Byron Price

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Byron Preiss (born April 11, 1953 in Brooklyn , New York, USA; † July 9, 2005 in East Hampton , New York, USA) was an American publisher , book packager , game developer and author .

Live and act

Preiss studied at the Universities of Pennsylvania (graduating in 1972) and Stanford and then worked for a short time as a teacher at an elementary school in Philadelphia. In the 1970s he worked for the television series Sesame Street and children's programs for the TV station ABC before founding Byron Preiss Visual Publications in 1979 . Further companies were founded, including Byron Preiss Video Productions and, in 1992, Byron Preiss Multimedia . In 2005, Preiss died in a traffic accident.

Preiss published books by Jane Goodall , Billy Crystal , Jerry Seinfeld and Jay Leno as well as several graphic novels . He published several science fiction, horror and fantasy anthologies, for example The Ultimate (from 1991) and Weird Heroes (1975-1977).

Byron Preiss Video Productions developed several computer games in the 1980s, including the text adventures Rendezvous with Rama , Fahrenheit 451 and Dragonworld published by Telarium , as well as the text adventure Treasure Island published by Windham Classics . Fahrenheit 451 were developed by Preiss himself together with the science fiction writer Ray Bradbury , who wrote the novel. Dragonworld was created on the basis of a fantasy novel written by Preiss together with Michael Reaves .

As an author, Preiss has written several comic books and novels (mainly from the genres of crime , fantasy and science fiction ) as well as non-fiction.

In obituaries, Byron Preiss was recognized as a pioneer of electronic publishing ("a pioneer in digital publishing"). He was one of the first publishers to publish CD-ROMs and e-books. As an author, he played an important role in the development of the modern graphic novel.

Works (selection)

  • Chandler , Pyramid Books 1976 (with the comic artist Jim Steranko)
  • Schlomo Raven, Public Detective , Pyramid Books 1976 (together with the comic artist Tom Sutton)
  • Starfawn , Pyramid Books 1976 (together with comic artist Stephan Fabian)
  • Dragonworld , Bantam Books 1979 (with co-author Michael Reaves)
  • The Secret , 1982 - illustrated by John Jude Palencar
  • Battlestar Galactica , 1999

literature

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ See Sharon Darling: Byron Preiss and Ronald Martinez. Trillium Software Developers . In: Compute! S Gazette, Issue 18, December 1984, pp. 52-58 (56).
  2. ↑ See Sharon Darling: Byron Preiss and Ronald Martinez. Trillium Software Developers . In: Compute! S Gazette, Issue 18, December 1984, pp. 52-58 (54).
  3. ↑ a b cf. Steven Zeitchik: Byron Preiss: 'He Saw Books Where Other People Didn't' . Obituary in: Publishers Weekly, July 15, 2005
  4. ↑ a b c Cf. NN: Byron Preiss, 52, Digital Publishing Pioneer, Dies . Obituary in The New York Times, July 11, 2005
  5. ↑ See Mark Frauenfelder: The Way of Comics . In: Wired , Issue 1.05, November 1993
  6. ↑ See the overview of the anthologies in the Internet Speculative Fiction Database
  7. ↑ See Sharon Darling: Byron Preiss and Ronald Martinez. Trillium Software Developers . In: Compute! S Gazette, Issue 18, December 1984, pp. 52-58.
  8. ↑ See the overview of his works in the Internet Speculative Fiction Database
  9. ^ A Masquerade- style puzzle book by Kit Williams, 1979; Of the 12 treasures hidden by Preiss across the United States, only two have so far been found (Chicago 1983, Cleveland 2004; status 2019);
    The quest to find 12 hidden treasures from a 1982 treasure hunt book. boingboing.net; See The Secret (a treasure hunt). Fan Wiki.
personal data
SURNAME Preiss, Byron
BRIEF DESCRIPTION American publisher, book packager, game developer, and author
DATE OF BIRTH April 11, 1953
PLACE OF BIRTH Brooklyn , New York, USA
DATE OF DEATH July 9, 2005
Place of death East Hampton (New York) , USA