<P>In Shorter Views, Hugo and Nebula award-winning author Samuel R. Delany brings his remarkable intellectual powers to bear on a wide range of topics. Whether he is exploring the deeply felt issues of identity, race, and sexuality, untangling the intricacies of literary theory, or the writing process itself, Delany is one of the most lucid and insightful writers of our time. These essays cluster around topics related to queer theory on the one hand, and on the other, questions concerning the paraliterary genres: science fiction, pornography, comics, and more. Readers new to Delany's work will find this collection of shorter pieces an especially good introduction, while those already familiar with his writing will appreciate having these essays between two covers for the first time.</P>

SAMUEL R. DELANY's many prizes include the Hugo Award, the Nebula Award, and the William Whitehead Memorial Award for a lifetime's contribution to gay and lesbian literature. Wesleyan has published both his fiction and nonfiction, including Atlantis: three tales (1995), Silent Interviews: On Language, Race, Sex, Science Fiction, and Some Comics (1994) and Longer Views: Extended Essays (1996). The press has also reissued his classic science fiction and fantasy novels Dhalgren (1996), Trouble on Triton (1996, originally published as Triton), and the four-volume Return to Nevèrÿon series. Delany's non-Wesleyan books include Times Square Red, Times Square Blue (1999), The Mad Man (1995), They Fly atÇiron (1993), and The Motion of Light in Water (1987).

Preface: On Creativity and Academic WritingI. Part One: Some Queer Thoughts: The Rhetoric of Sex/ The Discourse of Desire1. Street Talk/ Straight Talk2. On the Unspeakable3. Coming/ Out4. A Bend in the Road5. The "Gay" Writer/ "Gay Writing"…?6. The Black Leather in Color Interview7. The Thomas L. Long Interciew8. Part Two: The Politics of the Paraliterary: Neither the First Word nor the Last on Deconstruction, Structuralism, Poststructuralism, and Semiotics for SF Readers1. The Para•doxa Interview: Inside and Outside the Canon2. The Politics of Paraliterary Criticism3. Zalazny/ Varley Gibson- and Quality4. Pornography and Censorship5. The Making of Hogg6. The Phil Leggiere Interview :Reading The Mad Man7. The Second Science-Fiction Studies Interview: Of Trouble on Triton and Other Matters8. Part Three: Some Writing/Some Writers : Antonia Byatt's Possession: A Romance1. Neil Gaiman, I, II, and III2. A Tribute to Judith Merril3. Michael Perkins's Evil Companions4. Now It's Time for Dale Peck5. Othello in Brooklyn6. A Prefatory Notice to Vincent Czyz's Adrift in a Vanishing City7. Under the Volcano with Susan Sontag8. Some Remarks on Narrative and Technology or: Poetry and Truth