Harlan Ellison (1934–2018) — American writer, editor, and provocateur, one of speculative fiction's most honored and combative figures. Career: Ran away from home as a teenager, took odd jobs (including a stint with a con-man traveling crew described in his book Memos from Purgatory), then broke into pulp fiction in the mid-1950s. Wrote across science fiction, fantasy, horror, television, journalism, and criticism — resisting genre labels his whole life and insisting he wrote "fantasy," not "science fiction." Signature work: "'Repent, Harlequin!' Said the Ticktockman" (1965) and "I Have No Mouth, and I Must Scream" (1967) remain his most anthologized stories; the latter's AI antagonist, AM, is a landmark of dystopian SF. He won the Hugo Award eight times and the Nebula Award four times — a record for short fiction. Television: Wrote "The City on the Edge of Forever," widely considered the best original Star Trek episode (though he famously feuded with the production over rewrites). Also wrote for The Outer Limits and pushed hard against network interference throughout his TV career. Editing: Assembled Dangerous Visions (1967) and Again, Dangerous Visions (1972), anthologies that helped define the New Wave movement in SF by publishing envelope-pushing work the mainstream magazines wouldn't touch. Persona: Notorious for volatility — public feuds, lawsuits (including a long, eventually successful suit against AOL and other parties over unauthorized digital distribution of his stories), and a reputation as SF's most quotable curmudgeon. He treated writers' rights and payment as a personal crusade, not a side issue. Legacy: A stylist known for compression, moral fury, and formal inventiveness within the short story — a form he defended as art in an industry oriented toward novels.
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