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Ray Nelson | |
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| Born | Radell Faraday Nelson (1931-10-03)October 3, 1931 Schenectady, New York, U.S. |
| Died | November 30, 2022(2022-11-30) (aged 91) Napa, California, U.S. |
| Occupations | Author,cartoonist |
| Known for | "Eight O'Clock in the Morning" |
| Spouse(s) | Perdita Lilly, Lisa Mulligan, Kirsten Enge, Helene Knox |
| Website | raynelson |
Radell Faraday Nelson (October 3, 1931 – November 30, 2022) was an American science fiction author andcartoonist most notable for his 1963 short story "Eight O'Clock in the Morning",[1] which was later used byJohn Carpenter as the basis for his 1988 filmThey Live.
Nelson was born October 3, 1931, inSchenectady, New York, the son of Walter Hughes Nelson and Marie Reed.[2] He has one younger brother, Trevor Reed Nelson. Ray became an active member ofscience fiction fandom while still a teenager atCadillac High School inCadillac, Michigan. After graduation, he attended theUniversity of Chicago[3] (studying theology), then spent four years studying in Paris, where he metJean-Paul Sartre,Boris Vian, andSimone de Beauvoir, as well asAllen Ginsberg,Gregory Corso,William Burroughs, and otherBeat Generation icons. In Paris, he worked withMichael Moorcock smuggling then-bannedHenry Miller books out of France. While there, he also metNorwegian Kirsten Enge, who became his third wife on October 4, 1957. Their only child, Walter Trygve Nelson, was born September 21, 1958, in Paris.[2] He had previously been married to Lisa Mulligan on December 13, 1955, and subsequently to fellow fan Perdita Lilly,[4][5] subject of his first book, the 23-page poetry collectionPerdita: Songs of Love, Sex and Self Pity,[6] who would later marryJohn Boardman.[7] He was married to published poet and professor Dr. Helene Knox, aFulbright scholar.[8]
Nelson died on November 30, 2022, inNapa, California,[2] at the age of 91.[9][10]
Nelson began his career writing and creatingcartoons forscience fiction fanzines.[11] Later Nelson wrote many professionally publishedshort stories including "Turn Off the Sky" and "Nightfall on the Dead Sea".[12] His best-known story "Eight O'Clock in the Morning" was published inThe Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction (November 1963). Ray Nelson and artistBill Wray adapted the story as their comic "Nada" published in thecomic book anthologyAlien Encounters (No. 6, April 1986), and directorJohn Carpenter adapted it as his filmThey Live (1988).[13]
Nelson collaborated withPhilip K. Dick on the 1967alien invasion novelThe Ganymede Takeover. Nelson was friends with Dick starting in childhood, and in a documentary about Dick, Nelson says that the only times that Dick tried LSD were the two times that he gave it to him.[14] That biographical documentary about Dick, in which Nelson is a featured interviewee, isThe Penultimate Truth About Philip K. Dick produced in 2007.
In the early 1970s, Nelson ran a writers' workshop at the First Unitarian Church in the San Francisco Bay Area. One of his students wasAnne Rice.[15] He was a lifetime member of theCalifornia Writers Club and an influental president for many years.
His 1975 bookBlake's Progress, in which the poetWilliam Blake is atime traveler, was described byJohn Clute inThe Encyclopedia of Science Fiction as "Nelson's best work".[16]Richard A. Lupoff called it "a revelation," saying "Nelson's style is sharply focused and carefully colored... His plotting is exactly as complex as it ought to be [and] his characters are nicely drawn."[17] It was rewritten and republished as 1985'sTimequest.[18]
At the 1982Philip K. Dick Awards, Nelson's novelThe Prometheus Man gained a special citation (runner-up).[19]
Nelson was added to theFirst Fandom Hall of Fame in 2019 for "his life-long genuine love of science fiction and his enthusiastic service to that community for decades."[20]
Nelson professed that his greatest claim to fame was as the creator of the iconic propellerbeanie as emblematic ofscience fiction fandom while a 10th-grader atCadillac High School. He also claims to have invented the "Beany" character in a 1948 contest for what would becomeTime for Beany while visiting relatives in California. "I think it's probably my best bet of being remembered", Nelson says. "I've never been on theNew York Timesbestseller list."[21]
