Earlier today I was reading a post on a site I don’t normally read these days (I was lured by the temptation of a free ebook).  The post made the argument that John Campbell was the greatest editor the science fiction and fantasy fields have seen.

That got me to thinking, which usually gets me in trouble.  I began wondering who would be the greatest editor, greater being defined as having the most impact over time.  The original post didn’t include fantasy other than a passing reference to Unknown.  So I thought I’d throw the question open to anyone who wanted to voice an opinion.  Below is a list I compiled off the top of my head.  I didn’t include any living editors.  If I had, Ellen Datlow would be on it.  My rationale is that the impact of living editors on the can’t be accurately assessed because they are still having an influence and their greatest influences may still be to come.

So in alphabetical order are ten editors.  I’ll provide a brief explanation as to why they have been included.  Some will be quickly eliminated.  Others, not so much.John W. Campbell.  Campbell took over the reigns of Astounding from F. Orlin Tremaine in the late 1930s.  Campbell raised the literary standards of the magazine (something not everyone thinks was a good thing) and helped launch the careers of a number of writers who went on to become some of the top writers in the field, such as Asimov, Heinlein, Leiber, and Anderson.  (Again, there are those who don’t think this was a good thing.)  Campbell also edited Unknown until the war-time paper shortage killed it.  One could make a case that Unknown was better than Weird Tales during that period.

Lin Carter.  Let me make something clear.  Carter is not on this list because of his literary molestation of the works of Robert E. Howard.  Rather, he’s here primarily because of the Ballantine Adult Fantasy series and secondarily because he was the editor of DAW’s Year’s Best Fantasy series.  The Ballantine Adult Fantasy line was primarily reprints of older fantasy by authors such as Clark Ashton Smith, James Branch Cabell, Lord Dunsany, and William Morris but also included original works by Katherine Kurtz and Poul Anderson.

Gardner Dozois.  Dozois was the editor of Asimov’s Science Fiction and as well as the editor of the longest running best of the year anthology.  During his tenure at Asimov’s he published a record number of stories that went on to win Hugos Nebulas, and other awards.  His best of the year anthologies have also set the tone for the field for a number of years, although in the last few years a crop of new anthologies have come on the scene.

Harlan Ellison.  Ellison isn’t known as an editor.  That being said, he did edit Dangerous Visions, a ground breaking anthology that focused  on taboo breaking stories.  For its time, Dangerous Visions was a major event that generated controversy and discussion for years.  It was followed by the less ground breaking Again, Dangerous Visions.  Since Ellison passed away recently, Last Dangerous Visions will probably never see the light of day, not that anyone has been expecting  it to.  Or maybe it will…

Hugo Gernsback.  If you’re wondering why I put Gernsback on the list, it’s because he created the literary category of science fiction, for good or ill.  That decision to publish a pulp wholly dedicated to what Gernsback referred to as “scientificition” pulled stories of the fantastic out of the general fiction pulps where they’d been appearing with regularity and created what many have referred to as a literary ghetto.  Some folks say we left the ghetto years ago while others are still trying to break out.

Charles L. Grant.  Grant edited a number of anthologies in the 1970s and 1980s, the best known being the Shadows series.  These were dark fantasy/horror anthologies filled with both established pros and newcomers, many of whom have gone on to become established pros and leading voices in the field.

Dorothy McIlwraith.  Ms. McIlwraith had the unenviable task of editing Weird Tales after Farnsworth Wright stepped down.  Many feel that Weird Tales was a shadow of its former self, in part because Howard and Lovecraft had died and Smith had stopped writing fiction.  And while that’s true, McIlwraith published many of the early horror and fantasy stories of Ray Bradbury.  She also regularly published Robert Bloch, Seabury Quinn, and Manly Wade Wellman.  That’s not a legacy to take lightly.

Frederik Pohl.  Frederik Pohl is another person who had a larger career as a writer than as an editor, but if all he had been was an editor, he still would have had an impact.  in the 1950s, Pohl edited one of the first original anthology series, Star Science Fiction.  In the 1960s, he was the editor of Galaxy and its companion magazine, Worlds of If.  Pohl bought early stories by Larry Niven, Fred Saberhagen, and Harlan Ellison.  Worlds of If won the Hugo Award for best professional publication for 1966,1967, and 1968, and many of the stories he published won multiple awards, such as Ellison’s “Repent, Harlequin, Said the Ticktock Man” and “I Have No Mouth and I Must Scream”.  Pohl was also an editor at Bantam books for a brief period in the 1970s.

Karl Edward Wagner.  Wagner was the editor of DAW’s Year’s Best Horror Stories for years.  Wagner had a discerning eye.  Like Grant, Wagner didn’t limit himself to stories by long time pros.  He also didn’t stick with the main venues, but searched out horror wherever he could find it.  Wagner had a deep knowledge of the history of the field, and copies of his anthologies are hard to find in the wild these days.  Wagner was one of the founders, along with David Drake, of the small press Carcosa.  Although Carcosa only published four volumes, they brought back into print Manly Wade Wellman, E. Hoffman Price, and Hugh B. Cave.  Wagner edited a series of collections of Robert E. Howard’s Conan stories.  This was at the same time that the Ace volumes edited by L. Sprague de Camp were in print.  Wagner published the stories without any editorial revisions or rewriting that were found in the de Camp versions.  Wagner also edited the three volumes of Echoes of Valor, a sword and sorcery anthology which reprinted a number of stories that were otherwise unavailable at the time.  Echoes of Valor is an essential part of any S&S library.

Donald A. Wolheim.  Wolheim found the publishing house that bears his initials, DAW.  Before that he edited the Avon Fantasy Reader, which reprinted a number of the Conan stories as well as other tales from the pulps.  As an editor at Ace, he developed a strong line, and launching the Ace doubles.  Believing The Lord of the Rings was public domain in the US, he published the trilogy but eventually had to pay Tolkien.  Ace was sold in the early 1970s, and things went downhill.  Wolheim went on to found his own publishing imprint, DAW books. Their yellow spines were ubiquitous for years.  Wolheim published a great deal of pulp, the Dray Prescott series and John Norman’s Gor (we won’t talk about that).  Throughout his career, Wolheim mentored a number of authors who went on to become successful.

Farnsworth Wright.  Wright was the editor of Weird Tales during what most people consider to be the best year of the Unique Magazine.  Wright published Howard, Lovecraft, Smith, Quinn, Hamilton, Williamson, Whitehead, Kuttner, Long, and a number of others.  Wright published C. L. Moore’s first story, “Shambleau”, and according to legend closed the offices for the afternoon in observance of C. L. Moore Day.  It’s arguable if some of the above writers would have had the careers they did if Wright hadn’t published their early work.

So that’s my list of candidates.  What are your thoughts?  Who should be removed from consideration?  Who is a contender for the title of greatest editor?