Astounding Stories of Super-Science, November, 1930 Part 45

I, for one, favor a larger sized magazine with a five cent increase in price, or, at least, if the magazine must remain small, I would like to see a quarterly out on the third Thursday every three months.

I am extremely pleased to see that an interplanetary story by R. F. Starzl will appear in your next issue. Please have more of his stories if possible.--Forrest James Ackerman, 530 Staples Ave., San Francisco, Calif.

_Likes Present Size_

Dear Editor:

Best stories in the last two issues: C. D. Willard's "Out of the Dreadful Depths" (Excellent); Chas. W. Diffin's "The Moon Master" (Very Good); Sewell P. Wright's "Forgotten Planet" (Fairly Good).

I am a new reader, but interested in these kinds of stories. I am pleased to see that your readers criticize freely. A story that will please one reader will not interest another, perhaps, and it may not be the fault of the author's ability so much as that he doesn't like that type of story.

"Out of the Dreadful Depths," by C. Willard is the best story I've read for some time. I could not see a single way it could be improved. "The Moon Master," by Chas. Diffin was just as good but I didn't like the ending so well. I certainly hope Mr. Diffin will write more stories like it, especially using his same three leading characters. "The Forgotten Planet," by Mr. Wright, was well written and pretty good in spite of the fact that I don't like that type of story so well.

"Murder Madness," by Murray Leinster was well written and the characters interesting and real but I didn't like his subject. I hope for more and different stories from him.

"Earth, the Marauder," by Arthur J. Burks looks as though it was going to be a record winner for me--accomplish the impossible, and make a good story from a story of the future.

I don't like horror stories, crazy stories and stories written far into the future, as "Brigands of the Moon."

These stories make light of the vast distances of s.p.a.ce and are too weird, droll and fail to give a single shiver down my old backbone. They are strange and inhabited by strange people. No story can give the faintest idea of the s.p.a.ce between those mighty suns of the universe. Most of them have more imagination than scientific knowledge. "Earth, the Marauder," an exception.

I would much rather hear stories of primeval days of the lost Atlantis before Earth was populated with scientific beings, when the cave man looked up at the unknown, then so near to him. At the moon, which was then so close, and uninhabited by superior beings. Tales of superst.i.tion and all mystery stories of the unknown. I like interplanetary stories, if not written too far into the future.

I like the present size and shape of your magazine. Best wishes for the success of your magazine.--An Interested Reader, Goffstown, N. H.

_Likes_

Dear Editor:

I have just finished reading the July issue of Astounding Stories and I think every story is simply great, especially "The Terror of Air-Level Six." That sure is a story! "The Forgotten Planet" is a corker, too!

While reading the letters in "The Readers' Corner" I noticed that almost everyone has a hankering for Edgar Rice Burroughs' stories. Believe it or not, I'm wild about his stories myself and I'm looking forward to reading his stories in Astounding Stories. It won't make any difference if they'll be originals or reprints, so long as they're Burroughs!

Ray c.u.mmings is another one of my favorites and I always read his stories first. His "Brigands of the Moon" hit me in the right spot. "The Moon Master" in the June issue was also a very fine story.

Now about this argument about reprinted stories. I think that if, at least, one reprinted story appeared in each issue of Astounding Stories, it wouldn't hurt its reputation. Here are some reprints that hit the ceiling: "The War in the Air," by Wells; "Tarranto, the Conqueror,"

by c.u.mmings; "The Conquest of Mars," by Serviss. I'm sure the readers would enjoy reading them. But if you are persistent about avoiding reprints then we'll have to do without them.--Paul Nikolaieff, 4325 S. Seeley Ave., Chicago, Illinois.

_Wants Sequel_

Dear Editor:

I have read every issue of Astounding Stories though I can barely afford it. I like it very much. The best novels were, in order: 1. "The Moon Master"; 2. "Phantoms of Reality"; 3.

"Sp.a.w.n of the Stars"; 4. "Terror of Air-Level Six."

In the July issue you published a story, "Earth, the Marauder," which promises to be even better than the "Skylark of s.p.a.ce" that once came out in another magazine. I like Harl Vincent, Ray c.u.mmings, Arthur Burks, and Martian stories best. Interplanetary stories always agree with me.

Burroughs is an excellent author. I like his Martian books.

"The Beetle Horde" in the first two issues was very good.

But why not give a sequel about the other and more terrible creatures in the earth whom the madman spoke of? Fourth dimensionals are sometimes good. You should have reprints by Burroughs, c.u.mmings and Merritt. I am eagerly waiting for the next issue. Do not enlarge the magazine because I cannot afford it. Don't publish stories like "From an Amber Block."

They're rotten. Publish more future and interplanetary stories.--Joseph Edelman, 721 De Kalb Ave., Brooklyn, N. Y.

_Stands Pat_

Dear Editor:

I have read all the issues of A. S. since the date of publication and think that there is no other magazine like it on the market. I would like to offer a few suggestions contrary to most of your readers (i.e., Jack Darrow & Chas.

Barret):

1.--Keep magazine in present size and price.

2.--Issue it only once a month. If it was issued semi-monthly the writers would soon run out of ideas; and the readers would get sick of it if they read it so often anyway.

3.--Keep up the style of stories now running, i.e., keep the science a little in the background. Do not let it monopolize the story.

I get other magazines that do not follow the last mentioned rule and the result is the stories are full of machines going 10,000 miles per hour, etc.; pink, black, purple and eleventeen other colored rays. As a result the stories are drier than the Sahara Desert.

The ill.u.s.trations are fine (O.K.) as they are.--Walter O'Brien, 6 Hageman Pl., North Bergen, N. J.

_Trial by Readers_

Dear Editor:

When Astounding Stories first appeared on the newsstands, a brand new Science Fiction magazine, I was prejudiced against it as a compet.i.tor to the existing magazines--one that might carry an inferior quality of Science Fiction so closely approaching the supernatural as to practically disregard science. In a few cases, as with very good writers like A.

Merritt and H. P. Lovecraft, this is permissible, but, otherwise, not at all so. In the first issue, "The Stolen Mind" seemed to bear me out, but, then, there was "Tanks." I bought the next issue--much better! And then the third showed "The Soul Master," very well written, but not quite science, as related. Yet, "Cold Light" held me on, and "Brigands of the Moon." There is no danger of my dropping off now!

In the current issue, "Murder Madness" and "The Power and the Glory" stand out as mile-posts in the history of Science Fiction. The rest are not far behind, though, as a matter of fact, "Beyond the Heaviside Layer" and "Earth, the Marauder"

have more discernible flaws than the rest. Just for example, a layer of organic matter would raise Cain with astronomy, due to refraction. Air is bad enough. But the writing overwhelms the error. You have certainly a.s.sembled a group of excellent authors, new and old, and I am glad to see the promise of R. F. Starzl in the next issue. His "Madness of the Dust" is one of the most naturally written interplanetary stories I have read--logical and clear, just as it would happen to anybody.

And now for the big question--that of reprints. You seem to have already decided the answer, and have defended your action well, but I wonder if it is well enough. By far your best argument is your last--"authors must eat"--with which I have no quarrel at all. Still, one cla.s.sic serial a year, or at most two, might not prove too harmful. Following back, I reach a statement concerning "The Sat.u.r.day Evening Post." In the past it has published hundreds of the world's best stories, and never reprinted. True. But why? Because these stories are all available in book form, in libraries and book stores, in original or new editions or in the Grosset and Dunlap list of perpetually printed best sellers. It is possible to read them for years after publication. But try to find the past masterpieces of Science Fiction. With the exception of Burroughs' books, most were never printed in book form. Even books by Wells and Verne, cla.s.sics of their kind are gone, totally gone, even from the shelves of libraries. Many of Verne's best stories were never translated from the French. And the other cla.s.sics of which readers write, cla.s.sics familiar to most of us only by name and a few lucky tastes of others, newer works by the same authors, are absolutely gone--annihilated. Their best works are beyond the reach of the reader. Only by republication, in magazine or book, can they be revived in an age when they will be remembered and preserved--an age awake to science and Science Fiction. Other magazines are doing it, one or two to the year, and it may be that you need not reprint; but the reservoir of the past is large, and a few cannot drain it. This leads to your first argument, that better stories are being written to-day. They are--better than the average of the past--but not better than the cla.s.sics. It would be folly to say that because the short story is a modern development, and because Galsworthy or Walpole or Reimarch are better than the average of yesterday, to our present tastes, that the cla.s.sics of the past should be sc.r.a.pped.

The a.n.a.logy, I feel, is good. The cla.s.sics of general literature have their place in history. The cla.s.sics of Science Fiction should have theirs. There are dozens better than the general run of present work, by A. Merritt, Homer Eon Flint, George Allan England, Austin Hall, John Taine, Garret P. Serviss, Ralph Milne Farley, Ray c.u.mmings, and others that stood out in an age when Science Fiction was considered pure phantasy or imaginative "trash." In the present age, they would be still better, and this time they would not be lost to the world, for there are publishers and readers who would preserve them. You may adhere to your decision, but, to my mind, and, I think to far more than 1% of other minds, reprints of cla.s.sics are essential, actually vitally necessary. Try to find out what a ballot would show.

Again, from the author's point of view. Up to now, Burroughs has had all the breaks as to book publication. Now Ray c.u.mmings and others are being published. "An author must eat." Give him a chance, by reviving his best efforts, and bringing them to public attention, so that a publisher will find them worthy of publication. Most of the masters of Science Fiction are alive--give them a chance to eat. Too, a great many of the best modern authors are modern readers: ask them if they would be willing to see one of the best stories of the past re-issued each year, stories unpublished in existing magazines for ten years or more. I certainly hope you will alter your decision.

And now to reverse some other decisions of readers. The size is quite all right and very handy for binding purposes, Mr.

Mack to the contrary. Incidentally, the staples are so placed as to make binding simple. Also contrary to Mr.

Darrow, I prefer the artist Gould, to Wesso, for interior ill.u.s.trations, though Wesso is best for mechanical ill.u.s.trations. Incidentally, give us the name of the artist for each story, especially when the ill.u.s.trations are unsigned, as in the April issue. Wesso's best cover for you has been that for April, ill.u.s.trating "Monsters of Moyen."

It shows his best style very well.

As to my favorite type of Science Fiction, any kind, if well written, will do. As it happens, the king of authors, A.

Merritt, has a type all his own, as Mr. Bryant notes, which is unbeatable, and my favorite. However, at times, a good writer may fall down in his fundamental a.s.sumptions. I don't care where or how far he goes, so long as he starts with something that present-day science does not deny. Here is where "The Soul Master" fell down, and, even more so, "The Soul s.n.a.t.c.her." Better leave souls and astrals and egos alone, except in very, very rare cases, when an author turns up who can make you believe in them as mechanical ent.i.ties.

As a Science Fiction fan, a student of chemistry, and a hopeful author, I will probably write to "The Readers'

Corner" as often as I want to blow off steam regarding science or fiction or the way in which you are running the magazine. I hope I won't be considered an utter nuisance, and will be given a trial by jury--a jury of readers.--P.

Schuyler Miller, 302 So. Ten Broeck St., Scotia, New York.