Being Gardner Dozois

by Michael Swanwick, Gardner Dozois

An in-depth look at a noted writer, anthologist and award winning editor. A facinating interview with Gardner Dozois describes his obsessions, collaborations, and his influence in the world of Fantasy and Science Fiction.

Genres: Nonfiction, Biography

248 pages, Hardcover

First published October 1, 2001

Reviews

[Craig · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a unique book. It's the transcription of one science fiction writer, Michael Swanwick, interviewing another, Garnder Dozois, about the genesis of every short story that Dozois had published. There are fifty stories discussed, published from 1966 through 1999. Dozois sold stories to many of the original anthology series such as Samuel R. Delany's Quark, Damon Knight's Orbit, Robert Silverberg's New Dimensions, as well as to one-shots edited by the likes of Roger Elwood and David Gerrold. In addition to some of the traditional genre magazines like If, Asimov's, F & SF, and Analog, he sold quite a few to the high-paying slicks like Omni and men's magazines including Playboy, Penthouse, and Oui. Not to mention High Times... Many of the stories are collaborations, with Susan Casper (Dozois' wife, who offers comments on the some of the stories she collaborated with), Jack Dann, and Swanwick himself (who steps aside from his interviewing role a few times to make his personal observations from the authorial viewpoint.) It's a fascinating look at the creative process, often illuminating and occasionally amusing. (For example, on page 193, Dozois comments: "Your readings of my stories are always so much cleverer than the stories themselves that it's always disappointing to straighten you out...") A couple of things that frustrated me were that I was unfamiliar with several of the stories discussed and didn't have quick access to a copy, and there is no biographical information other than what's presented as answers to specific story-related questions. Dozois is remembered much more for his editorial work than his own writing, after all. I also wondered about the interview process; how long did Swanwick spend studying the stories before the interview, how long the interviews took to complete, how long the sessions were, etc. Dozois offers a final comment that's interesting: "I figure there's about five people in the world who are going to want to read this book. Maybe that's overestimating it. But for what it's worth, you have done it." I wonder if he was surprised when it won the Locus award in 2002 for best non-fiction and placed second in the Hugo balloting for best related book. It's one of the most insightful books about writing I've encountered.

[Chris Urie · Rating 4 out of 5]

For anyone who wants to look into the mind of a master sci fi short story artist. Brilliantly human interview by Michael Swanwick.

[David H. · Rating 5 out of 5]

I've never read a book like this before! It's one long interview between Michael Swanwick and Gardner Dozois, talking solely about Dozois's fiction (and not about any of his editing or other work). A friend of mine and I read one of Dozois's collections, Geodesic Dreams: The Best Short Fiction of Gardner Dozois, which had 14 of the approximately 50 stories discussed here. I really enjoyed it! Seeing Dozois go through his writing career in this retrospective interview was a fascinating look at one writer's mind. (His wife Susan Casper showed up a few times in the interview for their co-written stories, as well.)

I was amused to see Dozois call out stories he's not proud of but that at least got him money, and having read some science fiction publishing histories, it's interesting to see how Dozois's writing career is explained by what's happening in the industry and in the real world (one story that I suspected to be related to the Kent State shooting was in fact, related), but also seeing how some genre digest magazines weren't willing to take certain stories so Dozois sold them to more adventurous slick magazines. Just endless fascinating, and I even have a short list of stories that weren't in Geodesic Dreams that I now want to check out.

I also really loved seeing Swanwick and Dozois's friendship as they reminisced about old times--imagining them and Jack Dann sitting down in an apartment writing stories together was really nice.