L. Sprague de Camp
Lyon Sprague de Camp (/ˌspreɪɡdəˈkæmp/;[3] November 27, 1907 – November 6, 2000) was an American author of science fiction, fantasy and non-fiction literature. In a career spanning 60 years, he wrote over 100 books, both novels and works of non-fiction, including biographies of other fantasy authors. He was a major figure in science fiction in the 1930s and 1940s.[2]
L. Sprague de Camp
Lyon Sprague de Camp
November 27, 1907
New York City, U.S.
November 6, 2000 (aged 92)
Plano, Texas, U.S.
- Novelist
- short story author
- essayist
- historian
American
1937–1996
Science fiction, fantasy, alternate history, historical fiction, history
Coinage of "Extraterrestrial" and "E.T."[edit]
"Extraterrestrial", a coinage from "extra" + "terrestrial", meaning from beyond earth, is attested as an adjective as early as 1868, according to the Oxford English Dictionary. Its first use in connection with life beyond earth was likely by H. G. Wells, in his 1898 novel The War of the Worlds.[16][17] L. Sprague de Camp is credited with its first usage as a noun with the meaning of "alien life" and with coining the abbreviation "E.T." in the first part of his two-part article "Design for Life", published in the May 1939 issue of Astounding Science Fiction.[17][16]
Hypothesis regarding sea serpent sightings[edit]
De Camp made a suggestion in 1968 that fossil discoveries had influenced modern reports of sea monster sightings. The suggestion was made in his article "Dinosaurs in Today's World" in The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction v. 34, no. 3, March 1968, later reprinted in his nonfiction collection The Fringe of the Unknown, Buffalo, New York: Prometheus, 1983. In 2019 de Camp's theory was scientifically tested by C. G. M. Paxton and D. Naish, who concluded that trends in the data of reported sightings appear to support his hypothesis.[18]
Awards and honors[edit]
De Camp and Willy Ley won the 1953 International Fantasy Award for nonfiction recognizing their study of geographical myths, Lands Beyond (Rinehart, 1952).[21][37] De Camp was a guest of honor at the 1966 World Science Fiction Convention[2] and was named the third Gandalf Grand Master of Fantasy, after Tolkien and Fritz Leiber, at the 1976 convention.[37] The Science Fiction Writers of America made him its fourth SFWA Grand Master in 1979[38] and he won the World Fantasy Award for Life Achievement in 1984,[37] a Special Achievement Sidewise Award for Alternate History in 1996, citing "seminal works in the field,"[26] and the Hugo Award for Nonfiction in 1997 for his autobiography, Time and Chance.[2][37]
At a meeting of the executive council of the Committee for Skeptical Inquiry (CSI) in Denver, Colorado, in April 2011, De Camp was selected for inclusion in CSI's Pantheon of Skeptics. The Pantheon of Skeptics was created by CSI to remember the legacy of deceased fellows of CSI and their contributions to the cause of scientific skepticism.[39] CSI was previously known as the Committee for the Scientific Investigation of Claims of the Paranormal (CSICOP).[40]
In popular culture[edit]
L. Sprague de Camp has been depicted in fictional works by a number of other authors. Randall Garrett conflated him with J. R. R. Tolkien's Gandalf in the character of the magician "Sir Lyon Gandolphus Gray" in his Lord Darcy series. He was the model for the "Geoffrey Avalon" character in Isaac Asimov's fictional group of mystery solvers the "Black Widowers,"[13] and the unnamed court magician in Lawrence Watt-Evans' "Return to Xanadu" (The Enchanter Completed: A Tribute Anthology for L. Sprague de Camp, 2005).
He also appears without fictional disguise in the short stories "Green Fire" by Eileen Gunn, Andy Duncan, Pat Murphy, and Michael Swanwick (Asimov's Science Fiction, April 2000) and "Father Figures" by Susan Shwartz (The Enchanter Completed: A Tribute Anthology for L. Sprague de Camp, 2005),[41] and in the novels In the Courts of the Crimson Kings (2008) by S. M. Stirling and The Astounding, the Amazing, and the Unknown (2011) by Paul Malmont.
A semi-fictionalized version of de Camp appears in the third episode of the 2017 TV series Manhunt: Unabomber, as one of several academics and authors consulted by the FBI on the basis of the citation of their work in the Unabomber manifesto. In the scene depicting this meeting, de Camp's name appears on a placard as "L. Sprague de Camp, S.A.G.A. Author, The Ancient Engineers." De Camp's name does not specifically appear in the episode credits, which identify the roles of actors in the scene as composite characters. The Ancient Engineers is cited in endnote 18 of the manifesto.