Ellison's fantasy work, however, is usually better aligned with surrealism or magical realism than space opera-type science fiction. There is also a strong ethical current that runs through his work, half of which is nonfiction, which includes social activism and criticism of the arts.

He is fiercely protective of his work and has sought (and won) legal action against copyright infringements.

Biography
Ellison was born in Cleveland, Ohio, United States, on May 27, 1934. His Jewish-American family subsequently moved to Painesville, Ohio, but returned to Cleveland in 1949 following the death of Ellison's father. Ellison frequently ran away from home, taking odd jobs — including by the time he was eighteen, by his own account, "a tuna fisherman off the coast of Galveston, itinerant crop-picker down in New Orleans, hired gun for a wealthy neurotic, dynamite truck driver in North Carolina, short order cook, cab driver, lithographer, book salesman, floorwalker in a department store, door-to-door brush salesman, and spent ten years as an actor (off and on) with the Cleveland Play House".

Ellison briefly attended Ohio State University before dropping out. In 1955, Ellison moved to New York City to pursue a writing career, primarily in science fiction. Over the next two years, Ellison published more than 100 short stories and articles.

In 1957, Ellison decided to write about youth gangs. To research the issue, he joined a street gang in the Red Hook, Brooklyn area, under the name "Cheech Beldone". His subsequent writings on the subject include the novel Web of the City/Rumble and the collection The Deadly Streets, and comprise part of his memoir Memos from Purgatory.

Ellison was drafted into the army and served from 1957 to 1959. Afterwards, living in Chicago, Illinois, Ellison edited Rogue magazine. As a book editor at Regency Books, Ellison published novels and anthologies by such writers as B. Traven, Kurt Vonnegut, Robert Bloch and Philip José Farmer.

Also, early in his career, in the late '50s, he wrote a number of soft porn stories, such as "God Bless the Ugly Virgin" and "Tramp", later reprinted in Los Angeles based girlie journals. This was the beginning of his use of the Cordwainer Bird pseudonym. This name was later used in July and August of 1957, in two journals each of which had accepted two of his stories. In each journal, one story was published with author Harlan Ellison, the other with author Cordwainer Bird. Later, as discussed in the Controversy section below, the pseudonym was used on material by him with which the editing of or use of he disagreed.

He moved to California in 1962, and subsequently began to sell scripts to such television shows as Burke's Law, Route 66, The Outer Limits, Star Trek and Cimarron Strip. His Memos from Purgatory was adapted into an episode of Alfred Hitchcock Presents. Ellison's scripts "Demon with a Glass Hand" (for The Outer Limits) and "The City on the Edge of Forever" (for Star Trek) won Best Original Teleplay awards from the Writers Guild of America; both are often cited as one of the best of their respective series.

During the late 1960s, Ellison wrote a column about television for the Los Angeles Free Press. Titled "The Glass Teat", the column addressed political and social issues and their portrayal on television at the time. The columns have been reprinted in two collections, The Glass Teat and The Other Glass Teat.

He continued to publish short pieces, fiction and nonfiction, in various publications, and some of his most famous stories were written in this period. "'Repent, Harlequin!' said the Ticktockman" is a celebration of civil disobedience against repressive authority. "I Have No Mouth, and I Must Scream" is an allegory of Hell, where five humans are tormented by an all-knowing computer throughout eternity. "A Boy and his Dog" examines the nature of friendship and love in a violent, post-Apocalypse world. It was made into the film A Boy and His Dog in 1975 starring Don Johnson.

He has won the Hugo Award eight and a half times; the Nebula Award three times; the Bram Stoker Award, presented by the Horror Writers Association, five times (including the Lifetime Achievement Award in 1996); the Edgar Award of the Mystery Writers of America twice; the Georges Méliès fantasy film award twice; and was awarded the Silver Pen for Journalism by International PEN, the international writers' union. He was presented with the first Living Legend Award by the International Horror Guild at the 1995 World Horror Convention. He is also the only author in Hollywood ever to win the Writers' Guild of America Award for Most Outstanding Teleplay (solo work) four times, most recently for "Paladin of the Lost Hour" in 1987. In March 1998, the National Women's Committee of Brandeis University honored him with their 1998 Words, Wit, Wisdom award. In 1990, Ellison was honored by International PEN for continuing commitment to artistic freedom and the battle against censorship.

A rather famous and popular film can also be credited to Ellison, though he had to go to court to get the credit. Some aspects of the story for The Terminator were sufficiently similar to two episodes of the TV series The Outer Limits — both written by Ellison — that Ellison sued James Cameron. Ellison settled for several hundred thousand dollars, and the film's end credits now include the simple statement: "Acknowledgement to the works of Harlan Ellison." The episodes in question were called "Soldier" and "Demon with a Glass Hand".

"I Have No Mouth, and I Must Scream" was turned into a computer game with the same title, with Ellison providing the voice of the god-computer AM.

He also edited the influential science fiction anthology Dangerous Visions (1967), which collected stories commissioned by Ellison, accompanied by his commentary-laden biographical sketches of the authors. He challenged the authors to write stories at the edge of the genre, and Dangerous Visions is widely considered the greatest and most influential SF anthology of all time. Many of the stories went beyond the traditional boundaries of science fiction pioneered by respected old school editors such as John W. Campbell, Jr. As an editor, Ellison was influenced and inspired by experimentation in the popular literature of the time, such as the beats. A sequel, Again Dangerous Visions, was published in 1972. A third volume, The Last Dangerous Visions, controversially will probably never see print.

The screenplay for his projected television series The Starlost was also given a Writers Guild Award, though the actual series was so altered by the producers that Ellison had his name removed from the credits. Ellison was the first writer to win this award three times.

Ellison served as creative consultant to the science fiction TV series The Twilight Zone (1980s version) and Babylon 5. As a member of the Screen Actors Guild (SAG), he has voiceover credits for shows including The Pirates of Dark Water, Mother Goose and Grimm, Space Cases, Phantom 2040, and Babylon 5, as well as making an onscreen appearance in the Babylon 5 episode "The Face of the Enemy".

For two years beginning in 1986, Ellison took over as host of the radio program Hour 25 on KPFK after the death of Mike Hodel, the show's founder and original host. It has been reported that his inadvertent use of an expletive on air caused his departure from the show.

Ellison's 1992 novelette "The Man Who Rowed Christopher Columbus Ashore" was selected for inclusion in the 1993 edition of The Best American Short Stories.

Ellison was hired as a writer for Walt Disney Studios, but was fired on his first day after being overheard by Roy O. Disney in the studio commissary joking about making a pornographic animated film featuring Disney characters. He recounted this incident in his book Stalking the Nightmare, as part 3 of a section entitled "The 3 Most Important Things in Life".

He does all his writing on a manual Olympia typewriter.

Harlan Ellison has provided vocal narration to numerous Audiobooks, both of his own writing and others. Ellison has helped narrate books by authors such as Orson Scott Card, Aurthur C. Clarke, and Terry Pratchett. Ellison is currently married to Susan, his fifth wife, and they live in Los Angeles, California. In 1994 he suffered a heart attack and was hospitalized for quadruple coronary artery bypass surgery. In 2006, Harlan Ellison will receive the title of Grand Master given annually by the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America.

Controversy
Ellison has a reputation for being abrasive and rude (a dust jacket from one of his books described him as "possibly the most contentious person on Earth") and he is fiercely litigious. These traits have attracted a degree of controversy, especially among science fiction and fantasy fans. His friend Isaac Asimov remarked of Ellison that "Harlan uses his gifts for colorful and variegated invective on those who irritate him—intrusive fans, obdurate editors, callous publishers, offensive strangers." His outspoken reputation earned him a spot on the fledgling Sci-Fi Channel where he was given an opportunity to express his views on whatever he chose to talk about. Ellison's segments, of which some transcripts are available, were broadcast from 1994 to 1997. Some found this ironic, as Ellison has derided the term "sci-fi" as a "hideous neologism" that "sounds like crickets fucking," a comment to which Forrest J. Ackerman, who coined the term, responded by producing buttons bearing the slogan, "I love the sound of crickets making love."

As Guest of Honor at the 1978 WorldCon (Iguanacon) in Phoenix, Arizona, Ellison vowed that he would not spend a penny in a state which had not ratified the Equal Rights Amendment. During the convention, he used a recreational vehicle instead of staying in a convention hotel. He was also a participant in the 1965 March from Selma to Montgomery, led by Martin Luther King, Jr..

The Last Dangerous Visions, the third volume of the anthology series, has become something of a legend in science fiction as the genre's most famous unpublished book. Originally announced for publication in 1973, other work demanded Ellison's attention and the anthology has not seen print to date. He has come under criticism for his treatment of some writers who submitted their stories to him, of which some estimate to be nearly 150 (many of the authors have died in the subsequent three decades since the anthology was first announced). In 1993 Ellison threatened to sue New England Science Fiction Association (NESFA) for publishing Himself in Anachron, a short story written by Cordwainer Smith and sold to Ellison for the book by his widow,[1] but later reached an amicable settlement.[2] Noted British SF author Christopher Priest has critiqued Ellison's editorial practices in a widely-disseminated article titled The Book on the Edge of Forever.[3] Priest documented a half-dozen instances in which Ellison promised TLDV would appear within a year of the statement, but did not fulfill those promises. Ellison has a record of fulfilling obligations in other instances, including to writers whose stories he solicited, and has expressed outrage at other editors who have displayed poor practices.

In the 1980s, there was a widely-publicized incident in which Ellison allegedly assaulted author and critic Charles Platt at the Nebula Awards banquet. Platt did not pursue legal action against Ellison, and the two men signed a "non-aggression pact" later, promising never to discuss the incident again or have any contact with one another. In later years, however, Ellison often publicly boasted about the incident. Platt, too, has been less than absolute in adhering to the agreement.

Ellison has on occasion used the pseudonym "Cordwainer Bird" to alert members of the public to situations in which he feels his creative contribution to a project has been mangled beyond repair by others, typically Hollywood producers or studios. (See, e.g., Alan Smithee.) The "Cordwainer Bird" moniker is a tribute to fellow SF writer Paul M. A. Linebarger, better known by his pen name, Cordwainer Smith. The origin of the word "cordwainer" is shoemaker (from working with cordovan leather for shoes). The term used by Linebarger was meant to imply the industriousness of the pulp author. Ellison has said, in interviews and in his writing, that his version of the pseudonym was meant to mean "a shoemaker for birds". Since he has used the pseudonym mainly for works he wants to distance himself from, it may be understood to mean that "this work is for the birds". Stephen King once said he thought that it meant that Ellison was giving people who mangled his work a literary version of "the bird".

Ellison recently gained attention for his April 24, 2000 lawsuit against Stephen Robertson for posting four of his stories to the Usenet newsgroup alt.binaries.e-book without authorization. Included as defendants in the lawsuit were AOL and RemarQ, internet service providers whose involvement was running Usenet servers carrying the group in question and for failing to stop the alleged copyright infringers in accordance with the "Notice and Takedown Procedure" outlined in the 1998 Digital Millennium Copyright Act. Robertson and RemarQ settled the lawsuit with Ellison, though he pressed on with his suit against AOL. The AOL suit was settled in June 2004 under conditions which were not made public.

Ellison mentions his disbelief in, among other places, the introduction to his book Strange Wine. His story "The Deathbird" presents an alternate take on the biblical account of creation, wherein the snake is a Prometheus figure sent to deliver humanity the wisdom it will need to overcome the tyrannical rule of the insane being who calls himself God.
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On Tom Snyder's Tomorrow Show Ellison is purported to have said "I am so far beyond atheism, there isn't a word in the English language dictionary to describe me."

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"In an early class, one of the students asked me if I believed in God. I replied, 'I don't think so.' And then proceeded to wail on the theme, using material from this column of some weeks ago, in which I observed the perpetuation of insanity on this planet through the mediums of Arabs-vs-Jews, Catholics-vs-Protestants, Southern Baptists-vs-Everyone. I said I felt if 'God created man in his *own* image, in the image of God created he them,' (Genesis 2:27, King James's italics, not mine) then *we* were God. And when Man (*my* cap, not King James's) in his most creative, his most loving, his most gentle and most human, then he is most God-like. The student said he would pray for my immortal soul. He also asked for my address, so he could send me some literature on the subject of God. I thanked him politely and told him I'd gotten all the literature I could handle on the subject from a certain Thomas Aquinas."

--Harlan Ellison, from "The Glass Teat", Article #29

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In the clue book for the computer version of I Have No Mouth, and I Must Scream, Harlan is interviewed by J. Michael Straczynski(?)...

JMS: [...] do you believe that we are alone in the universe?

HE: Do I believe we are alone...How could I know? Look, I'm an atheist. People say to me, do you believe in God? No, I don't believe in God. Because all the Gods that they offer me are completely as crazy as AM in this game. Every god that I've ever heard of, with the exception...if I had to pick a religion, I'd pick Buddhism. Buddhism is a kindly religion. It says you got a chance...it's got humor, it's got wisdom, it says to be nice to each other. All the rest of them have gods that want to beat the crap out of you if you defy the rules. I don't believe that, I'm not an imbecile, I'm not a moron. I have to have some proof of something. When I look at Fundamentalists, I just want, I don't know, hit them in the kisser with a pie. But in fact they rule most of this country, which is kind of sad. I know we're really going to get in trouble on this tape. They're going to edit the hell out of this, god...you know the president of Cyberdreams will see this and his hair will stand on end. I am a pragmatist, I believe in Ockham's razor which says, 'go with the most logical answer, it's probably right.' Occasionally you get fooled, occasionally you get fooled. But we know there is no pelucidar in the center of the earth. We've gotten back seismic readings. We know. We know very well that...that ain't a face on Mars. I don't give a damn how many people, 'It's a face on Mars.' You know, your Momma's face is on Mars. All it is, is a shadow or whatever it is...a rock structure. There's no life on Mars. We may, eventually, someday find life or it may find us, but that's a long way off. It would seem to me it is more in our, more to our benefit to worry about how, learning how to live with each other, which we haven't learned how to do very well, since the dawn of recorded history...than worrying about how the hell were going to deal with creatures with pointy little heads that come down here and want to give us enemas. I hate being so rational, I know that people would love to have me say that, 'I believe that Whitley Streiber did get taken aboard a flying saucer.' No, I think Whitley Streiber, probably a very nice man, is self-delusional. I mean he really believes that by this time, and also it's made him quite a lot of money. But I don't think he did it for the money, I think he really actually believes that. The same way that Joan of Arc thought God talked to her. But God has more important things to do than talk to little French girls in jail. And has more things to do than give you hair growing on the palm on your hand if you masturbate.