John-Henri Holmberg

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John-Henri Holmberg at Loncon 3, 2014.
Photo by Mark Olson.

(June 22, 1949 –)

John-Henri Holmberg is a Swedish fan (from age 13), writer, publisher, critic and translator. In the 1960s and 1970s, he edited (alone or in tandem with Bertil Mårtensson and/or Mats Linder or with Per Insulander) 17 issues of Science Fiction Forum; in all he has published over 250 fanzines of his own. He has sometimes used the penname Carl Brandon, Jr., in homage to Carl Brandon. He was GoH at Helsinki, the 2017 Worldcon.

He led clubs and chaired several conventions: Stockon 5, 1965, Stockon 6, 1968, Fancon 70, 1970, Fancon 2, 1974, and Scancon 76 in 1976. He was a member of the Stockholm in 1976 and Stockholm in 1980 Worldcon bids, and was co-editor of Asgard. With fellow fans Mats Linder and Bertil Mårtensson he formed the humorously and satirically intended Witterhetssellskapet Din Vän Fandom, which translates as "The Belles-Lettres Society Your Friend Fandom"; its main activity consisted of publishing satirical oneshot fanzines, but it also ceremoniously awarded silly prizes accompanied by diplomas in Latin. One of the fans with whom he worked was fellow Swede Stieg Larsson. He has continued his fannish life alongside his professional career as editor, publisher, critic and translator. A critic and writer also on crime fiction, in 2007 he was elected to the Swedish Crime Fiction Academy.

He is a contributor to John Clute and Peter Nicholls' The Encyclopedia of Science Fiction and The Encyclopedia of Fantasy and the contributor on sf to the National Encyclopedia of Sweden, and is probably the major voice of both SF and fandom in Sweden. From 2004 until 2010 he has edited and published the resurrected Nova science fiction (which in its earlier incarnation he also edited from 1982 to 1987), the largest Scandinavian prozine. With fellow fans Per Insulander and John Ågren in 1978 he formed Laissez-faire production, a corporation which performed editorial services and additionally published a line of original paperbacks; by the time the company was closed in 1988, it had produced or published around 75 sf titles. With Per Insulander, Holmberg in 1982 wrote Kvinnor i science fiction ["Women in sf"), a long essay plus short biographies and bibliographies of women sf authors; alone he published a short history of sf in 1974 and in 2004-2005 a major two-volumen critical and historical overview of sf literature entitled Inre landskap och yttre rymd ("Inner Landscapes and Outer Space").


In 1986, he published Fandom Harvest, a collection of Terry Carr's fanwriting, under the Laissez Faire Produktion imprint.

Entry in The Encyclopedia of Science Fiction.

Fanzines and Apazines:

Awards, Honors and GoHships:


Person 1949—
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