic novel, an anthology and a TV series – that have been inducted into the Prometheus Hall of Fame for Best Classic Fiction.

Plus, 10 works have received Special Prometheus Awards – including three libertarian sf anthologies, two films, two graphic novels, a novella, a filk song and (most recently in 2017) a webcomic series.

Continue reading The Prometheus Awards reach a notable milestone: 100 works recognized!

Prometheus Blog progress: The LFS Appreciation series about past winners is now complete and accessible

If sci-fi fans or anyone else ever wants to know why the Libertarian Futurist Society presented a Prometheus Award to any work of fiction, and how that work reflects libertarian, classical liberal and anti-authoritarian themes, they now have an easy, quick and enjoyable way to find out.

Just visit the LFS website’s Prometheus Awards page, scroll down to any particular past winner of interest – for Best Novel, Best Classic Fiction or Special Awards – and click on the “Appreciation” link added next to its title.

To highlight and honor the four-decade history of the Prometheus Awards, which the Libertarian Futurist Society celebrated in 2019, LFS members began writing review-essays about each past winner that summer.

Today, more than three years later, that series of informative essays is now complete:
Continue reading Prometheus Blog progress: The LFS Appreciation series about past winners is now complete and accessible

Lafferty, Heinlein stories and Pratchett novel make it as first-time nominees onto this year’s Prometheus Hall of Fame finalist list

Most years tend to see at least some continuity in the annual Prometheus Hall of Fame , since any eligible work can be renominated if it doesn’t win.

Since 1983, when the first classic works were inducted into the Prometheus Hall of Fame, it’s become common for works to be nominated repeatedly, often with returning nominees dominating the list of selected finalists.

Not this year, notable for several fresh contenders.

Continue reading Lafferty, Heinlein stories and Pratchett novel make it as first-time nominees onto this year’s Prometheus Hall of Fame finalist list

Works by Asimov, Heinlein, Lafferty, Lewis, Longyear, Pratchett and more: Judges to select Prometheus Hall of Fame finalists from eight nominees

LFS members have nominated eight works for the next Prometheus Hall of Fame for Best Classic Fiction.

Among them are one song, a novelette, a collection of linked short stories, two short stories and three novels – reflecting the many forms of fiction that are eligible for consideration in this Prometheus category.

With the nominations deadline having passed in September, here is the final list of this year’s nominees:

* The End of Eternity, a 1955 novel by Isaac Asimov
* “Free Men,” a 1966 novelette by Robert Heinlein
* “Primary Education of the Camiroi,” a 1966 short story by R.A. Lafferty
* That Hideous Strength, a 1945 novel by C.S. Lewis
* Circus World, a 1981 collection of linked stories by Barry B. Longyear
* “The Trees,” a 1978 song by Neal Peart and Rush
* The Truth, a 2000 novel by Terry Pratchett
* “Or Give Me Death,” a 1955 short story by Donald Westlake

Continue reading Works by Asimov, Heinlein, Lafferty, Lewis, Longyear, Pratchett and more: Judges to select Prometheus Hall of Fame finalists from eight nominees

Why the Hall of Fame is important, and why Citizen of the Galaxy deserves a place in it: Stoddard’s awards-ceremony presentation of the Best Classic Fiction category

In his apt introduction and presentation of the Prometheus Hall of Fame category at the recent 2022 Prometheus Awards ceremony, LFS President William H. Stoddard explains why this annual awards category is such an important part of the Libertarian Futurist Society’s awards program – and why this year’s inductee by Robert Heinlein is so deserving of recognition.

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Change and variety marks the new slate of Prometheus Hall of Fame finalists

A rock song, a linked collection of stories, a classic sf juvenile novel and the culmination of a trilogy of novels will be considered for induction into the Prometheus Hall of Fame for Best Classic Fiction.

Four works have been selected as finalists for the 2022 award, to be determined by Libertarian Futurist Society members over the next half year.

Moreover, this year’s slate of finalists reflects a good deal of change and variety, compared to last year slate of finalists, with only one of those five finalists reappearing on this year’s ballot. In addition, one of this year’s finalists was nominated for the first time, while two others had not been nominated in quite a few years.

Robert Heinlein, a drawing (Creative Commons license)

Here are this year’s finalists, in alphabetical order by author, along with their and their author’s history in the Prometheus Awards:

Continue reading Change and variety marks the new slate of Prometheus Hall of Fame finalists