Today is April 23. It is the birthday of Talbot Mundy (1879-1940) and Avram Davidson (1923-1993). Both are writers who should not be forgotten.
Talbot Mundy wrote adventure stories. While he (in my opinion) didn’t quite reach the level of quality of Harold Lamb, he was one of the top adventure writers of his day.
He is best remembered for the novel King of the Khyber Rifles, and two series, Tros of Samothrace and GrimJim. One of the lower tier piublishers, I want to say Zebra, reprinted the Tros books i paperback in the seventies but broke them up into more volumes that Mundy origiinally wrote them. That broke up the pacing and made the reading difficult. I only got throught eh second book before I gave up.
Black Dog Books published The Talbot Mundy Library about a decade and a half ago, collecting Mundy’s short fiction. I’m not sure they are still in print, but they provided a good overview of Mundy and collected much of his short fiction that hadn’t been previously collected.
Avram Davidson was one of the most unique voices in fantasy. He wrote a handful of novels, but his strength was in short fiction. His most remembered story is “Or All th e Seas with Oysters.” I haven’t read much Davidson in the last decade or so. I need to rectify that omission. Davidson was a superior stylist. There was no one quite like him.
Davidson was also the editor of F&SF from 1962 to 1964. A quick perusal of the contents of some of those issues on the ISFDB show a number of well-known names, such as Richard Matheson, Kate Wilhelm, and Robert Heinlein (a serialization of Glory Road).
Davidson’s work is available in electronic form.
I remember Mundy’s Tros-meets-Cleopatra story fondly.
Both underrated authors. Davidson to the point I sometimes think there should be an Avram Davidson award for most underrated author. Except when I want to call it the R. A. Lafferty award.
We tend to think that authors of quality always last in the long term, but there are good little known authors of every period. And few famous writers in the Canon who should be. cough Fitzgerald cough.
In agree with you about Lafferty. I’m glas cnetipede Press is reprinting all of his short fiction. And there is a two volume collection containing mostly unplublished work by Davidson.
Actually, Mundy’s big Tros book began as a series of novelettes in Adventure,/i> magazine. He then collected them into one big, door-stop book. Much the same as Asimov’s “Foundation Trilogy” began as a series of novelettes in <i.Astounding. Wikipedia explains how the big book was divided for the various paperback incarnations.
The exact number of series he wrote is an open question as he was fond of crossover appearances. The hero of one series might appear as a supporting character in another. The fantasy elements are generally subdued as Adventure,/i> was his main magazine market. As you say, King of the Khyber Rifles is his best remembered book and is a good starting place for anyone wanting to test the waters.