Science Fiction Blues

Collected from an evening of live performance, a selection of the Science Fiction Grand Master’s best stories, poetry, and speculations.

In October 1987, Brian W. Aldiss—with the help of two other performers—took his science fiction to the masses, staging theatrical performances of his best stories and fantastic, mind-wrenching speculations before a live audience. Included in Science Fiction Blues are three short stories that were included in the show’s program, three scripted stories that didn’t make the final cut, and a selection of the author’s science fiction poetry. Among the scripted stories, readers will find “Supertoys Last All Summer Long,” based on the original short story that inspired Stanley Kubrick and Steven Spielberg’s film A.I. Artificial Intelligence, in which Aldiss portrayed the role of Teddy.

When the show was taken on the road, Matrix hailed it as “possibly the best piece of SF theatre [they’ve] seen.” In this book’s introduction, Robert Holdstock recalls it as “an evening of splendidly visual effects” all done by words that “managed to indulge all the senses, all the moods. . . .The feeling was one of something very special.”