Roger Zelazny Biography and List of Works

American science fiction and fantasy writer. Zelazny was one of the most important writers of the New Wave of science fiction along with Philip K. Dick, Samuel R. Delany, Thomas M. Disch, Ursula K. LeGuin and Harlan Ellison. He published 50 novels, some 150 stories and three collections of poetry.

"I do not have a soul. You do."
"A soul?" she laughed. "What's a soul? I've never seen one. How do I know it's there? Even so, what good has it done to me? I'd trade it in a twinkling to be like one of you. It's beyond my Art, though."
(from Jack of Shadows, 1971)

Roger Zelazny was born in Euclid, Ohio. He received his M.A. in Elizabethan and Jacobean drama from Columbia University in 1962. Zelazny briefly enlisted with the Ohio National Guard and then worked for the Social Security Administration in Cleveland, Ohio, and Baltimore, Maryland. Zelazny's first published story was 'Passion Play' which appeared in 1962. Before becoming a full-time writer in 1969, Zelazny concentrated on short stories and novellas. At the age of 38, he moved to Santa Fe, where he lived until his death.

In the 1960s Zelazny became highly visible in a group of science fiction writers known as the 'New Wave'. Up until that time the genre had been dominated by writers producing action-adventures set in space. The new generation felt they had the freedom to experiment; they focused on psychology and believed science fiction should be taken seriously as literature. Zelazny's novel This Immortal won the 1966 Hugo for Best Novel, and the self-mocking, immortal, jokester became Zelazny's favourite character type. The Dream Master won the 1966 Nebula for Best Novella, and in the same year The Doors of His Face, The Lamps of His Mouth won a Nebula for Best Novellette.

"It is no shame to lose to me, mortal. Even among mythical creatures there are very few who can give a unicorn a good game."
"I am pleased that you were not wholly bored," Martin said. "Now will you tell me what you were talking about concerning the destruction of my species?"
(from 'Unicorn Variations', the Hugo Award in 1981)

Zelazny's interest in magic, myths and dreams are already present in these early stories, which are considered among his best works. In 1970 he started the enormously popular Amber series, which have been adapted for comics and used as the basis for a computer game. The nine books, beginning with Nine Princes in Amber, evoke the betrayals of Jacobean drama. The narrator Corwin and rival princes and princesses double-cross one another, all seeking the crown. One of the siblings is responsible for Corwin losing his memory and another attempts to kill him. Corwin's archrival is his brother Eric. Amber is a higher, infinitely more sophisticated plane, and the machinations of its godlike inhabitants reflect in the actions of the human protagonists - humans being the apes of gods. Corwin and his many siblings are more real than mortals, or the Gods of any Shadow realm - our world among others. The concept of Shadow has much in common with Jungian psychology. Jung considered the 'shadow' the sum of those characteristics we wish to conceal - the most famous example found in literature is Robert Louis Stevenson's Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde. However, when the story continues, it is revealed that Amber itself is not an ultimate reality, but shares a Ying-Yang relationship with the forces of Chaos.

The Chronicles of Amber includes Nine Princes in Amber, The Guns of Avalon (1972), Sign of the Unicorn (1975), The Hand of Oberon (1976) and The Courts of Chaos (1978). Triumphs of Doom (1985), opens a follow-up starring Corwin's son Merlin. The series includes Blood of Amber (1986), Sign of Chaos (1987), Knight of Shadows (1989) and Prince of Chaos (1991). Two further related works are A Rhapsody in Amber (1981) and Roger Zelazny's Visual Guide to Castle Amber (1988, with Neil Randall).

Zelazny relished the 'science fantasy' form and in Lord of Light (1967) he established a world ruled by Hindu gods, but based the cycle of reincarnation on technology, and the god's powers on psionic ability augmented by exotic weapons. A creature of Light and Darkness (1969) was inspired by the gods of ancient Egypt.

Among Zelazny's other works are Jack of Shadows (1971), set on a non-rotating world whose dark side is run by magic, the 'Wizard World' sequence Changeling (1980) and Madwand (1981), the 'Dilvish' fantasies The Changing Land (1981) and Dilvish the Damned (1982), and the comic A Night in the Lonesome October (1993), which recounts a gaslight romance with Dracula, Sherlock Holmes, Jack The Ripper and others, and has a talking animal, Snuff, in the central role. In the 1990s Zelazny published several books in collaboration with Robert Sheckley. One of the author's last works was Wilderness (1994), written in collaboration with Gerald Hausman. The book recounts the true stories of two mountain men as they surmount dangers with unyielding spirit in the Old West. The story, reminiscent of a Philip José Farmer's World of Tiers adventure, can be read as a testament to the author, before his untimely death on June 16, 1995, at the age of 58.

For further reading: Roger Zelazny: A Primary and Secondary Biography by Joseph L. Sanders (1980); The Dream Master; Roger Zelazny by Carl B. Yoke (1980); A Checklist of Roger Zelazny by Christopher P. Stephens (1990); Roger Zelazny by Jane Lindskold (1993) - Note: Richard Paul Russo's short story 'In the Season of the Rains', published in the anthology In the Field of Fire, ed. by Jeanne Van Buren Dann and Jack Dann (1987), took its title form the opening lines of Zelazny's Lord of Light.

This Immortal, (1966)