Colin Wilson is a cult English science fiction writer of the late 20th - early 21st century. The most famous cycle is "Spider World", which still remains one of the best works of the genre. In this article we will talk about the biography of the writer and his books.
Biography
Colin Wilson was born on June 26, 1931 in a town called Leicester (Great Britain, county Leicestershire). At 16, a difficult marital status forced him to drop out of school and go to work in a factory. Then he had to change several duty stations, he managed to be a clerk in the tax administration, serve in the Royal Air Force, as well as a magazine dealer in Paris. In his spare time, everything went into creative work.
Since 1954, Wilson began to earn a living as a writer. The first book was published in 1956, it was called "Outsider" and brought the author a real success. This inspired the writer to continue his literary career. However, Wilson did not stop there.
In the 60s, the writer begins to teach at universities. So, he lectured at Hollins College (USA), at the University of Washington (Seattle), the Mediterranean Institute in Mallorca, Rutgers University (New Brunswick, New Jersey).
In the last years of his life he lived in solitude in his cottage in the county of Cornwall. The writer died on December 5, 2013.
Creation
In 1967, Colin Wilson published one of his most popular books - it was a science fiction novel called "Parasites of Consciousness." However, the cycle “Spider World”, of which the first part was released in 1987, certainly brought the most popularity. The series quickly became a cult. Later, other science fiction writers began to finish it, as often happens with popular art sagas.
In different periods of his life he was fond of music, sociology, criminology, occultism, philosophy, literary criticism, sexology. Many books have also been written on all these topics. However, most of them have not been translated into Russian.
Colin Wilson, Spider World
Let's talk about the most famous saga of the writer. As we already said, the series was continued by other science fiction writers, but here we will only consider original books written by Wilson himself.
So, the world of the cycle is the future after a global cataclysm, which not only changed the climate on the planet, but also led to the evolutionary leap of arachnids. Now on planet Earth spiders dominate. People are forced to hide from them, but every year they are becoming less and less, since the Arachnids constantly need slaves and food. In addition, spiders are endowed with telepathic abilities and are able to penetrate the consciousness of people. As you can see, Colin Wilson came up with a rather original plot.
"Spider World" includes 4 parts:
- "Tower";
- "Delta";
- "Mage";
- "Land of ghosts."
The protagonist of the cycle is Niall, one of those who are hiding from the pursuit of spiders. Suddenly, his telepathic abilities open up, and now he is already able to penetrate the head of arachnids, and not vice versa. You can find out what the confrontation between humans and spiders will lead to by reading the series.
Note that relatively recently began the translation of works written by Colin Wilson. Books (The Spider World in particular) by the writer, however, quickly gained high marks from Russian readers and gained popularity among science fiction fans.
The series "Space Vampires"
This is the last saga of the writer, translated into Russian. Colin Wilson began writing it in 1976. In total, it includes two novels: “Space Vampires” and “Metamorphoses of Vampires”.
This time, the author chose the field of space science fiction for himself, including characters vampires atypical for this genre. True, this time the origin of blood-sucking monsters are alien.
Other works
He wrote many other works in the genre of science fiction Colin Wilson. The author’s books have always been very popular, but here we give only 2 of the most famous cycles.
So, the “Outsider” series was Colin's first literary experience, which immediately brought him the glory of an excellent writer. In total, it includes 7 novels, the first was written in 1956, and the last in 1966.
And the second cycle worth mentioning, Gerard Sorm, includes just three novels. Years of writing - from 1960 to 1970. Refers to the genre of erotic-philosophical novel, includes elements of mysticism and detective story.