Brian Aldiss

Brian Aldiss, OBE, is a fiction and science fiction writer, poet, playwright, critic, memoirist and artist. He was born in Norfolk in 1925. After leaving the army, Brian worked as a bookseller, providing the setting for his first book, The Brightfount Diaries (1955). His first published science fiction work was the story 'Criminal Record', which appeared in Science Fantasy in 1954. Faber encouraged Brian to pursue his enthusiasm for SF and published Space, Time and Nathaniel (1957). Since then he has written more than 75 books and 300 short stories, including the acclaimed novels Hothouse, Non-stop and the Helliconia series, all regarded as modern classics.

Several of Brian's books, including Frankenstein Unbound, have been adapted for the cinema and his story ‘Supertoys Last All Summer Long’ was adapted and released as the film AI in 2001. Besides his own writing, Brian has edited numerous anthologies of science fiction and fantasy stories and the magazine SF Horizons.

Brian is a vice-president of the international H. G. Wells Society and was elected Grand Master by the Science Fiction Writers of America. He lives in Oxford, where his bookselling career began in 1947, and was awarded the OBE for services to literature in 2005.