Williams, Eric C
Entry updated 14 August 2023. Tagged: Author, Fan.
(1918-2010) UK author, previously a bookseller and involved with Fandom from the 1930s, publishing some fiction at that time in Fanzines, beginning with the simultaneous appearance of "Mr Hazel's Miracle Carpet" and "The Venus Vein" in Amateur Science Stories for December 1937. He began publishing sf professionally with "The Silent Ship" (July 1965 New Worlds) and "The Garden of Paris" (in Weird Shadows from Beyond, anth 1965, ed E J Carnell).
Williams was the author of nine more or less routine sf novels for Robert Hale Limited, starting with The Time Injection (1968), which imagines a future Stone Age (see Ruins and Futurity). To End All Telescopes (1969) glibly deploys Imaginary Science to justify the Invention of a supertelescope which not only revolutionizes Astronomy within the solar system but allows direct observation of extrasolar Life on Other Worlds; this story successfully captures something of the Sense of Wonder of amateur astronomy, an interest intimately linked with UK fandom in its early years.
The Drop In (1977), Williams's sole non-Hale novel, is an Alien-Invasion novel of some interest. His autobiography, For Mona (2010), is also of interest. [JC/DRL]
Eric Cyril Williams
born Camberwell [now London]: 22 July 1918
died Horsham, Surrey: 21 January 2010
works
- The Time Injection (London: Robert Hale, 1968) [hb/]
- Monkman Comes Down (London: Robert Hale, 1969) [hb/Barbara Walton]
- To End All Telescopes (London: Robert Hale, 1969) [hb/Laurence Cutting]
- The Call of Utopia (London: Robert Hale, 1971) [hb/]
- Flash (London: Robert Hale, 1972) [hb/]
- Project: Renaissance (London: Robert Hale, 1973) [hb/]
- The Drop In (Leeds, West Yorkshire: Elmfield Press, 1977) [hb/John Leeder]
- Largesse from Triangulum (London: Robert Hale, 1979) [hb/]
- Time for Mercy (London: Robert Hale, 1979) [hb/]
- Homo Telekins (London: Robert Hale, 1981) [hb/]
nonfiction
- For Mona (no place or publisher given: privately published, 2010) [nonfiction: pb/]
links
previous versions of this entry