June 18, 2013

Nebula Anthologies

Tagged: Publication

Anthologies of Nebula-winning short fiction, along with a selection of the runners-up, have been published roughly annually since the award's inception, each volume edited by a Science Fiction Writers of America member. The series, initially Nebula Award Stories, has occasionally been titled Nebula Award Winners and other slight variants, and from the year 2000 became Nebula Awards Showcase. The first volume was Nebula Award Stories 1965 (anth 1966; vt Nebula Award Stories 1 1967) edited by Damon Knight; see Checklist for the series' subsequent history and editors. These books sometimes contain critical essays and accounts of the year in sf, as well as winners of the Rhysling Award for sf Poetry. Winning novels are recorded but not included; latterly, winners of the Rhysling Award for Poetry also appear.

Early Nebula anthologies appeared in the year after the award presentations; this continued until Nebula Award Stories 11 (1976) edited by Ursula K Le Guin, whose US edition was delayed to 1977. From then until 1983 the year of publication was two years behind the year for which the awards were given. With the appearance in the same year of Nebula Award Stories Seventeen (anth 1983) edited by Joe W Haldeman and The Nebula Award Winners 18 edited by Robert Silverberg, the books went back to trailing the award year by only one year until the delay between Nebula Awards 21 (anth 1986) and Nebula Awards 22 (anth 1988) – both edited by George Zebrowski – restored the two-year gap. At present the anthology titles include the year of volume publication, but trail the actual presentations by a year: thus Nebula Awards Showcase 2009 (anth 2009) edited by Ellen Datlow contains the shorter works which won Nebulas at the 2008 ceremony, having been published in 2007.

In 1969 the concept of SFWA members voting on stories was extended retroactively to cover those stories (but not novels) considered the all-time best prior to 1965. The chosen short stories were published as Science Fiction Hall of Fame (anth 1970) edited by Robert Silverberg and the novellas in The Science Fiction Hall of Fame Volume Two A (anth 1973; vt The Science Fiction Hall of Fame Volume Two) and The Science Fiction Hall of Fame Volume Two B (anth 1973; vt The Science Fiction Hall of Fame Volume Three) edited by Ben Bova. These should be distinguished from the non-SFWA career honour, the Science Fiction Hall of Fame. A further poll of SFWA members' favourite past Nebula-winning stories led to the selection The Best of the Nebulas (anth 1989), again edited by Ben Bova. [DRL/PN]

see also: Hugo Anthologies.

Nebula Awards

Science Fiction Hall of Fame

individual titles

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