Award winners Le Guin, Harryhausen & Lee
RIVERSIDE, Calif. — Award-winning author Ursula K. Le Guin, special effects creator Raymond F. Harryhausen and Spider-Man co-creator Stan Lee will be recognized with the J. Lloyd Eaton Lifetime Achievement Award in Science Fiction at the University of California, Riverside’s Eaton Science Fiction Conference April 11-14, 2013. The conference examines science fiction in multiple media, and will be held at the Riverside Marriott Hotel.
Le Guin, who will receive the Eaton Lifetime Achievement Award for 2012, has written 20 science fiction and fantasy novels, among them “The Left Hand of Darkness” and “The Dispossessed,” each of which won Hugo and Nebula awards. She is the author of many short stories, six volumes of poetry, 13 books for children, as well as criticisms, collections of essays and screenplays.
“Ursula Le Guin is probably the most significant American writer of science fiction and fantasy to have emerged in the past 50 years,” said Rob Latham, professor of English and conference co-organizer. “Her work has consistently pushed the envelope in terms of serious ethical and political engagement with these popular genres.”
Conference organizers decided to present two awards for 2013 “to honor both science fiction film culture and science fiction comic book culture, which we felt deserved to be recognized separately,” said Melissa Conway, head of Special Collections and Archives of the UCR Libraries.
Harryhausen, who created a type of stop-motion model animation known as Dynamation, will receive the award for his groundbreaking contributions to science fiction film. Among his best-known productions are “Mighty Joe Young,” for which the ARKO team won an Oscar for special effects in 1949; “The 7th Voyage of Sinbad”; and “Jason and the Argonauts,” which included a swordfight against skeleton warriors.
Lee, former president of Marvel Comics, also will be recognized with the award for 2013 for his various contributions in the realm of comic books. Lee, who began as a comic-book writer at age 19, moved on to become editor, producer, publisher, and president and chairman of Marvel Comics. The co-creator of Spider-Man, the Hulk, the X-Men, the Fantastic Four, Iron Man, Thor and other superheroes is also being recognized for his successful challenge to the Comics Code Authority.
Previous recipients of the Eaton lifetime achievement award are Ray Bradbury (2008), Frederik Pohl (2009), Samuel R. Delany (2010) and Harlan Ellison (2011).
UCR is the home of the Eaton Collection of Science Fiction and Fantasy, the largest publicly accessible collection of its kind in the world. The collection embraces every branch of science fiction, fantasy, horror and utopian/dystopian fiction.
The collection, which attracts scholars from around the world, holds more than 300,000 items including English-language science fiction, fantasy and horror published in the 20th century and a wide range of works in Spanish, French, Conference registration opens August. 1 and may be completed online. Registration for students is $95; early-bird registration, $150 (ending Feb. 1, 2013); general registration (after Feb. 1, 2013), $170; and single-day registration, $95.
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