Iain Banks

Author profile

born

in Dunfermline, Fife, Scotland, The United Kingdom

February 16, 1954

gender

male

website

http://www.iain-banks.net/

genre

Literature & Fiction

About this author

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This author also publishes science fiction under the pseudonym Iain M. Banks.

Banks's father was an officer in the Admiralty and his mother was once a professional ice skater. Iain Banks was educated at the University of Stirling where he studied English Literature, Philosophy and Psychology. He moved to London and lived in the south of England until 1988 when he returned to Scotland, living in Edinburgh and then Fife.

Banks met his wife Annie in London, before the release of his first book. They married in Hawaii in 1982. However, he announced in early 2007 that, after 25 years together, they had separated. He currently lives in North Queensferry, a town on the north side of the Firth of Forth near the Forth Bridge and the Forth Road Bridge....more This author also publishes science fiction under the pseudonym Iain M. Banks.

Banks's father was an officer in the Admiralty and his mother was once a professional ice skater. Iain Banks was educated at the University of Stirling where he studied English Literature, Philosophy and Psychology. He moved to London and lived in the south of England until 1988 when he returned to Scotland, living in Edinburgh and then Fife.

Banks met his wife Annie in London, before the release of his first book. They married in Hawaii in 1982. However, he announced in early 2007 that, after 25 years together, they had separated. He currently lives in North Queensferry, a town on the north side of the Firth of Forth near the Forth Bridge and the Forth Road Bridge.

As with his friend Ken MacLeod (another Scottish writer of technical and social science fiction) a strong awareness of left-wing history shows in his writings. The argument that an economy of abundance renders anarchy and adhocracy viable (or even inevitable) attracts many as an interesting potential experiment, were it ever to become testable. He was a signatory to the Declaration of Calton Hill, which calls for Scottish independence.

In late 2004, Banks was a prominent member of a group of British politicians and media figures who campaigned to have Prime Minister Tony Blair impeached following the 2003 invasion of Iraq. In protest he cut up his passport and posted it to 10 Downing Street. In an interview in Socialist Review he claimed he did this after he "abandoned the idea of crashing my Land Rover through the gates of Fife dockyard, after spotting the guys armed with machine guns." He relates his concerns about the invasion of Iraq in his book Raw Spirit, and the principal protagonist (Alban McGill) in the novel The Steep Approach to Garbadale confronts another character with arguments in a similar vein.

Interviewed on Mark Lawson's BBC Four series, first broadcast in the UK on 14 November 2006, Banks explained why his novels are published under two different names. His parents wished to name him Iain Menzies Banks but his father made a mistake when registering the birth and he was officially registered as Iain Banks. Despite this he continued to use his unofficial middle name and it was as Iain M. Banks that he submitted The Wasp Factory for publication. However, his editor asked if he would mind dropping the 'M' as it appeared "too fussy". The editor was also concerned about possible confusion with Rosie M. Banks, a minor character in some of P.G. Wodehouse's Jeeves novels who is a romantic novelist. After his first three mainstream novels his publishers agreed to publish his first SF novel, Consider Phlebas. To distinguish between the mainstream and SF novels, Banks suggested the return of the 'M', although at one stage he considered John B. Macallan as his SF pseudonym, the name deriving from his favourite whiskies: Johnnie Walker Black Label and The Macallan single malt.

His latest book is a science fiction (SF) novel in the Culture series, called The Hydrogen Sonata, published in 2012.(less)

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Iain Banks's Books

Average rating: 3.74 · 56,534 ratings · 2,765 reviews · 25 distinct works · Similar authors

	The Wasp Factory 3.86 of 5 stars 3.86 avg rating — 21,316 ratings — published 1984 — 48 editions	Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	The Crow Road 4.03 of 5 stars 4.03 avg rating — 6,668 ratings — published 1992 — 13 editions	Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	Complicity 3.8 of 5 stars 3.80 avg rating — 4,517 ratings — published 1993 — 16 editions	Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	The Bridge 3.73 of 5 stars 3.73 avg rating — 3,846 ratings — published 1986 — 24 editions	Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	Whit 3.72 of 5 stars 3.72 avg rating — 2,728 ratings — published 1995 — 8 editions	Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	The Business 3.35 of 5 stars 3.35 avg rating — 2,908 ratings — published 1999 — 19 editions	Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	Espedair Street 3.79 of 5 stars 3.79 avg rating — 2,541 ratings — published 1987 — 12 editions	Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	Dead Air 3.38 of 5 stars 3.38 avg rating — 2,385 ratings — published 2002 — 10 editions	Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	Walking on Glass 3.65 of 5 stars 3.65 avg rating — 2,204 ratings — published 1985 — 19 editions	Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	The Steep Approach to Garbadale 3.56 of 5 stars 3.56 avg rating — 2,156 ratings — published 2005 — 10 editions	Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars

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Quotes by Iain Banks

“You need to read more science fiction. Nobody who reads science fiction comes out with this crap about the end of history”
― Iain Banks

tags: history, reading, sci-fi

91 people liked it

“Empathize with stupidity and you're halfway to thinking like an idiot”
― Iain Banks

tags: consider-phlebas

67 people liked it

“Fuck every cause that ends in murder and children crying.”
― Iain Banks, Against a Dark Background

63 people liked it

See all Iain Banks's quotes »

Polls

Here are my choices for the October SciFi selection.

Against a Dark Background by Iain M. Banks

5 votes 31.3%

House of Suns by Alastair Reynolds

5 votes 31.3%

The Warrior's Apprentice by Lois McMaster Bujold (free at Baen.com/library)

4 votes 25.0%

Spin by Robert Charles Wilson

2 votes 12.5%

16 total votes

3 comments

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