The Langford RAQ (Rarely Asked Questions)

Who is this David Langford anyway? A little-known British freelance writer living in Reading, England, who has won inexplicably many science fiction awards and publishes an sf newsletter called Ansible. Hence the Langford web site which tells you more than you could possibly wish to know about me is at ansible.uk.

Why Ansible, and where is it? The name is lifted from a faster-than-light communications gadget which was described in Ursula K. Le Guin's sf novels as far back as the 1960s, and later pinched by Orson Scott Card and others (notably Vernor Vinge and Elizabeth Moon) for their sf. Current and back issues of Ansible itself live at news.ansible.uk, and several questions about submissions and listing policy are answered on the FAQ page there. About my tiny software company Ansible Information, and the even more obscure publishing outfit Ansible E-ditions, the less said the better.

Where does this mysterious freelance writing actually appear? There used to be several regular and irregular Langford magazine columns, most frequently for SFX and Interzone, with occasional sallies into Fortean Times and The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction. I also reviewed books for SFX, the Sunday Telegraph magazine and, rarely, New Scientist. Since about 2005 I've been writing for and editing The Encyclopedia of Science Fiction, Third Edition, which launched online in October 2011. This has eaten my life, and as of mid-2016 I'm writing regularly only for Interzone.

Is there a Langford bibliography? Oh all right, since you insist ... but for the sake of sanity let's deport it to another page and separate the books, the short stories, the miscellaneous non-fiction (including magazine columns) and the fanzines. Also, the Immodesty Page goes into embarrassing detail about awards.

Is there anything that people do frequently ask you? The following questions actually arise from time to time ...