SFWA author page</a> or, in French, her <a href=https://strangehorizons.com/wordpress/author/lisabeth-vonarburg/"http://www.noosfere.org/heberg/auteurstf3/sommaire.asp?site=58%22>website.%22 />
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Born to life in 1947 (France), and to science-fiction in 1964. Teaches French Literature and Creative Writing on and off at various universities in Quebec (since immigration, in 1973). “Fulltime writer” since 1990, (despite PhD. in Creative Writing, 1987), i.e. translator, SF convention organizer, literary editor (Solaris magazine), essayist. Still managed to publish fifteen novels and eight short stories collections in French, two in English (Slow Engines of Time, Blood Out of A Stone). Five novels translated in English, (The Silent City, In the Mothers' Land aka The Maerlande Chronicles—1993 Philip K. Dick’ s Special Award and a finalist of the 1993 Tiptree Award —Reluctant Voyagers, Dreams of the Sea (Tyranaël I, 2003), A Game of Perfection (Tyranaël 2, 2005) ; other translations in German. The more recent novels, Reine de Mémoire (2005-2007, five books), received four major awards in Quebec. Numerous short stories published in French and English. Also writes for children and YA. More than thirty awards in France, Canada, Quebec and the States, among which the Grand prix de la SF française ((1982), le Grand Prix de la SF et du fantastique québécois (three times), le Philip K. Dick Special Award, le Prix du Conseil québécois de la Femme en littérature (1998, a one-time literary award given by the Quebecois Council for Women’s Affairs on its twentieth anniversary), and seven Aurora awards (last one for Reine de Mémoire 5, 2007).

More information can be found at her SFWA author page or, in French, her website.


Élisabeth Vonarburg in our archives
Current Issue
16 Mar 2026

The garden is the resting place of your vulnerabilities; there’s a reason you’ve left them here instead of carrying them with you. Typically you enter hardened and hurried, beelining straight for the correct plot and quickly releasing whatever is clutched in your hand without a second thought—today, an attempted weaving of leather and lace, strength and suppleness that your body cannot figure out how to wear, nor your words to narrate.
If you say there are rats, I will believe you, though I don’t hear or see them.
A ruffling of branches as they resettle for the night. We dare not ask why they are here.
Spec Fic and the Politics of Identity 
As part of a collective of African writers who have created an Afrocentric Sauútiverse of five planets, two suns and a spirit moon, a world of science and fantasy, where there is no written language, we play with technology and sound magic to scrutinise the world as we know it, and use speculative fiction as a response to our world. 
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