Roger
Zelazny had his first story published in 1953, at the tender
age of 16. Ten years later, he was nominated for his first
Hugo Award, for the short story “A Rose for Ecclesiastes”,
which had appeared in the venerable Magazine of Fantasy
and Science Fiction. He would go on to garner a further
13 nominations, with 6 wins; 14 Nebula nominations and 3
wins; and over the course of a professional career spanning
more than three decades, he forged an unassailable
reputation for inventiveness and paradigm-shattering
world-building that is hard to equal. His collaborators
included Phillip K. Dick and Fred Saberhagen, he became a
favorite on the Convention and Guest Lecturer circuit, and
he was accounted one of contemporary Science Fiction and
Fantasy’s most treasured resources.And then there’s Amber.
In his wide ocean of speculative fiction, much of it in short story form -- ranging from Martians to magic to mythology to near-future to ancient past to alternate now, and beyond -- it is for his seminal 10-book master work, The Chronicles of Amber (beginning with 1970’s Nine Princes in Amber), that he is most renowned. It is among the great series of its genre, and ranks Zelazny with Tolkien and Niven and Norton, McCaffrey and Herbert and Heinlein as a master storyteller in his field.
Zelazny
himself held a Masters in literature from Columbia
University, and he was also an Army Reservist, as well as
being a fencer and martial artist of no little skill. He was
also accounted the very nicest of guys: his death in 1995
brought a rush of fond reminiscence from both those who had
met him and those who knew him only through his work. His
legacy endures in his influence on many other writers (some
of whose tributes you will find below), and in the fandom of
which he was such an integral part. In his compelling “In Memoriam: Roger Zelazny, Lord of Light”, author George R. R. Martin writes: “He was a poet, first, last, always. His words sang.” And for all that Zelazny himself wrote, in the 1967 Hugo-winning novel Lord of Light: “No word matters, but man forgets reality and remembers words,” Martin has the right of it. His words do sing, of reality and surreality and unreality, and their sheer poetic power will always matter to those who have, and will, gratefully discover them.
His name is legion.
DANIEL
ARENSONI discovered Roger Zelazny’s Amber novels in 1991, when I was eleven years old. I was a Dragonlance fan, and a friend suggested I try Amber. From the first line, I was sucked in. I've reread the Amber books twice since, and my appreciation grows every time. Roger Zelazny influenced my work so much that without him I might have become a very different author.
My dark fantasy novel Flaming Dove--about a half angel, half demon--is being released this year. In one scene, one fallen angel becomes upset and tosses a wine horn at another. That's Amber. That's Julian tossing his wine glass at Corwin after losing his favorite game. All these years later, Amber still inspires me. I don't see myself as aping Roger Zelazny; I know that his influence still lives within the books of those who followed him.
Roger Zelazny died when I was fifteen. If he were alive today, I would tell him: Thank you for the worlds you gave us. You are among our genre's brightest lights.
Daniel Arenson is the author of Firefly Island (2007), an epic fantasy novel, and Flaming Dove (forthcoming 2010).
DAVID
G. GRUBBSWhy would anyone in his right mind start a project that was expected to take two years and fill five volumes with 2500 pages of Roger Zelazny's short works? Because I loved Roger's writing. Happy memories of seeking out his novels and short stories when they first came out drove me to re-read my favorites when appearances in "Best Ever" lists and anthologies of "SF Classics" brought them to mind.
When some members of NESFA Press [New England Science Fiction Association – Ed.] brought up the idea of a large Zelazny collection at a meeting, I shredded Robert's Rules of Order, leaped on the opportunity with all four limbs, and howled, "MINE!" It took almost an hour to club back the competition, who did not heed snarls and bared fangs. (That's how NESFA Press chooses editors -- the Klingon way.)
Why would someone in his right mind continue with the project as it expanded to four years and 3572 pages in six volumes, (and continues this Fall with a seventh volume, a bibliography)? Because immersion in Roger's writing only polished my admiration for him. He was a craftsman at all times, he stayed creatively skewed in his approach, and he tried (and succeeded entirely in his short works) never to repeat himself.
When Michael Whelan agreed to provide a cover painting (for, as it turned out, one of his favorite writers) and when more than a dozen writers and editors, nearly every individual I approached, all expressed real eagerness to be involved, the project became even richer. I talked to a few and corresponded with all, a highlight of my time with NESFA Press. You'll have to peruse the Tables of Contents for the Zelazny volumes to see who they all are.
And the mania continued. We found in Roger's papers a play he had written, based on his short story "Godson." I just had to produce it. That's a story of its own, involving at least 25 people to manage, a dozen songs to write (setting Roger's lyrics to music) and a set to design. It was performed at Boskone [NESFA’s annual SF convention] last year and will be performed at the Reno Worldcon next year.
I never met Roger Zelazny, but what I read about him, as I wrote in a "Thank You" at the end of Volume 6, told me that he was by all accounts a helluva guy. I was half surprised by that. Bright stars, as Roger was for much of his career, have a tendency to become self-absorbed. Roger never did. His friends and colleagues continue to praise him. Roger Zelazny, the writer, became Roger to me.
You
might think deep immersion and multiple readings would get
old after a while. Roger's writing never gets old to me. He
wrote that he tried to create layered stories that could be
read rewardingly at different levels. Stories with multiple
layers repay multiple readings.I hope I've convinced you to go read some Roger Zelazny. I know I've convinced myself. I think I'll go re-read ...And Call Me Conrad [AKA This Immortal - Ed.], or “Godson”, or "Mana from Heaven", or anything in The Last Defender of Camelot, or “The Doors of His Face, The Lamps of His Mouth”, or “The Furies”, or “A Rose for Ecclesiastes”, or some of the Dilvish stories, or one of his novels. Or just open a Roger Zelazny collection to any random story and spend an hour or a day lost in Roger's marvelous imagination.
David G. Grubbs, in addition to editing books for NESFA Press, also plays lead trumpet in a big band, works as a computer programmer, and sings bass in a classical chorus, a theater group, and an a cappella group. In the past few years, he has recorded the narration for a series of company training videos, worked on the annual Boskone convention, and staged a musical based on Roger Zelazny's "Godson." His main life goal is to invent the 30-hour day.
RACHEL
HYLANDRoger Zelazny taught me there could be beauty in chaos. He showed me that there are infinite shades of gray -- varied and vast, each one of value -- between Good’s pure white and the darkness of Evil. I learned through his complex, fascinating and troubled Princes of Amber that I didn’t have to like a character to find them interesting. Before Zelazny, I thought as a child -- after all, I was a child -- seeing only straight lines and uncomplicated narrative and a universe of absolutes. I believed the worthy should always triumph, the guy should always get the girl, and the world should always make sense.
Reading Zelazny made me grow up.
I discovered Amber before I was 10; by the time I hit high school, I had journeyed with its mastermind through many other magical lands; into space, and the future, into human nature and my own burgeoning sense of self. I don’t know who I would be today without his influence, but I’m sure I wouldn’t like her. Oh, it wasn’t a solo effort -- Zelazny had help raising me, from Ray Bradbury and John Wyndham and the ever-present Tolkien, among many others -- but it was he who set me on the path to who I would eventually become, gave me a lifelong love of speculative fiction in its infinite multiplicity, and opened my eyes and my mind to possibilities I had never dreamed existed.
I will be forever grateful.
(Well, except for the fact that I still, occasionally, smoke. After all, most of Zelazny's coolest creations do.)
Rachel Hyland is Editor in Chief of Geek Speak Magazine. She has spent her life en route to the One True City, in one way or another.
CHRISTOPHER
KOVACSRoger Zelazny created such memorable and cool characters (Kalifriki, Conrad, Corwin, Sandow), captured a world in a few short but elegant phrases, and told a story that grabs and keeps hold until you’re left gasping for more at the end. Even the way he crafted sentences is part of what makes his writing so memorable and enjoyable. Some of his best short stories ("24 Views of Mt. Fuji, by Hokusai"; "This Moment of the Storm", etc.) could easily have been novels; the scope of some of his best novels (Isle of the Dead, Lord of Light, etc.) would have been bloated trilogies or endless series in the hands of some writers today. Re-reading his books and stories is a welcome escape from the current flood of urban fantasy and mega-long-series on the store shelves today.
I met Zelazny at a convention in Toronto, and although he was hurrying out the door to go to the airport, he stopped to sign my books and say hello. “…and call me Roger,” was his response to the “Mr. Zelazny” that I’d addressed him with.
At some point after he died, I decided that I simply had to read everything that he’d ever published, no matter how obscure. It took a while to gather all of this from various sources – including eBay – but I succeeded. (I also decided I had to have signed first editions of all of his works, and that was a more expensive undertaking. Did I mention he’s my favorite author? And that maybe I’m obsessed?) I kept thinking that this stuff deserved to see the light of day, but fewer and fewer works of his remained in print.
And
then when I learned that NESFA Press was thinking of doing a
best-of collection of Zelazny’s works, I contacted them to
suggest that with the source material I had, it could become
a definitive, multi-volume collection of all his short
fiction and poetry. So that’s how The Collected Stories
of Roger Zelazny, Volumes 1 to 6 came about. But the
effort of putting together the collection spurred me on to
visit several university archives which held Zelazny’s
manuscripts and correspondence, and to correspond with his
colleagues, friends, and son Trent. Out of this material
grew a six-part biography (“…And Call Me Roger”: The
Literary Life of Roger Zelazny), story notes in which
Zelazny commented upon each work (“A Word from Zelazny”),
and annotations. I also found numerous unpublished works
that we were able to include in the collection. Plus there’s
a seventh book, The Ides of Octember: A Pictorial
Bibliography of Roger Zelazny, which should be released
by NESFA Press within the next month or so. This project was
literally a labour of love for me and all involved, from my
co-editors, to Zelazny’s colleagues who wrote introductions,
to cover artist Michael Whelan. I like to think that Roger
would be very pleased with the result. And certainly the
readers seem to have appreciated it too: the collection
received the most first-place votes in the recent Locus Poll
for Best Collection, and second overall after that
complicated vote-counting method. Hopefully a new generation
of readers will now encounter Zelazny’s works and his legacy
will continue.When he’s not reading or writing about Zelazny, Christopher Kovacs is a medical doctor, academic research scientist, and artist.
KELLY
McCULLOCHRoger Zelazny's Chronicles of Amber opens with Corwin wondering who he is and how he's arrived at his current pass. It's a sensation that I think all of us experience from time to time, if not as literally as in the case of Corwin's dilemma on awakening in a mental institution.
Certainly, this year as I embark on the beginnings of a second series for ACE, I find myself wondering how I got here, and I have to say that some of the credit (or blame, whichever you prefer) for my becoming the author I am rests on Zelazny's shoulders. And certainly, Ravirn of the middle House of Fate with his green and black personal colors and his mad, bad, semi-divine family could never have been born if Corwin of Amber hadn't come first.
I was fifteen when a girlfriend pressed Nine Princes in Amber into my hands and told me that I absolutely had to read it, thereby changing my world forever. I'm a third generation fan and a ravenous reader, so I probably would have gotten around to Amber eventually, but it's hard to say whether an older me would have been so profoundly affected by Zelazny's work.
I loved everything about Amber, from Corwin's quirky, snarky, first-person narration, to his semi-divine semi-demonic nature, to his huge and crazy family in which I found echoes of my own rather odd upbringing. I was raised by hippies rather than immortals from another dimension, but the idea of a childhood that created a distance between you and normal society echoes rather strongly for me.
I
went from Amber to Lord of Light and thence to
Creatures of Light and Darkness, and at every step I
found myself enchanted and astounded. Dilvish the Damned,
the Madwand Pol Detson, Conrad Nomikos, I delighted in all
of their adventures, and while I read I learned a great deal
about character and plot and world, all of the things I
would later need when I started down my own path to becoming
an author. Zelazny was a brilliant writer and one of my most
important teachers, though I never got the chance to meet
him in person. And I didn't stop learning from the master
when I started getting published on my own. I'm currently
writing my fifteenth novel, Broken Blade, which
will be coming out in December of 2011. The protagonist is a
detective noir sort of character named Aral Kingslayer, a
world weary ex-assassin.Aral owes a lot to Sam Spade, but he probably owes even more to Snuff the canine companion to Jack the Ripper and protagonist of A Night in the Lonesome October. When I first read that book in my 20s, I didn't really get it, and I found myself wondering if Zelazny had slipped with time. But rereading it in my 40s as a writer I had the proper perspective to realize just how brilliant it was and I found myself with a powerful desire to write a book about a grand old cynic who can still do good in a corrupt world. Aral is that character and I don't know that I could write him half so well without having first read Snuff and Corwin and Conrad. So, thank you, Roger Zelazny.
Kelly McCullough's novels include the WebMage series and the forthcoming Chronicles of Aral Kingslayer, beginning with Broken Blade in 2011. His short fiction has appeared in numerous venues including Writers of the Future, Weird Tales, TOTU and his illustrated collection, The Chronicles of the Wandering Star--part of an NSF-funded middle-school science curriculum. Visit him at his website: www.kellymccullough.com.
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