Nationality American Role Fiction writer Name Ted Chiang | Subject Software Period 1990–present | |
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Genre Science fiction, fantasy Notable works Nominations World Fantasy Award for Best Novella Books Stories of Your Life and Others, The Lifecycle of Software, The Merchant and the A Similar People Daniel Abraham, George R R Martin, David Eddings, Joss Whedon, Albert Camus | ||
Understand by ted chiang part 1 of 4
Ted Chiang (born 1967) is an American science fiction writer. His Chinese name is Chiang Feng-nan (姜峯楠).
Contents
- Understand by ted chiang part 1 of 4
- Ted chiang on the future
- Early life and career
- Awards
- Works
- Collections
- Film
- Teaching
- References
His work has (as of 2013) won four Nebula awards, four Hugo awards, the John W. Campbell Award for Best New Writer, and four Locus awards. His short story "Story of Your Life" was adapted to a film called Arrival in 2016.
Ted chiang on the future
Early life and career
Chiang was born in Port Jefferson, New York. Both of his parents were born in China, but immigrated to Taiwan with their families during the Communist Revolution before immigrating to the United States. He graduated from Brown University with a computer science degree and in 1989 graduated from the Clarion Writers Workshop. He currently works as a technical writer in the software industry and resides in Bellevue, Washington, near Seattle.
Critic John Clute has written that Chiang's writing has a "tight-hewn and lucid style ... [which] has a magnetic effect on the reader."
Awards
Although Chiang has published only fifteen short stories, novelettes, and novellas as of 2015, he has won a string of prestigious science fiction awards for his works: a Nebula Award for "Tower of Babylon" (1990); the John W. Campbell Award for Best New Writer in 1992; a Nebula Award and the Theodore Sturgeon Award for "Story of Your Life" (1998); a Sidewise Award for "Seventy-Two Letters" (2000); a Nebula Award, Locus Award, and Hugo Award for his novelette "Hell Is the Absence of God" (2002); a Nebula and Hugo Award for his novelette "The Merchant and the Alchemist's Gate" (2007); a British Science Fiction Association Award, a Locus Award, and the Hugo Award for Best Short Story for "Exhalation" (2009); and a Hugo Award and Locus Award for his novella "The Lifecycle of Software Objects" (2010).
Chiang turned down a Hugo nomination for his short story "Liking What You See: A Documentary" in 2003, on the grounds that the story was rushed due to editorial pressure and did not turn out as he had really wanted.
In 2013, his collection of translated stories Die Hölle ist die Abwesenheit Gottes won the German Kurd-Laßwitz-Preis for best foreign science fiction.
Chiang's first eight stories are collected in Stories of Your Life and Others (2002). His novelette "The Merchant and the Alchemist's Gate" (2007) was also published in The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction.
"The Great Silence", Chiang's latest story, was selected for inclusion in The Best American Short Stories anthology for 2016, which is a rare honor for stories and authors that fall under the science fiction, fantasy, and horror genres.
Works
Collections
Film
A film adaptation by Eric Heisserer of "Story of Your Life", titled Arrival and directed by Denis Villeneuve, was released in 2016 to a critical and commercial success. It stars Amy Adams and Jeremy Renner.
Teaching
Chiang was an instructor at the Clarion Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers' Workshop at UC San Diego in 2012 and 2016.