Because this has been bothering me since Wiscon

[starlady]

Poll #7183 Greatest living SF writer?

Open to: Registered Users, detailed results viewable to: All, participants: 35

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Greatest living SF writer?

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Ted Chiang (source: owner of Dreamhaven Books)
0 (0.0%)

Samuel R. Delany (source: me)
2 (5.9%)

Ursula K. LeGuin (source: me)
28 (82.4%)

Gene Wolfe (source: Neil Gaiman)
0 (0.0%)

someone else I will name below
4 (11.8%)

Write-in candidate?

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I just can't believe someone would put Ted Chiang over the woman who coined the term 'ansible,' but maybe I shouldn't be all that surprised.

Comments

[kindkit]

I like Chiang's work enormously, and I do think he's an important and underread writer, but . . . no.

I wonder whether that claim may be coming from folks somehow interpreting "living SF writer" as "currently working SF writer." LeGuin's best work, in my opinion, was written in the sixties and seventies, while Delany doesn't write SF anymore. Gene Wolfe I don't know about. But if the question was understood as "who's the best SF writer right now?" naming Chiang is much less ridiculous. Especially if SF is being defined narrowly as pure science fiction.

[starlady]

*nods* That's a good point. I do think The Other Wind stands with LeGuin's earlier work, but I haven't actually read a lot of her newer stuff, most of which is YA, yes? I did read Lavinia and liked it, but it's not on the same level as her masterpieces.

I could still see Wolfe even if "currently working in the genre" were added to the list, though, because he still has been fairly recently.