gjerawlins@watdaisy.UUCP (Gregory J.E. Rawlins) (06/12/85)
[once again into the breach rode the 600]
Well here's the current state of the poll, keep those cards
and letters coming! (Those of you who tried to send mail within
the last five days - this is June 11 - probably got it returned
with an obscure mailer error, mea culpa, as is the way of all
programmers i was trying to "improve" my machine environment and
accidentally blew myself out of the water. Sigh. Please repost).
I tried to send mail to everyone who responded so far, but it
looks like many have "gone off system", when the final tally is
in i'll include a list of all who contributed.
Call to Chris Jarocha-Ernst - Please mail old list! Thanks.
Here are the top 59 books ordered by number of votes and
within each block alphabetically by author. So far i have
received about 40 mail messages with 500 (!!) books recommended
with about 145 authors in all. To me there seem to be many
unexplained "oversights" (like Hogan,Blish,Ballard,Chalker,
Campbell,Delaney,Duane,Tiptree,.......etc!). But then if i knew
what was "Canonical" i wouldn't have to run the poll in the first
place.
Keep 'em coming!
------------------------------------------------------------
Asimov, Isaac - I, Robot (2)
Asprin, Robert - Another Fine Myth (2)
Beagle, Peter - The Last Unicorn (2)
Bester, Alfred - The Demolished Man (2)
Bradley, Marion - The Darkover Series (2)
Bradbury, Ray - Fahrenheit 451 (2)
Brin, David - The Practice Effect (2)
Brunner, John - Shockwave Rider (2)
Brust, Steven - Jhereg (2)
Brust, Steven - Yendi (2)
Clarke, Arthur - Rendezvous with Rama (2)
De Camp, L. Sprague and Pratt, Fletcher - The Complete Enchanter (2)
Dickson, Gordon R. - The Tactics of Mistake (2)
Eddings, David - The Belgariad Pentology (2)
Gibson, William - Neuromancer (2)
Haldeman, Joe - The Forever War (2)
Harrison, Harry - Bill, the Galactic Hero (2)
Harrison, Harry - Star Smashers of the Galaxy Rangers (2)
Heinlein, Robert - Starship Troopers (2)
Heinlein, Robert - The Puppet Masters (2)
LeGuin, Ursula - The Left Hand of Darkness (2)
Lem, Stanislaw - The Cyberiad (2)
McKinley, Robin - Beauty (2)
May, Julian - The Saga of the Pleocene Exile Tetrology (2)
Myers Myers, John - Silverlock (2)
Niven, Larry - Protector (2)
Niven, Larry - The Integral Trees (2)
Panshin, Alexei - Rite of Passage (2)
Piper, H. Beam - Little Fuzzy (2)
Pohl, Frederick - Gateway (2)
Robinson, Spider - Callahan's Crosstime Salloon (2)
Rosenberg, Joel - The Guardians of the Flame Series (2)
Stasheff, Christopher - The Warlock in Spite of Himself (2)
Vance, Jack - The Dying Earth (2)
Wells, H. G. - The War of The Worlds (2)
Wyndham, John - The Midwich Cuckoos (2)
Zelazny, Roger - The Doors of His Face, The Lamps of His Mouth (2)
Asimov, Isaac - The Foundation Tetrology (3)
Brunner, John - The Sheep Look Up (3)
Brunner, John - Stand on Zanzibar (3)
Clement, Hal - Mission of Gravity (3)
Donaldson, Steven R. - The Thomas Covenant Trilogy (3)
Farmer, Philip - To Your Scattered Bodies Go (3)
Ford, John - The Final Reflection (3)
Heinlein, Robert - Stranger in a Strange Land (3)
LeGuin, Ursula - The Dispossessed (3)
McCaffery, Anne - The Pern books (3)
Smith, E. E. 'Doc' - The Lensman Series (3)
Zelazny, Roger - Creatures of Light and Darkness (3)
Brin, David - Sundiver (4)
Herbert, Frank - Dune (4)
Heinlein, Robert - The Moon is a Harsh Mistress (4)
Tolkien, J. R. R. - The Lord of the Rings Trilogy (4)
Varley, John - The Persistence of Vision (collection of short stories) (4)
Zelazny, Roger - Lord of Light (4)
Niven, Larry - Ringworld (5)
Wolfe, Gene - The Book of the New Sun Tetrology (5)
Brin, David - Startide Rising (6)
Niven, Larry and Pournelle, Jerry - The Mote in God's Eye (6)
--
Gregory J.E. Rawlins, Department of Computer Science, U. Waterloo
{allegra|clyde|linus|inhp4|decvax}!watmath!watdaisy!gjerawlinsjayj@hpisla.UUCP (Jay Johannes) (06/19/85)
Hold on just a second, here. I have been reading over the list and am wondering if everybody knows what "canonical" means? Webster gives definitions of orthodox and simplest form. I take the word in context to mean that the author wanted those stories that have set the standards for the current state of science fiction. That is, those stories that have broken new ground in either plot or style. I am not going to argue about the QUALITY of the stories that were listed. Most are very good examples of the best authors. However, many just cannot be classed as ground breaking. I especially question those stories that have been published within the last 12 months. How can a new story be changing directions already? A number of the books on the list can be traced back to earlier works sometimes even to works by the same author. One of the problems might be that some of the most innovative work is done in short story format. The novel, which requires much more extensive plot and character development, generally doesn't have the same freedom to work with new directions. I guess the offshoot is that I am not sure that asking for novels is the best way of exploring this. I finish up with an apology for not yet submitting my own list. The check is in the mail :-)