Photo courtesy of batwrangler via Flickr.
By Jude Barrera ’24
The literary science fiction Hugo Awards stirred up major controversy this year with the disqualification of two of science fiction’s biggest hits of last year: R.F. Kuang’s speculative novel “Babel” and Xiran Jay Zhao’s “Iron Widow” were disqualified despite having the votes to qualify in the awards.
For over 60 years, the Hugo Awards have run in conjunction with the World Science Fiction Convention, or Worldcon, to recognize exemplary works in the science fiction and fantasy genre. Unlike other awards, the Hugos are open to be voted on by all members of the World Science Fiction Society, not just by specialized committees.
The 2023 Hugo Awards were held in Chengdu, China, on Oct. 21. Typically, voting statistics are released a few days after Worldcon, though the guidelines state that voting statistics must be shown at most 90 days after winners are announced. This year, the committee waited for nearly the full 90 days, releasing the final nomination statistics on Jan. 20, 2024.
When the statistics were published, fans noted that several nominations on the final ballot were disqualified with no explanation. Among them, Xiran Jay Zhao, nominated in the Astounding Best New Writer category and R.F Kuang’s “Babel, Or The Necessity of Violence,” which originally picked up a nomination for Best Novel, drew much attention for their disqualification.
Zhao and Kuang are both from the Chinese diaspora, and each of their respective novels explores aspects of Chinese identity. Other non-Chinese nominees were disqualified, including an episode of the Sandman series and popular fan writer and critic Paul Weimer.
“Babel’s” voting statistics drew scrutiny from fans. The Hugo ballot runs on a preferential system, where voters can rank their choices, and nominees can gain points as other nominees are eliminated. Yet, on the released voting statistics, “Babel” remained at a stagnate score of 164.93 until it was eliminated in the second to last round.
Stagnation in votes is more common for finalists in the lower rankings, yet “Babel” ranked third in the general voting. Notably, ballots are counted again once the short list of finalists is decided.
“Babel” has previously won a Nebula Award and a Locus Award, two other prestigious literary awards in science fiction. The Locus Awards, like the Hugos, are based on fan votes, with subscribers of the magazine “Locus” comprising the voter base. Following this, it was anticipated that “Babel” would be a frontrunner for the 2023 Hugos.
Other disqualifications, like the team of the movie “Prey” denying a nomination, or a work published in an ineligible year, were clearly stated in the nomination statistics. However, there is no evidence that this was the case for “Babel” or Zhao.
The ambiguity around the disqualifications and the content of the books raised questions of political censorship by the Chinese government of both work and author. “Babel” deals with the imperial relationship between the United Kingdom and China in the 1800s, and Xiran Jay Zhao has previously been critical of the Chinese government.
Both authors released statements following the release of the nomination statistics expressing confusion and disapproval at their disqualifications. In her statement posted on Bluesky and Instagram, Kuang stated, “Until [an explanation] is provided that explains why the book was… [ineligible for] the Hugos, I assume this was a matter of undesirability rather than ineligibility.”
On TikTok, Zhao posits, “Which rules did we break? Which articles of the [Hugo’s] constitution?” At the time, no detailed explanation had been provided, and committee members dismissed concerned fans who questioned the decision on Facebook. On Jan. 30, two committee members stepped down from the board of directors of Worldcon Intellectual Property, the nonprofit corporation that runs Worldcon, and two other members were censured in the statement from WIP.
On Feb. 14th, nearly a month after the nomination stats were released, emails leaked by Diane Lacey, a member of the Hugo administration team, became public and revealed that the awards committee initiated the attempts to disqualify candidates rather than disqualifications coming from pressure from the hosts or governing bodies. Dave McCarty, the overall administrator of the 2023 committee, had emailed the entire committee to ask them to “highlight anything of a sensitive political nature,” noting “work [focusing] on China, Taiwan, Tibet” as specific indicators for review.
For categories that awarded people rather than specific bodies of work, committee members dug through social media posts on X, formerly known as Twitter, and Patreon. Notably, author Paul Weimer was flagged for traveling to Tibet. In an interview with NBC News, after the emails were leaked, Weimer clarified that he had traveled to Nepal, not Tibet.
Similarly, “Babel” and “The Daughter of Doctor Moreau” by Sylvia Moreno Garcia, who was ultimately deemed eligible, were flagged for mentions of China, and the committee member who flagged both novels admitted to not having read either of them.
Another member flagged Xiran Jay Zhao and, in their three-sentence long email, managed to misspell Zhao’s name as “Zhou” and “Zhoa.” They also incorrectly referenced Zhao’s debut novel as “The Iron Giant” rather than its actual title, “Iron Widow,” a mistake that led Zhao to change their profile picture on X to a still from the movie “The Iron Giant.”
In the release of the emails, it is noted that one committee member was carbon copied but had never replied to any emails concerning the censorship. Lacey sent the emails exchanged between committee members to writers and Hugo finalists Chris M. Barkley and Jason Sanford, who created a cumulative report of the controversy.
Lacey included a statement of apology to Barkley and Sanford, dated Jan. 25. In her statement, she expressed that McCarty had waited the full 90 days to release statistics so that the “Chinese nationals would be safe from the ensuing uproar.”
The 2024 Hugo Awards are set to be held in Glasgow, Scotland, featuring none of the previous committee members. The Glasgow committee published a statement committing to full transparency on nomination statistics.