James Tiptree, Jr.

James Tiptree, Jr: The Double Life of Alice B. Sheldon (2006) is a biography of a revered science fiction author, written by Julie Phillips. Unlike other female creators that I have heard of, Sheldon took her male Tiptree persona far into her real life.

Tiptree was a science fiction writer, and I have been reading a bit of science fiction lately (as you can see in previous posts). When I read about Tiptree, it reminded me of the Omni magazines I read as a child.

Tiptree wrote a number of stories that are still cropping up in recent science fiction (SF) anthologies. He was the type of writer whose work other writers admired.

Sheldon led an adventurous life and had experience that most women of her time may not have had (safari adventurer as a child, psychologist, special services analyst) as she was born in 1915. She found that writing as a man (Tiptree) and cloaking her views under the veil of science fiction allowed her to express what she seemed to find otherwise inexpressible.

The next stop for me is reading some of Tiptree’s works. Sadly I had not heard of (or perhaps had not remembered) Tiptree before reading this biography.

Labels: biography, nonfiction, Phillips, sciencefiction, Sheldon

posted by reader kay at 12:05 PM