Before I look at several folks born on this date, please indulge me by allowing me to explain one of the reasons I do these posts.

No, it’s not because I have nothing else to say.  Anyone who has been reading this blog for a while should know that usually isn’t the case.  (Well, okay, maybe a little.)

One of the main reasons I do these posts are for historical reasons.  The fields of science fiction, fantasy, horror, and weird fiction have long histories. Aside from a few well-known authors such as Lovecraft, Howard, Asimov, Clarke, and a few others, most of the writers of the past are unknown to the general reading public.

Why does this matter, you ask?  Because every few years some new writer will write a novel/short story/screenplay/ransom note/etc that young readers, critics, and other writers will hail as original and groundbreaking.  Only it won’t be.  It will have been done years or decades before by someone else.  And usually done better, although YMMV as to how much better.  The new work will be shinier, have more up to date technology, and express the correct sociopolitical opinions du jour.  But the central conceit will be anything but original.

IOW, those who fail to learn from the past are doomed to repeat it.  Case in point the undead myth that women weren’t represented in the field before [insert year of speaker’s birth here].  This is one of those myths that just won’t die, in spite of some of us trying to put a stake in its heart.

There was a conversation that came across my Twitter feed yesterday (and is probably still going on for all I know; I am on Twitter sporadically these days) in which someone stated that Asimov, Clarke, and Heinlein came to dominate the science fiction field in their later years while many writers contemporary to the time these three did their most well-known work and were just as admired and respected became forgotten.  And while this topic is better suited for another post, part of what I’m trying to do with these birthday posts is to prevent some of these formerly well-respected but now obscure writers from being completely forgotten.

So, with that in mind, here are today’s birthdays.

Hugh B. Cave

First, Hugh B. Cave (b. July 11, 1910).  Cave was a writer for a variety of pulps, including horror, fantasy, adventure, romance, and detective.  A correspondent during WWII, after the war he owned a coffee plantation in Jamaica.  He continued writing during this period, contributing women’s fiction (i.e., romance) to the slick magazines as well as writing novels.

When Karl Edward Wagner and David Drake launched Carcosa Press in the 1970’s, one of the authors they published was Hugh B. Cave.  Murgunstruumm and Others collected Cave’s horror and fantasy from the pulps.  The book won a World Fantasy Award in 1978.

Cave was an early champion of ebooks, and many of his works are available in electronic format today, so check him out.

Cordwainer Smith

Next we have Cordwainer Smith (real name Paul Myron Anthony Linebarger, b. 1913).  There has never been a science fiction writer like Cordwainer Smith.  He had one of those unique voices, like R. A. Lafferty or Avram Davidson, that no one has successfully imitated.  Most of Smith’s work falls into the series known as The Instrumentality of Mankind.  It’s a sprawling, far future epic filled with space travel, genetically modified people and animals, and all sorts of bizarre and odd things.  Smith has a small group of fans active on Twitter, so he’s completely forgotten.  If you’ve never read him, here’s a good place to start.

The last birthday I want to mention isn’t that of a writer, but of an artist.  The name Roy G. Krenkel (b. 1918) should be familiar to most of you.  I’ll close with a few of his works.