Biography

Walter M. Miller Jr. was born on January 23, 1923 in New Smyrna Beach, Florida, USA. Walter M. was a writer, known for Captain Video and His Video Rangers (1949) and On the Edge (2001). Walter M. was married to Anna Louise Becker. Walter M. died on January 9, 1996 in Daytona Beach, Florida, USA.

Science fiction writer best known for his amazing, far-future post-apocalypse novel 'A Canticle for Leibowitz' (1960), which at this writing [2003] is still predicted by most in the field to remain one of the finest, most insightful SF works dealing with religion in a formal, critical, and yet compassionate way. Miller converted to Catholicism in 1947. After flying combat missions in WWII, he began publishing science fiction in 1951. His work was widely admired and thematically influential upon what followed. His Hugo Award-winning novelette "The Darfsteller" sounds in summary like just another story about robots replacing people, yet Miller's handling of it creates a deeply sympathetic and haunting Passion Play about an unemployed actor (the Darfsteller; the word is from the German) who sabotages an android so that he may act in one final performance. He was deeply mourned by fans after his suicide, which was attributed by many to depression caused by writer's block; he left a manuscript that was completed by the remarkable, quirky SF writer Terry Bisson: a sequel to 'Canticle' entitled 'Saint Leibowitz and the Wild Horse Woman'.