R. A. Lafferty

"About A Secret Crocodile" © Galaxy, Aug 1970 Does Anyone Else Has...1974 "All The People" © Galaxy, Apr 1961 900 Grandmothers, 1970 "And Name My Name" © Orbit # 13, 1974 "And Read The Flesh Between The Lines" © Universe # 4, 1974 Through Elegant Eyes, 1983 --foreign short story : 1995 Seiun --/ cool sf story "Berryhill" © Whispers, Dec 1976 Iron Tears, 1992 --/ cool f story --/ humour award "Brain Fever Season" © Universe # 7, 1977 Through Elegant Eyes, 1983 "Bright Flightways" © Chrysalis # 3, ed. R. Torgeson, 1978 --/ fourth place sf story --/ wonder award --/ idea award --/ style award "Continued On Next Rock" © Orbit # 7, 1970 Strange Doings, 1972 --short story : 1971 Hugo --novelette : 1971 Nebula --short fiction : 1971 Locus /3 --international sf : 1972 Ditmar --/ cool sf story "Eurema's Dam" © New Dimensions # 2, 1972 Golden Gate And Others, 1982 --short story : 1973 Hugo W (tie) --short fiction : 1973 Locus 16 (tie) --foreign short story : 1975 Seiun W --/ cool sf story "Ginny Wrapped In The Sun" © Galaxy, Aug 1967 900 Grandmothers, 1970 "Interurban Queen" © Orbit # 8, ed. D. Knight, 1970 --/ cool sf story --/ idea: small trains instead of cars "The Man Who Never Was" © Magazine Of Horror, 1967 --/ cool sf story --/ idea award "The Man Who Walked Through Cracks" © Chrysalis # 3, ed. R. Torgeson, 1978 --/ idea award ---------------------------------------------- "Narrow Valley" © F&SF, Sep 1966 900 Grandmothers, 1970 --short story : 1999 Locus All-Time Poll /40 --/ cool sf story --/ idea award --/ humour award Here is the typical "Lafferty-yarn": perfectly skewed piece of nonsense, wrapped in a dead serious narrative with a brilliant idea in the center and an eye for cracked grandiosity. In this story he investigates a very peculiar geological phenomenon, mixing it with the dream-logic of typical tall tales. Check out this quote: "It is a continental fault coinciding with a noospheric fault," said the scientist. "The valley really is half a mile wide, and at the same time it really is only five feet wide. If we measured correctly, we would get these dual measurements. Of course it is meteorological! Everything including dreams is meteorological.... There is a clear parallel in the Luftspeigel sector in the Black Forest of Germany which exists, or does not exst, according tho the circumstances and to the attitude of the beholder. Then we have the case of Mad Mountain in Morgan County, Tennessee, which isn't there all the time, and also the Little Lobo Mirage south of Prisidio, Texas, from which twenty thousand barrels of water were pumped in one two-and-a-half year period before the mirage reverted to mirage status. I'm glad I was able to give a scientific explanation to this or it would have worried me." Some call Lafferty a genius, some dissmiss him as too oblique. As one reviewer says: "That problem is exacerbated by the fact that under superficial consideration he looks easy... readers and critics should make some effort to look beneath the hood to see what was what, otherwise his complexities--of both language and meaning--end up dismissed as just nonsensically bad ordinary writing. As a thirsty drinker expecting the taste of a soda pop might well spit out in disgust a mouthful of vintage brut champagne, so might an SF reader expecting typical SF reject vintage Lafferty." review: 12-Sep-06 (read in 2001) ---------------------------------------------- "Parthen" © Galaxy, May 1973 "Primary Education of the Camiroi" (Camiroi series) © Galaxy, Dec 1966 Nine Hundred Grandmothers, 1970 --story: Best SF 1968 list --/ cool sf story --/ idea award: super education curriculum "Puddle On The Floor" © New Constellations, ed. T. Disch, 1976 "Rainbird" © Galaxy, Dec 1961 Strange Doings, 1972 --/ cool sf story "Selenium Ghosts Of The Eighteen Seventies" © Universe # 8, 1978 Iron Tears, 1992 --novelette : 1979 Locus /15 "The Six Fingers Of Time" © IF, Sep 1960 900 Grandmothers, 1970 --/ fourth place sf story --/ wonder award --/ idea award "Slow Tuesday Night" © Galaxy, Apr 1965 900 Grandmothers, 1970 --short story : 1966 Nebula --/ fourth place sf story --/ idea award "A Special Condition In Summit City" © Universe # 2, 1972 "Splinters" © Shadows, ed. C. Grant, 1978 --/ fourth place sf story --/ wonder award --/ idea award "St. Poleander's Eve" © Chrysalis # 4, ed. R. Torgeson, 1979 "Thieving Bear Planet" © Universe # 12, 1982 Iron Tears, 1992 "This Grand Carcass" © Amazing Stories, Nov 1968 Does Anyone Else Have Something Further to Add?, 1974 --story : Best SF 1969 --/ cool robot sf story "Through Other Eyes" © Future, Feb 1960 900 Grandmothers, 1970 --/ cool sf story "Thus We Frustrate Charlemagne" © Galaxy, Feb 1967 900 Grandmothers, 1970 "The Ugly Sea" © The Literary Review, Fall 1960 Strange Doings, 1972 "You Can't Go Back" © IASFM, Sep 1981 Iron Tears, 1992 --/ cool sf story --------------------------------------

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