Writers honor Michael Moorcock, SFWA's latest grand master

John Picacio's posted the transcript of his speech honoring Michael Moorcock on the occasion of Moorcock's being awarded the Science Fiction Writers of America's Grand Master title. Freddie adds, "the speech includes plaudits from Neil Gaiman, Chris Roberson, Jeff Vandermeer, Jeffrey Ford, China Mieville, and Alan Moore."

Our first message is from the author of AMERICAN GODS, the 2002 Nebula Award Winner for Best Novel — Neil Gaiman.

Neil — "Mike Moorcock changed the inside of my head. I read STORMBRINGER when I was nine, and that was pretty much that. My pocket money went on Moorcock books — which were gloriously being issued and reissued back then — and I read them and took what I could from them. It's not long until you have a multiverse in your twelve-year-old mind, and you learn that every hero is the Eternal Champion, and suddenly you're puzzling over Jerry Cornelius stories, with your head going places it hasn't gone before.

When people ask me about my influences, I tend to forget Mike, much in the way that people listing the things that were important to them growing up, fail to list the earth, the air, and sunlight. He taught me that high culture and low culture were simply points of view, and that what mattered was the writing. His influence as an editor still reverberates today. We're lucky to have him."

Link

(Thanks, Freddie Freelance!)