Pournelle had just returned from dragon con, the annual convention in atlanta for fans of science fiction, fantasy and other genres. Open library is an initiative of the internet archive, a 501c3 nonprofit, building a digital library of internet sites and other cultural artifacts in digital form. In our fourpart podcast he holds forth on the role of science fiction in predicting future technology, writing bestsellers in the internet age, and a whole lot more. And if im being honest, well, i understood about 1 word in 20, mostly the adjectives but what i did find actually not only readable but just plain joyful was chaos manor, jerry pournelles column. Order of larry niven and jerry pournelle books science. Review collaboration, cowritten with jerry pournelle retelling of dantes inferno. Rip jerry pournelle, the first author to write a novel on. How to write a history of writing software the atlantic. He and his writing partner, larry niven were big, popular names back in the 70s, and long ago i read several of his long tomes. Jerry pournelle, the first author to write a novel on a. Used and recommended at chaos manor jerry pournelle. Jerry, i read this piece early in my career, i believe, or an early rendition of it and it made such an impression on me. We had vietnam and watergate, the apollo space program quit abruptly. The other day we were sitting around the byte offices listening to software and hardware explosions going off.
Not exactly an original observation, but pournelle, who died on september 8 at the age of 84, strove to make his writerly life a little. Parsifal has an ati rage fury video board, a creative dvd drive, and the new ati dvd software that goes with the rage fury board. When he showed me electric pencil word processing software, primitive as it was with only 14 lines of 64 characters on a monochrome monitor the. Jerry pournelle, science fiction novelist and computer. Pournelle is particularly known for writing hard science fiction, and received multiple awards for his writing. Jerry pournelle is back in the house informationweek. Jerry pournelles daughter jennifer wrote a sequel to mote called outies no, the title is not very original. Larry niven is the multiple hugo and nebula awardwinning author of the ringworld series, along with many other science fiction masterpieces. One of the giants of new wave hard science fiction, jerry pournelle, has died. The best of jerry pournelle is available now, and mamelukes 4 is available for preorder with publication set for 2 jun 2020. Science fiction author and byte magazine columnist jerry pournelle has died according to a statement by his son alex posted to jerrys web site. A wellwishing page has been set up for visitors to post their thoughts and memories of mr. He had advanced degrees in psychology, statistics, engineering, and political science.
Inferno by larry niven overdrive rakuten overdrive. Nov 30, 2019 the best of jerry pournelle, edited by john f. Jerry pournelle, top left, with other science fiction writers in 2007. Jerry pournelle biography childhood, life achievements. Jerry eugene pournelle august 7, 1933 september 8, 2017 was an american science fiction writer, essayist, and journalist who contributed for many years to the computer magazine byte in the 1970s, 1980s and early 1990s. Jerry pournelle, a prolific writer of science fiction novels and witty advice columns for computer users, died on sept.
The rightwing sciencefiction writers jerry pournelle an admirer of the fascist dictator benito mussolini and larry niven pursued a similar argument in their codominium novels, a longrunning series of novels that started in 1973 and imagines a world where the u. As maclean had predicted, an avalanche of free computer software. Jerry eugene pournelle born august 7, 1933 is an american science fiction writer, essayist and journalist who contributed for many years to the computer magazine byte pournelle served as president of the science fiction and fantasy writers of america in 1973. August 7, 1933 september 8, 2017 was an american polymath. He worked in the aerospace industry and consulted with various politicians on space related technology.
Just to be clear, while my writing style might be influenced by pournelles, im not nearly as good a writer, of course. Jerry pournelle, a prolific writer of science fiction novels and witty advice. Watch my next column for my chaos manor picks in hardware, software, gadgets, books, utilities, and more. Pournelle was active in the science fiction and fantasy writers.
As a science fiction author, he is best known for his many collaborations with larry niven, including. And if you are not writing and learning, you are not getting published. Larry niven has coauthored almost a dozen new works, with a wide variety of collaborators. The most prolific partnership in his long career has been with his friend jerry pournelle in addition to the writers mentioned above, larry has also written stories and essays with mike flynn, david drake and even isaac asimov. Requiem was written in 1939, long before the real space program became a government monopoly. Bio of jerry pournelle, with whom niven had recently published the mote in gods eye and inferno and was hard at work on lucifers hammer. Top 30 quotes of jerry pournelle famous quotes and sayings. Notably jerry pournelle, who was a science fiction author. Tools like vi and pico basically evolved from very small seeds like this, where a programmer whips up a basic editor to make writing code or docs easier, and then keeps adding features. W riting, jerry pournelle liked to say, is hard work. In 2011, he joined journalist gina smith, pundit john c. A lesser known fact about him is that he is a polymath too, with degrees in statistics, systems engineering, psychology and political science. Science fiction author jerry pournelle passed away earlier this week after a sudden illness at the age of 84.
In the 1960s and early 1970s he worked in the aerospace industry, but eventually focused on his writing career. Pournelles literary career included the 1985 science fiction novel footfall with larry niven, which became. In addition to his solo writing, he wrote several novels with collaborators, most notably larry niven. Both are available now on amazon, use the links below. Jerrys son alex has asked that we let you know of exciting book news for fans of dr. Daniel kersten general writing where your teacher is at i have spent a lot of time critiquing my own writing and that of others.
He published fourteen science fiction novels, and was a frequent collaborator with fellow science fiction author larry niven. Jerry eugene pournelle is an american sciencefiction writer, essayist and journalist. And for more on what we are doing here, including saving the space program and desert adventures, click. Rip jerry pournelle, the first author to write a novel on a computer. He was also one of the first computer and technology journalists. While working towards his phd, pournelle published science fiction using the pseudonym wade. I like it better than the gripping hand but not as much as mote. Jerry pournelle, a wellknown science fiction writer, suggests the use of a grammar checker in his advice to beginning writers. After being thrown out the window of his luxury apartment, science fiction writer allen carpentier wakes to find himself at the gates of hell. I havent looked at some of my systems since 1998, when i began the hard xray treatments for brain cancer. Chaos manor jerry pournelle the original blog of jerry. Scifi author and byte columnist jerry pournelle has died. Scifi titan jerry pournelle passes, aged 84 the register. Writing a very basic word processor or inputeditstore program is also actually pretty easy when youre talking about text and command line based computing.
Jerry pournelle is the author of the popular janissaries and codominium series and coauthor with larry niven of several bestselling science fiction novels, including inferno, footfall, lucifers hammer, oath of fealty, the mote in gods eye, the gripping hand, the burning city, burning tower and escape from hell. Feeling hes landed in a great opportunity for a book, he attempts to follow dantes road map. It now runs windows 98 second edition, is highly stable, and is the main writing machine. I often write from what i might call the poweruser point of view, writing about my own experiences using a particular software package or piece of hardware. From that point forward, i read byte for jerrys column and he was the person who gave me a deep love for computing in general and software in specific. After serving in the united states army during the. Computer authors go to computer shows and then come home to open boxes of new equipment and software, and play with the new stuff until they tire of it. Acclaimed writing pair larry niven and jerry pournelle offer a new twist on dantes classic tale, inferno. He is probably the first person to sit and compose at a typewriter connected to a. Science fiction writer jerry pournelle offered factbased hope for future. Jerry pournelle 19332017 was an essayist, journalist, and science fiction author.
Today, its hard to imagine authors writing on anything but a computer, but pournelle was the ultimate. The bestknown commentator in tech journalism history, jerry pournelle is back at byte as its senior technologist. Jerry pournelle was one of the great science fiction authors of the late 20th century. Jerry pournelleiconic byte columnist, sciencefiction writer, and allaround polymathtalks with us about writing and computers. The technology and science fiction community recently lost one of their own as jerry eugene pournelle died following a sudden illness on september 8. Dvorak, political cartoonist ted rall and several other staff reporters to launch an independent tech and.