Sunday, November 3, 2013

The Oklahoma Troll

'Lafferty?  Lafferty?  He's that Oklahoma troll who's been bamboozling us for years with his indescribable and impossible stories.  (Who but Lafferty would write a story whose main characters are a ghost, a sawdust-filled doll, and an Australopithecus?)  His work has been published all over the lot, though he's best known outside the science-fiction world for his powerful novel of the American Indians, Okla Hannali. An issue of New Dimensions wouldn't be complete without him.'

-Robert Silverberg, intro blurb to Lafferty's story 'Animal Fair' in New Dimensions IV (1974)
'It was all strong talk with the horns and hooves still on it.'
(R. A. Lafferty, The Devil is Dead)