Swedish Academy of Science Fiction Award

Swedish Academy of Science Fiction

In Swedish, "Svenska akademin för science fiction", this organization was started in 1964 by Ingvar Svensson, a biochemist at the Wallenberg Laboratories of Uppsala University and a very active fan. Initially, in 1963, Svenssons notion was just to express his appreciation of a specific fan publication: the first, mimographed edition of Sam J. Lundwall's bibliography of sf and fantasy in Swedish. Svensson consequently in the fall of 1963 presented Lundwall with a diploma called the Nobel Prize in Science Fiction.

However, on closer reflection, Svensson decided to actually form an "Academy of Science Fiction". in order to award diplomas for commendable serious contributions to the study of sf, and to otherwise "preserve and contribute to the literary and scientific values of science fiction, and to help timulare cooperative research into sf and its fandom". To do this, the idea was to also publish an annual volume ofboth ongoing encyclopedic entries and longer essays.

With this aim, the "Academy" was formed in early 1964, consisting of Ingvar Svensson himself as well as four other active fans: Leif Andersson, Christer Landergren, Sam J. Lundwall, and Lars-Olov Strandberg. In 1966, Roland Adlerberth was also elected to the academy.

The Academy Award was presented from 1964 and on. However the intended annual publication had only two mimeographed volumes, in 1964 and 1966. The first, entitles, Skandifandom, was an impressive volume of 154 pages; the second, Skandifandom Annual 1964-65, added 86 pages.

After a period of no activity apart from the awards, new members were elected in 1973, when Sam J. Lundwall and Christer Landergren left the group. Instead, Göran Bengtson, John-Henri Holmberg, Mats Linder and Bertil Mårtensson were elected. This however had no noticeable effect on the activities of the Academy, and nothing further was heard of it after its last annual award was presented at the 1976 ScanCon in Stockholm.

The award itself was presented to:

1963: Sam J. Lundwall 1964: Dénis Lindbohm 1965: no award 1966: Jannick Storm, Denmark 1967: John-Henri Holmberg 1968: Bertil Mårtensson 1969: Mats Linder 1970: Jon Bing, Norway 1971: no award 1972: Hans Arnold 1973: Göran Bengtson 1974: Carl Johan Holzhausen 1975: Tor Åge Bringsværd, Norway 1976: Sven Christer Swahn