SMorg

Harlan Ellison is one of my favorite authors. He’s written HUNDREDS of novels and short stories – he’s one of the most prolific writers to ever put pen to paper. He’s a bit of a wild man too…from his days in the 60s of writing for television to daring L. Ron Hubbard (with Robert Heinlein, reputedly) to create a religion, he’s been there and done that.

He is widely known for his ‘Dangerous Visions’ anthologies, as well as one of the best Star Trek & Babylon 5 episodes ever and, oh yes – he was acknowledged legally as the creator of the Terminator concept. He takes no guff off anyone and has sued repeatedly to protect his work.

Anyway, below are a couple short clips of Ellison on different subjects. Thanks to @bynkii for reminding me of these interviews.
PS: Here’s a great interview with the Onion AV Club: http://www.avclub.com/articles/harlan-ellison-part-one,14252/

Finally, a quote from the above interview, that I particularly like:

So I sound off as if I was Mr. Know-It-All, but in truth, I’m just as flawed as anybody, and I make just as many mistakes. The one thing that has saved me—and if you’re looking for the core of my being, as most interviewers are, it is summed up in a quote that I have right here over my typewriter. It’s one of the many, but it’s the one that I really, actually live by, and it is from Louis Pasteur. It says, “Chance favors the prepared mind.” The smarter you are, the better-read you are, the more knowledgeable, the more questioning you are, the more skeptical you are, the better chance you have of not being manipulated, of not winding up somebody’s tool. And you can see through bullshit. What Hemingway called a very accurate bullshit detector, it’s what every good journalist needs. As S.J. Perelman said, “The muse is a tough buck.” And all we have is language; that’s the one tool that enables us to grasp hold of our lives and transcend our fate by understanding it. And the smarter you are, the more you know, the better things work out for you.