2004 Hugo Awards Presented at Noreascon

DragonMagic writes "The Hugo Awards for 2003 have been handed out at the WorldCon at Noreascon in Boston." The winners are below.

Best Novel: Paladin of Souls, Lois McMaster Bujold
Novella: The Cookie Monster, Vernor Vinge
Novellette: Legions in Time, Michael Swanwick
Short Story: A Study in Emerald, Neil Gaiman
Related Book: The Chesley Awards for Science
Fiction and Fantasy Art: A Retrospective, John Grant, Elizabeth L. Humphrey, and Pamela D. Scoville
Professional Editor: Gardner Dozois
Professional Artist: Bob Eggleton and Pamela D. Scoville
Dramatic Presentation, Long Form: Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King
Dramatic Presentation, Short Form: Gollum's Acceptance Speech at the 2003 MTV Movie Awards
Semiprozine: Locus
Fanzine: Emerald City
Fan Writer: Dave Langford
Fan Artist: Frank Wu
Campbell Award: Jay Lake
Special Noreascon Four Committee Award: Erwin Strauss, aka Filthy Pierre

Comments

Question

[Raul654]

Who won the 1953 retroactive award? The nominees included The Caves of Steel, Fahrenheit 451, and Childhood's End. Yeesh - what a hard call.

Re:Question

[Txiasaeia]

Although I'm not usually a fanboy, Neil Gaiman's work has typically been stellar - do yourself a favour and pick up Coraline, last year's winner (novella? novelette? not sure which), an absolutely fantastic story about a young girl who visits the "flip side" of existence. There's no way that I can explain it without it sounding cheezy. Anyway, if you would just read that one story, you'd see that the current state of SF is pretty good.

Although not quite as current, other works by British SF writers such as J.G. Ballard and Christopher Priest are still fairly recent but are absolutely fascinating, even when held up to giants such as Bradbury and Clarke, even going back to Mary Shelley. Yes, we will remember Ballard for a *very* long time, and I think that Neil Gaiman will outlast a lot of pulp SF being written today.

Last Night....

[Dr Reducto]

Last night some kid at the LAN party I was at came in at around 11 and was like: My dad won a Hugo!! And I asked him about it, and apparently his dad wrote Legions in Time, which is apparently about a man and woman who travel through the galaxy or alternate worlds or something. I guess good luck to that kids dad, and good luck to all those considered and those who won.

Re:Hu?

[Abberlaine]

They're, like, the Oscars of sci-fi. They're pretty popular; last year, I went out to my local Chapters branch to pick up a copy of Robert J. Sawyer's "Homonids", a recent Hugo Award winner. It turns out that a few days prior, some nutter had been to every major Chapters location in the city and had bought out their entire stock of the book. As the clerk helping me out sighed, "The Hugo Awards make people do strange things."

Sci-Fi or Fantasy?

[ta_relax]

From FAQ of Hugo awards:
"Aren't Hugos just for Science Fiction?
Have you ever tried to define science fiction? ..."It's all fantasy," he proclaimed. "Science fiction is fantasy you can convince yourself might happen. ...."

I like, for example, LoTR as much as anyone else and find it one of the best trilogies ever (as novels). But, what has magic, dragons, castles etc. to do with science? If science or scientific methodology is not part of the story then why should it be eligible for this award? What happened to the heritage of Asimov, Lem, Dick, Heinlein, Clarke, and others?
Has popular themes of Star Wars and Star Trek reduced Sci-Fi to mere fantasy now?

As a scientist myself, I still believe that Sci-Fi is more than simple fantasy. It is -to me- exploration of possibilities for humanity's future (and past), scientific developments, and their effects. Believe me, in today's incredible speed of scientific progress we need Sci-Fi in this sense more than ever.

I am sure the winner is a wonderful novel but...

Re:Sci-Fi or Fantasy?

[Artifakt]

Part of this is a pragmatic attitude on the part of fandom, that has developed into a tradition, particulary with the film Hugos.
For many given years, particularly pre Starwars era, Hollywood didn't release any SF movies, not just any GOOD Sf, but any, period. So it quickly became a case of either giving the award to a fantasy film or nobody, or of picking between a good fantasy film and a lousy SF film. The earlier era was mostly "It's Fantasy or Nothing this year", while the post Starwars era was the "Do I choose Good Fantasy or Bad SF" era, and unfortunately often remains so to this day.
This is also a case of 50's era SF writers tending to also do fantasy, so they weren't opposed to broadening the awards (Heinlein's Glory Road and Magic, Inc., Poul Anderson's Operation Chaos, Azimov's Azaziel stories, and Blish's Black Easter all come to mind as possibly Hugo worthy in their time.).
Of the authors you cite, only Lem and Dick didn't openly call any of their own works fantasy in the sources I've seen so far, and a lot of people would argue for at least P K Dick being a fantasiast at times (Is valis SF?).

Re:Harry Potter OotP

[Gallowsgod]

Not commenting on whether the latest Harry Potter book should have been on the list or not, I cannot see that sales figures should be a reason for giving a book an award.
High sales figures != quality

Re:LOTR

[crashfrog]

Because it's good, maybe?

What are you asking for, exactly? Clearly the story has a resounding appeal to thousands of readers, if not more. I imagine it'd be nice for your ego if they all abandoned their own preferences and adopted yours, which, I'm sure are way more informed and well-reasoned to you.

You'll have to pardon the others, though, if they don't quite see it that way.