{"id":1389,"date":"2018-10-15T11:58:12","date_gmt":"2018-10-15T16:58:12","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/adventuresfantastic.com\/futurespastandpresent\/?p=1389"},"modified":"2018-10-15T11:58:12","modified_gmt":"2018-10-15T16:58:12","slug":"two-birthdays-schmitz-and-tubb","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/adventuresfantastic.com\/futurespastandpresent\/two-birthdays-schmitz-and-tubb\/","title":{"rendered":"Two Birthdays, Schmitz and Tubb"},"content":{"rendered":"

Today, October 15, marks two more birthdays.\u00a0 James Schmitz (1911-1981) and E. C. Tubb (1919-2010).<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>Schmitz wrote space opera in the 1950s and 1960s, although he sold his first story, “Greenface” to Unknown in 1943.<\/p>\n

Most of Schmitz’s work is set in the Hub.\u00a0 While there are a variety of characters, the two principle recurring characters are Telzey Amberdon, a young woman with psi powers who tends to find herself in a jam on a regular basis, and Trigger Argee, an agent for the government.<\/p>\n

Neither lady is a damsel in distress.\u00a0 Both are competent and keep their heads in a crisis.\u00a0 They are usually able to rescuse themselves.\u00a0 If they can’t, they can at least hold out until help arrives.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>The Hub wasn’t the only universe Schmitz wrote about.\u00a0 His best known novel is The Witches of Karres, about a group of sisters escaping from slavery.\u00a0 Eric Flint and some of his coauthors have written at least one sequel.<\/p>\n

Schmitz quit writing in the early 70’s.\u00a0 I’m not sure why.\u00a0 I read somewhere years ago that when Ben Bova took over the editorial reigns of Analog<\/em> after John Campbell’s death, he told Schmitz he would publish anymore Telzey stories.\u00a0 I don’t know if that’s true or not.\u00a0 Can anyone verify that, or show that it’s not true?<\/p>\n

Regardless of the reason Schmitz hung up his typewriter, he was writing strong, competent women at a time where that wasn’t the norm.\u00a0 In this regard he was a pioneer.<\/p>\n

So why don’t we hear more about him and his works?<\/p>\n

It’s been nearly two decades since I last read Schmitz.\u00a0 Time to correct that.\u00a0 Schmitz’s works are available in inexpensive ebook editions from Baen.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>Next, the author of the Dumarest of Terra series, E. C. Tubb. Tubb was a British author who was quite prolific.\u00a0 Here in the US, he’s remembered as the author of the Dumarest series, and the rest of his work is pretty much unknown.<\/p>\n

I read the first of this series shortly after I finished graduate school.\u00a0 I liked it and intended to read more in the series.\u00a0 Another thing I’m going to need to correct.<\/p>\n

Dumarest believes he was born on a mythical planet named Earth.\u00a0 He stowed away on a spaceship when he was a boy, and now he wants to return home.\u00a0 Only he has no idea where home is.\u00a0 The series concerns his search for this allegedly mythical planet. Opposing him in this is a group called the Cyclan, who seem to want Earth’s location hidden.<\/p>\n

The series ran to 31 books.\u00a0 The series was initially published by Ace.\u00a0 DAW picked up the books at some point (probably when Wollheim left Ace) and published all but the final volume here in the States.\u00a0 I’m not sure why DAW didn’t publish the last book in the series.<\/p>\n

The premise lends itself to some good space opera, and I keep intending to read more of it.\u00a0 The books are currently available electronically, both individually and in omnibus editions.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Today, October 15, marks two more birthdays.\u00a0 James Schmitz (1911-1981) and E. C. Tubb (1919-2010).<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[812,296],"tags":[715,848,846,847],"class_list":["post-1389","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-baen-books","category-birthday","tag-baen-books","tag-daw-books","tag-e-c-tubb","tag-james-h-schmitz"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p3P5pJ-mp","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/adventuresfantastic.com\/futurespastandpresent\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1389","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/adventuresfantastic.com\/futurespastandpresent\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/adventuresfantastic.com\/futurespastandpresent\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/adventuresfantastic.com\/futurespastandpresent\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/adventuresfantastic.com\/futurespastandpresent\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1389"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/adventuresfantastic.com\/futurespastandpresent\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1389\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1393,"href":"http:\/\/adventuresfantastic.com\/futurespastandpresent\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1389\/revisions\/1393"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/adventuresfantastic.com\/futurespastandpresent\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1389"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/adventuresfantastic.com\/futurespastandpresent\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1389"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/adventuresfantastic.com\/futurespastandpresent\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1389"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}