Russell Blackford is an Australian writer, philosopher, and critic, based for many years in Melbourne, Victoria. He was born in Sydney, and grew up in Lake Macquarie district, near Newcastle, NSW. He moved to Melbourne in 1979, but returned to Newcastle to live and work in 2009.
As a fiction writer, Blackford specialises in science fiction, fantasy and horror fiction. His work includes four novels published by iBooks, three of them forming an original trilogy (The New John Connor Chronicles) set in the world of the Terminator movies.
His non-fiction work frequently deals with issues involving science and society, particularly philosophical bioethics, cyberculture, transhumanism, and the history and current state of the science fiction genre. His work has appeared in many magazine, journals, and reference books, and has been featured most prominently in Quadrant, a monthly journal of literature and policy. It draws on his academic qualifications in a number of fields.
Blackford graduated with First Class Honours degrees in both Arts and Law from the University of Newcastle and University of Melbourne respectively. He also holds a Ph.D, also from Newcastle, on the return to myth in modern fictional narrative (as postulated by Northrop Frye). More recently, he completed a Master of Bioethics and a second Ph.D program (in philosophy), both at Monash University. According to his web site, he has sought to gain greater academic credibility in the debates in which he has become immersed, relating to emerging technologies and the human future.
The Tempting of the Witch King, Melbourne, Cory & Collins, 1983, ISBN 0-909117-18-7
The New John Connor Chronicles:
Dark Futures: Book One of Terminator 2: The New John Connor Chronicles, iBooks, August 2002, 336p, ISBN 0-7434-4511-2
An Evil Hour: Book Two of Terminator 2: The New John Connor Chronicles, iBooks, May 2003, 368p, ISBN 0-7434-5863-X
Times of Trouble: Book Three of Terminator 2: The New John Connor Chronicles, iBooks, September 2003, 384p, ISBN 0-7434-7483-X
Kong Reborn, ibooks, Inc. November 2005, 320p, ISBN 1-59687-133-4
Non-fiction books
Hyperdreams: Damien Broderick's Space/Time Fiction, Nimrod Publications, PO Box 170, New Lambton, NSW 2305, Australia, Babel Handbooks series on Fantasy and Science Fiction Writers 8, 1998, also available on Damien Broderick's unofficial web site.
Strange Constellations: A History of Australian Science Fiction (with Van Ikin and Sean McMullen), Greenwood Press, Contributions to the Study of Science Fiction and Fantasy, May 1999, 264p, ISBN 0-313-25112-6
Reviewed in: * "Science Fiction in Australia", by Michael Levy (Science Fiction Studies 27:1 (March,2000) "Russell Blackford ... among Australia’s most widely respected critics"
Editor
Why We Are Atheists, co-editor with Udo Schuklenk, 2009
Urban Fantasies, anthology of 13 stories, edited with David King, Ebony, 1985.
Contrary Modes, proceedings of the academic track of Aussiecon 2, edited with Jenny Blackford, Lucy Sussex and Norman Talbot, 1985.
Academic articles
"Judicial Power, Political Liberty and the Post-Industrial State." Australian Law Journal 71 (1997): 267-93.
"Thinking about Cloning: A Reply to Judith Thomson." Journal of Law and Medicine 9 (2001): 238-50.
"Stranger Than You Think: Arthur C. Clarke's Profiles of the Future." Prefiguring Cyberculture: An Intellectual History. Ed. Darren Tofts, Annemarie Jonson, and Alessio Cavellaro. Sydney: Power Publications, 2002; co-published Boston: MIT Press, 2003: 252-63.
"Try the Blue Pill: What's Wrong with Life in a Simulation?" Jacking In to the Matrix Franchise: Cultural Reception and Interpretation. Ed. Matthew Kapell and William Doty. New York: Continuum, 2004: 169-82.
"Should We Fear Death? Epicurean and Modern Arguments." Immortality Institute, ed. The Scientific Conquest of Death: Essays on Infinite Lifespans. Buenos Aires: LibrosEnRed, 2004: 257-69.
