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Authors: Christopher Sirmons Haviland
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yours,
Robert A. Heinlein
17 January 1941
Dear Heinlein:
“Lost Legacy” arrived okay, and I decided to scan it hastily—and read it attentively. Which is another way of saying that no additional changes will be necessary. I’ll take it as it stands.…
Cordially,
Frederik Pohl
From the Frederik Pohl Correspondence collection, Special Collections Research Center, Syracuse University Libraries at Syracuse University.
***
James Gunn
(photo by Jason Dailey)
James Gunn has worked as an editor of paperback reprints; as managing editor of Kansas University alumni publications; as director of KU public relations; as a professor of English; and now is professor emeritus of English and director of the Center for the Study of Science Fiction. He won national awards for his work as an editor and a director of public relations. He was awarded the Byron Caldwell Smith Award in recognition of literary achievement and the Edward Grier Award for excellence in teaching, was president of the Science Fiction Writers of America for 1971–72 and president of the Science Fiction Research Association from 1980 to ’82, and has been guest of honor at many regional science fiction conventions, including SFeracon in Zagreb, Yugoslavia, and Polcon, the Polish National SF convention, in Katowice. Gunn was presented with the Pilgrim Award of SFRA in 1976, a special award from the 1976 World SF Convention for Alternate Worlds, a Science Fiction Achievement Award (Hugo) by the 1983 World SF Convention for Isaac Asimov: The Foundations of Science Fiction, the Eaton Award in 1992 for lifetime achievement. SFWA’s Grand Master Award in 2007, and was a Guest of Honor at the World Science Fiction Convention in 2013. He was a KU Mellon fellow in 1981 and 1984 and served from 1978 to ’80 and 1985 to present as chairman of the Campbell Award jury to select the best science fiction novel of the year. He has lectured in Denmark, China, Iceland, Japan, Poland, Romania, Singapore, Sweden, Taiwan, Yugoslavia, and the Soviet Union for the US Information Agency.
Gunn is also the distinguished author of numerous science fiction novels and shorter works, including The Listeners , The Dreamers , The Witching Hour , The Joy Machine (with Theodore Sturgeon), Crisis! , The Burning , The Magicians , Station in Space , The Immortals (on which the 1969 TV movie and 1970–71 TV series The Immortal was based), and his current novel Transcendental . He also edited a series of science fiction anthologies intended for use in teaching courses on the subject, published as a six-volume work entitled The Road to Science Fiction .
The Synopsis Saga
When I started writing novels in 1952, the only way I knew to write a novel was to start at the beginning and work my way sequentially to the end. There was no point in writing a synopsis, since I had no prospect of getting a contract to write a novel until I had written it. After the first two, I started writing my novels as a series of novellas or novelettes, the way Isaac Asimov wrote The Foundation Trilogy, like tinker toys, each new one attached to the one that came before. Sometimes I would discuss work in progress with an editor on my annual visits to New York, and sometimes that would result in a contract before the work was finished. The only occasion on which that required a synopsis was when I submitted to Fred Pohl a couple of chapters of my novel-in-progress Kampus , when he was the science fiction editor at Bantam Books, and he told me he’d give me a contract for it, but he wanted a synopsis. “But you never wrote a synopsis,” I protested. “I just need it for the editorial committee,” he replied. “You don’t have to follow it.”
Later in my career as a novelist, however, I found other ways to write a novel. I wrote the final chapter of The Millennium Blues and then went back and wrote the preceding eighteen, and I did write a synopsis in hopes of getting a contract. That was when I had
Robert A. Heinlein
17 January 1941
Dear Heinlein:
“Lost Legacy” arrived okay, and I decided to scan it hastily—and read it attentively. Which is another way of saying that no additional changes will be necessary. I’ll take it as it stands.…
Cordially,
Frederik Pohl
From the Frederik Pohl Correspondence collection, Special Collections Research Center, Syracuse University Libraries at Syracuse University.
***
James Gunn
(photo by Jason Dailey)
James Gunn has worked as an editor of paperback reprints; as managing editor of Kansas University alumni publications; as director of KU public relations; as a professor of English; and now is professor emeritus of English and director of the Center for the Study of Science Fiction. He won national awards for his work as an editor and a director of public relations. He was awarded the Byron Caldwell Smith Award in recognition of literary achievement and the Edward Grier Award for excellence in teaching, was president of the Science Fiction Writers of America for 1971–72 and president of the Science Fiction Research Association from 1980 to ’82, and has been guest of honor at many regional science fiction conventions, including SFeracon in Zagreb, Yugoslavia, and Polcon, the Polish National SF convention, in Katowice. Gunn was presented with the Pilgrim Award of SFRA in 1976, a special award from the 1976 World SF Convention for Alternate Worlds, a Science Fiction Achievement Award (Hugo) by the 1983 World SF Convention for Isaac Asimov: The Foundations of Science Fiction, the Eaton Award in 1992 for lifetime achievement. SFWA’s Grand Master Award in 2007, and was a Guest of Honor at the World Science Fiction Convention in 2013. He was a KU Mellon fellow in 1981 and 1984 and served from 1978 to ’80 and 1985 to present as chairman of the Campbell Award jury to select the best science fiction novel of the year. He has lectured in Denmark, China, Iceland, Japan, Poland, Romania, Singapore, Sweden, Taiwan, Yugoslavia, and the Soviet Union for the US Information Agency.
Gunn is also the distinguished author of numerous science fiction novels and shorter works, including The Listeners , The Dreamers , The Witching Hour , The Joy Machine (with Theodore Sturgeon), Crisis! , The Burning , The Magicians , Station in Space , The Immortals (on which the 1969 TV movie and 1970–71 TV series The Immortal was based), and his current novel Transcendental . He also edited a series of science fiction anthologies intended for use in teaching courses on the subject, published as a six-volume work entitled The Road to Science Fiction .
The Synopsis Saga
When I started writing novels in 1952, the only way I knew to write a novel was to start at the beginning and work my way sequentially to the end. There was no point in writing a synopsis, since I had no prospect of getting a contract to write a novel until I had written it. After the first two, I started writing my novels as a series of novellas or novelettes, the way Isaac Asimov wrote The Foundation Trilogy, like tinker toys, each new one attached to the one that came before. Sometimes I would discuss work in progress with an editor on my annual visits to New York, and sometimes that would result in a contract before the work was finished. The only occasion on which that required a synopsis was when I submitted to Fred Pohl a couple of chapters of my novel-in-progress Kampus , when he was the science fiction editor at Bantam Books, and he told me he’d give me a contract for it, but he wanted a synopsis. “But you never wrote a synopsis,” I protested. “I just need it for the editorial committee,” he replied. “You don’t have to follow it.”
Later in my career as a novelist, however, I found other ways to write a novel. I wrote the final chapter of The Millennium Blues and then went back and wrote the preceding eighteen, and I did write a synopsis in hopes of getting a contract. That was when I had
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