The Science Fiction "Pulp" - A brief history |
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The appearance of dozens of novels from Edgar Rice Burroughs, beginning with UNDER THE MOONS OF MARS as a serial in a 1911 pulp magazine called The All-Story, flooded readers with superb science fiction adventures. Within a few years. there were several 'sf' authors: Garret Smith, George Allan England, Abe Merritt, H. Eon Flint, Murray Leinster, Ray Cummings and others.
A unique magazine titled Weird Tales began in 1923, but it contained more 'horror' and 'fantasy' than sf. In April 1926, a publisher of popular science, electronics & radio magazines, Hugo Gernsback, introduced Amazing Stories, which was to publish only "scientifiction" stories. It promptly started reprinting Jules Verne, H. G. Wells, and Edgar Rice Burroughs, but soon introduced new authors such as H. Hyatt Verrill. In Jan. 1930 another sf pulp began, Astounding, and soon a new editor named John W. Campbell was insisting on "hard science" as a basis for story acceptance. By the mid-1930's, there was almost a blur between "science fiction", "monster stories" and the "hero pulp" stories like Shadow and Doc Savage. Today, these all fall into the realm of what has become "traditional sf", but Campbell's' discovery of Robert Heinlein and Isaac Asimov are special milestones. )
These "pulp magazines", originating with The Argosy in the 1890's, had grown and multiplied during the first 30 years of the 20th century, and by 1930 there were hundreds of titles, many "sf" oriented, many general adventure, western and air-war, some "spicy", some "love," and many "hero" or character centered. By 1938 radio and motion pictures were occupying much of the old pulp reading public, and pulp magazine publishers were worried about lagging sales at newsstands. Argosy would make a dramatic change from "pulp fiction" to "men's adventure" in 1943, a milestone in the history of pulp magazines.
There was a revival of interest in pulp magazines in the early 1940's but by 1947, pulp readers were turning to Ballantine and Ace "paperbacks", and by 1954 nearly all the pulps were gone. In the late 1940's, digest sf magazines such as Analog, Fantasy and Science Fiction and Galaxy were monthly sources of "science fiction," as were specialty hardcover publishers such as Gnome Press and Avalon Books, who were reprinting stories from the pulps. We are delighted to be offering an extensive library of pulps in our November public auction - more than 1500 unique titles - collected, read and carefully preserved by a true lover of the genre. In the hope that a new collector will continue in the same tradition, we are offering the collection intact. These items are among more than 1,500 pulp era publications offered as one collection. )
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