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Christopher Priest (II)

Date of Birth / Doğum Tarihi
14 July 1943, Cheadle, Cheshire, England, UK

Birth Name / Gerçek Adı
Christopher McKenzie Priest

Trivia / Önemsiz Şeyler
British novelist, short story writer, and anthology editor Christopher Priest should not be confused with James Owsley, the American comic book writer who legally changed his name to Christopher James Priest (aka Christopher J. Priest, C. J. Priest, or simply Priest). Unfortunately, the two have been confused by consumers - who buy works by one, expecting the works to have been created by the other. In a November 2004 interview, the ""real"" Priest showed some anger about this confusion, saying he thought it ""a bit bleeding irritating to have my name pinched by another writer,"" and made an open plea to DC Comics, Inc.: ""If Jim must use a pseudonym, why doesn't he pick a really silly one, like, say, Harlan Ellison?"".One of Priest's enduring works is his ""The Book on the Edge of Forever"" (Fantagraphics Books, 1994), whose title alludes to Harlan Ellison's "Star Trek" (1966) script for the episode ""The City on the Edge of Forever."" The book concerns the history of Ellison's anthologies Dangerous Visions (Berkley, 1969) and Again, Dangerous Visions (Doubleday, 1972), and his plans for a final anthology entitled The Last Dangerous Visions. Ellison promised to publish the third volume in the early 1970s, and went on to make that promise during the following decades. No one is certain (except Ellison himself) how many stories he purchased for Last Dangerous Visions, but Ellison claimed at one point that 75 writers were involved, later that there were 115, and rumors have as many 150. Priest's book chronicles Ellison's many delaying tactics and, tragically, lists the authors who passed away while their manuscripts sat in a box in Ellison's house. As of 2006, when Last Dangerous Visions remains unpublished, contributors who died having never seen their submissions again include: Alfred Bester, Leigh Brackett, Avram Davidson, Theo Durrant, George Alec Effinger, Howard Fast, Leslie Fiedler, Edmond Hamilton, Frank Herbert, John Jakes, Ward Moore, Tom Reamy, Thomas N. Scortia, Robert Sheckley, Clifford D. Simak, Robert Thom, A.E. van Vogt, and Manly Wade Wellman.Priest wrote the novelization of David Cronenberg's eXistenZ (1999).

Personal Quotes / Kişisel Alıntılar
Perception of memory, and understanding it, is probably the central theme in most of my novels. [interview in The Third Alternative magazine, 1998]I grew up reading science fiction, and within three months of discovering it, I knew I wanted to write science fiction. [Interview in Locus magazine, June 2006][about his 1984 novel The Glamour:] The Glamour was once spoken of as a major Hollywood vehicle for Barbra Streisand and Christopher Walken, a fact which ten years later still has the power to make my goolies shrink in horror. [interview with David Langford, 1995][about his work The Book on the Edge of Forever: An Enquiry into the Non-Appearance of Harlan Ellison's the Last Dangerous Visions:] The essay started as a conscious exercise in investigative journalism. You don't get much of that in the sf world, and the Ellison non-anthology was a God-given story just waiting to be written. I think it came as sheer novelty to most people. All those lies and evasions, the bragging and boasting, the promises and betrayals. The story has a horrid fascination when it's set out factually. At first I thought that people would simply read the story, say tut-tut, and pass on to something else. What I hadn't counted on was the army of Ellison camp-followers. These come in all persuasions, from the worst sort of toady up to a kind of fannish armed militiaman, bent on crazed revenge against Ellison for some long-ago slight, real or imaginary. When my essay first came out I got piles of mail from these types, respectively threatening me, and urging me to put on camo gear and pack a machine pistol. At this point I realized the thing could run and run. ... Latterly, it's been egged on by Ellison himself. It seems that every time interest dies down, Ellison pops up to threaten me with something, or to make up some bizarre new explanation of his inertia. As you know, in recent weeks he's been comparing himself wonderfully with Michelangelo, working slowly but surely in the Sistine Chapel, while an angry pope rages below, insensitive as ever to genius. All this makes me think that in some odd way my essay gratifies his ego. [interview with David Langford, 1995][concerning an anecdote in his novel The Prestige about a Chinese stage magician who pretended to be crippled for his best trick to work:] Yes, that anecdote is genuine, and was what originally suggested the idea of the book. This particular magician is often muddled up with another one with an almost identical name, who is in some ways even more interesting. 'Chung Ling Soo' was actually an American (real name William Campbell) [sic; Priest meant William Robinson (1861-1918)] who performed as a Chinese, in a direct lift from my man, Ching Ling Foo. It was Soo who was famously shot while trying to catch a bullet in his teeth. [interview with David Langford, 1995]