Jack Williamson

There are a number of birthdays today that I could write about, but I want to focus on three, in no other order than their importance to me.

Legendary science fiction and fantasy author Jack Williamson was born 111 years ago today.  That would be April 29, 1908.  He passed away in 2006.

Williamson got his start in the pulps in the late 1920s with his first story, “The Metal Man”, being published in Amazing Stories.  His final novel, The Stonehenge Gate, was published in 2005.

My project to read and compare the magazine and book versions of Darker Than You Think got sidetracked last year.  I’ll try to get it restarted in the summer.

I’ve written about Williamson’s impact on me several times before, so I’ll keep my comments short.  I came across a stripped copy of The Best of Jack Williamson for a quarter at the flea market in Wichita Falls, Texas, when I was in the seventh grade.  (Stripped means the cover had been stripped off and the book had been reported to the publisher as having been pulped.  It was stolen, IOW, although I didn’t know that then.)  My favorite story in the collection at the time, and still a favorite today, is “With Folded Hands”.  It’s a chilling story about robots who protect us from ourselves, whether we want them to or not.  If you haven’t read it, it’s worth tracking down a copy.

You can read about my visits to the Jack Williamson Lectureship here and here.

Rafael Sabatini

Next on the birthday roll of honor is Rafael Sabatini, who was born in 1875.  Although he didn’t write fantasy, he did write historical swashbucklers, many of which were made into successful films, such as Captain Blood, The Sea Hawk, and The Black Swan.

Like Harold Lamb, Sabatini was an expert historian who also wrote nonfiction.  He’s not too easy to find in print these days, certainly not in new editions, but his work is available in electronic format.

Finally, the last author is H. Bedford-Jones (b. 1887).  Jones wrote prolifically for the pulps, especially the adventure pulps, but he also wrote some things with a fantastic element to them.  I have to confess I haven’t read much of his work.  I do know that James Reasoner has a high opinion of him.  And James has never steered me wrong in one of his recommendations.  I’m going to try to fit him into the queue.