James Gunn interviews Clifford D. Simak on his writing career at the 1971 World Science Fiction Convention in Boston starting with the anecdote of his very first written and submitted story (ca. 1929-30), but which was never published. The interview covers Simak's initial introduction to science fiction and his subsequent writing endeavours for Gernsback and Campbell, a couple of interesting anecdotes involving other individuals from the SF community such as Ackerman and Asimov, on writing SF by being unconstrained by the knowledge of science, the changes in direction and style of his writing - from writing functionally to tell a story versus being able to convey real meaning, etc.
Author and critic James Gunn began a project in 1969 to film interviews and lectures by prominent science fiction writers (and one important fan) which would partly tell the story of their genre, capture a snapshot of the knowledge and insights of some of these early architects of the SF genre & community, and also allow this information to be incorporated as aids in teaching curricula. The videos have been restored to preserve them in as high a quality as is possible.
29 сен 2024
