Today, July 24, marks the birth of three writers and one artist who have not only been major figures in the fields of fantasy and science fiction but also personal favorites of mine. In order of the years of their births, they are Continue reading
So yesterday’s post on Edgar Rice Burroughs and Harold Lamb and the recent post on the canon, coupled with today is the anniversary of the passing of J. R. R. Tolkien and the seventh anniversary of the death of Frederik Pohl, got me to thinking. I referred to Burroughs and Lamb as giants. In the canon post I quoted Newton talking about his achievements being due to his standing on the shoulders of giants.
So who exactly are the giants in the field? Continue reading
There is a richness of birthdays today, July 24. E. F. Benson (1867-1940), Lord Dunsany (1878-1957), and Lee Brown Coye (1907-1981) were all born on this date. Continue reading
“A Child is Crying”
Originally published in Thrilling Wonder Stories, December 1948
Even though he’s best remember as a writer of crime novels and the Travis McGee series of thrillers, John D. MacDonald was also an accomplished author of science fiction. He only wrote three sf novels (The Girl, the Gold Watch, and Everything; Ballroom of the Skies; Wine of the Dreamers), but the ISFDB lists 70 short stories if I’ve counted correctly. Not all of those are necessarily science fiction, but that’s more than enough for a retrospective collection or two. (Stephen Haffner, are you paying attention?) Some of his science fiction was collected in Other Times, Other Worlds. That little paperback is long out of print, although copies can still be found. I bought one at a secondhand bookstore in Colorado a few weeks ago.
MacDonald was born on this date, July 24, in 1916, and passed away during surgery in 1986. In observance of his birth, I managed to read one of his tales. “A Child is Crying” is one of his best-known sf short stories, and it’s easy to see why. Continue reading
Today (July 24) marks the birth of three practitioners of the weird tale: authors E. F. Benson (1867) and Lord Dunsany (1878) and artist Lee Brown Coye (1907).
E. F. Benson
During his lifetime, Benson was probably best known for his novels of upper middle class British life. The best known of these were the Mapp and Lucia novels, which have been adapted for television.
Benson’s legacy, though, was with his supernatural tales. Ash-Tree Press collected all his known ghost and spook stories in the early 2000s. Those editions are nice. They’re also expensive and out of print AFAIK. Fortunately Wordsworth has collected all the stories in an inexpensive edition.
I first encountered Benson when I was around ten, give or take a year. My grandparents had a farm in rural Mississippi, and we would stay there in the summers. One day I was poking through the bookcase and found a battered paperback copy of a ghost story anthology. It had probably belonged to my uncle, as my grandparents didn’t read that kind of thing. The book contained the Benson story “Caterpillars”. I became an instant fan. Other Benson stories that have stuck with me have been “Mrs. Amworth” and “The Room in the Tower”.
Lord Dunsany
Lord Dunsany needs little introduction. His work was greatly admired by H. P. Lovecraft. In fact, much of Lovecraft’s early work is written in a style similar to Dunsany’s.
Dunsany was primarily a writer of short stories, many of them only a page or two in length. One of his recurring characters was Jorkens. The Jorkens stories fall into what is primarily a British type of story, commonly called the club story. This is when a group of men (sorry, ladies, these stories were at the height of their popularity when men’s clubs were part of British upper crest society) sit around their club and tell tall tales. P. G. Wodehouse wrote some of these.
The difference between the standard club story and that practiced by Dunsany is that the core of the story involves something fantastic. Other examples include Gavan’s Bar by L. Sprague de Camp and Fletcher Pratt and Tales From the White Hart by Arthur C. Clarke.
Lee Brown Coye was an artist. I first became acquainted with his work when I snagged a copy Hugh B. Cave’s Murgunstrumm, published by Carcosa Press. Lately I’ve been reading the reprint of Manly Wade Wellman’s Worse Things Waiting, originally published by Carcosa. It was Lee Brown Coye who gave Karl Edward Wagner the idea that became his classic horror story “Sticks”. Here are some examples of his work.
There are a number of writers and artists who share a birthday today, July 24. I’m going to focus on four of them, although there are others such as Alexandre Dumas, Barry Malzberg, Gordon Eklund, or Travis S. Taylor, whose work has either been significant to the field or work that I enjoy (or both).
I want to focus on these four because they’ve had a major impact on my reading and writing habits and/or have had lasting influence. I”ll discuss them in the order of their births. Continue reading
Just a quick note to let you know my latest post on the Ballantine Adult Fantasy series, The King of Elfland’s Daughter by Lord Dunsany is up on Black Gate. You can find it here. If you haven’t read it, check it out and join the discussion. There are some great comments.