Acclaimed author Howard Waldrop passed away on January 15, 2024 in Austin, Texas at the age of 77 after complications from a stroke. Waldrop, who is recognized by many to be one of the best short story writers in SFF, was known for works including 1980’s “The Ugly Chickens,” a story about how the dodo became extinct in the South, which won the Nebula and World Fantasy awards that year.
Waldrop was born in Houston, Mississippi on September 15, 1946, but moved to Weatherford, Texas when he was four years old. He lived in Texas for most of his life, and was a founding member of the state’s Turkey City Writer’s Workshop, a program founded in 1973 that is seen as the locus for the cyberpunk subgenre.
Waldrop’s first published genre work was “Lunchbox,” which appeared in the May 1972 issue of Analog. His first novel was 1974’s The Texas-Israeli War: 1999, which he co-authored with Jake Saunders. That story took place in a post-World War III dystopian future where 90 percent of the population had been killed.
Waldrop, however, is best known for his short fiction. In addition to “The Ugly Chickens,” he’s also known for 1987’s “Night of the Cooters,” which Vincent D’Onofrio adapted as a 2022 film short that he directed and starred in, with George R.R. Martin producing. In over 50 years he published more than 80 short stories, and had several collections published, including Strange Monsters of the Recent Past, Night of the Cooters: More Neat Stories, Horse of a Different Color: Stories and, most recently, 2023’s H’ard Starts: The Early Waldrop. In 2021, Waldrop received the World Fantasy Award for Lifetime Achievement.
“Most people reading my writing think I’m like a buffoon, you know, blowing off my bazoo just by the writing,” Waldrop said in a 2017 interview with The Austin Chronicle. “I don’t use it to hide, but people reading it can probably figure out what I’m about. But I don’t set out to do that. Most people write to show off. I write because I don’t know anything else.”
