Susan Wood

Susan Wood (1945-1981) was a scholar of Canadian literature and science fiction, and a central figure in the establishment and development of feminist science fiction in the 1970s. She arranged and moderated the first "Women in Science Fiction" panel at MidAmericon in Kansas City in 1976. She arranged and hosted the first "Room of Our Own" separate women's space at the Worldcon in Phoenix in 1978.

When she was married to science fiction fan Mike Glicksohn, and co-editor with him of the fanzine Energumen she also produced her own fanzine, Aspidistra, with a more feminist slant. She went on to edit a special women's science fiction issue of a literary journal (fill in this information from home), and to write the introduction for Ursula K. Le Guin's first book of essays, The Language of the Night.

Wood won a Hugo Award in 1974, 1977, and 1981 for Best Fan Writer, and another in 1973, with Mike Glickson, for Energumen as Best Amateur Magazine. In 1975, she was the Fan Guest of Honor at Aussiecon I. At Aussiecon, she moderated a panel, "Discovering Worlds", with Ursula Le Guin, Stella Lees, Peter Nichols, Anna Shepherd, Ann Sidman (tapes at the Science Fiction Oral History Archives).

She earned her doctorate in Canadian literature from the University of Saskatchewan at Regina in (year), and took a job as a professor at (university in Vancouver). In 1986, she published a novel, The Colonists and the Chronicles of Novae.

Wood was always a very public figure on the science fiction scene, both writing a great deal for fannish and professional publications, and also very visible on the convention circuit. Her untimely death was a great blow to the community.

Intersections

Gregory Rihn, WisCon 32, on an SF in Feminist Science Fiction panel:

... there were some people in the audience that welcomed a reissue of Lichtenberg's "Sime/Gen" books. (Very interesting, since it was the late Susan Wood's massive dissing of those stories that was a massive controversy at WisCon 2 and helped put future WisCons on the overtly feminist track.)

See also: Jacqueline Lichtenberg

External links

Science Fiction Oral History Archives: http://www.sfoha.org/catalog/aus.html