"Neat Sheets" by James Tiptree, Jr.



			Neat Sheets The Poetry of James Tiptree, Jr.

Available as a paperbound chapbook for $6.50.
Introduction by Karen Joy Fowler.
Find out how to get a copy on our order information page.

Jacket design and illustration by Freddie Baer

As James Tiptree, Jr., Alice Sheldon wrote many of the best science fiction stories to appear in the 1970s and 1980s, winning all the major awards the field had to offer. The poetry in this volume dates from an earlier period, written in the late 1940s and early 1950s (around the same time as her first article, "The Lucky Ones," appeared in the New Yorker). Emotional and full of vigor, Neat Sheets: The Poetry of James Tiptree, Jr., is a must for Tiptree lovers, shedding new light on one of science fiction's most enigmatic personalities and one of it's greatest writers.

The one thing in the world I wanted was something I'd done solo, all by myself, unhelped . . . on my own. I didn't believe I could, I was almost too frightened to try. So can you see why I wanted those stories to flutter over the transom and into the slushpile all on their own, without a nod or a smile from any living soul? Without even a person behind them - in those days I still had a bit of physical charm left, and I'd learned the hundred ways in which the destiny of a pretty woman differs from a plain one - sad but true. (And that applies to men too, god help them).
- Alice Sheldon (James Tiptree, Jr.) from an interview in Locus

You can also find out about the James Tiptree, Jr. Award, which is given to the work of science fiction or fantasy published in one year which best explores or expands gender roles.

Photo by Patti Penet


	Tiptree was one of the most original writers ever in a field that values originality above all things. These early poems are intriguing, suggestive, and essential to all serious fans of her work. *- Michael Swanwick* James Tiptree was one of the best short story writers of the last half of the twentieth century. *- Gardner Dozois* The Poetry has a heightened sense of emotionalism, a clear message of isolationism and loneliness, a disappointed romanticism, and the occasional lash of a sharp wit. - from the introduction by Karen Joy Fowler . . . phrases such as "I am burned to a fine white bone of truth" and "'Life ' is just another name for agony" speak of pure Sheldonian anguish. Read and weep. *- Isaac Asimov's Science Fiction Magazine* Some of the poems are powerful and lucid. Others probably had private meaning. They form a footnote to a significant career. *- Aboriginal Science Fiction* Alice Sheldon was one of the most charming and involving people to grace the science fiction field with their presence in modern times. She was enchanting both in person and in her fiction. She won, and deserved to win, the Nebula and the Hugo for short fiction and was many times a nominee, producing a body of work in the 1970s that is unexcelled in range, variety, and depth. She invented cyberpunk in "The Girl Who Was Plugged In. " She wrote "The Women Men Don't See, " which is arguably the greatest feminist science fiction story. She had the respect and admiration of her peers and the love of her readers, and yet she never rested on her laurels, always teaching herself new techniques, working for years to write in persons and verb tenses other than third and past to achieve her effects. - David Hartwell


	Books by James Tiptree, Jr. Ten Thousand Light-Years from Home (1973) Warm Worlds and Otherwise (1975) (recommended) Star Songs of an Old Primate (1978) (recommended) Up the Walls of the World (1978) novel Out of the Everywhere and Other Extraordinary Visions (1981) Byte Beautiful (1985) Brightness Falls from the Air (1986) novel Tales of the Quintana Roo (1986) Crown of Stars (1988) Her Smoke Rose Up Forever (1989) (recommended) Neat Sheets: The Poetry of James Tiptree, Jr. (1996) Books about Tiptree The Fiction of James Tiptree, Jr. by Gardner Dozois (1977)

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Last updated April 4, 1998.
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