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Fantascience Digest, v. 3, issue 1, whole no. 12, January-February 1940

Page 15

FANTASCIENCE DIGEST                       Page 15

ing is damned good, and the characterization all that could be desired?" If they're done like Ziska's two short stories, then Campbell is as right as a man can be. "Succubus", a tale of a plant cultivated by the genius of a biologist that took partially human form and lured the man to his death. Not so original? No, but you haven't read the story Ziska wrote and the manner in which he wrote it. "Man of Ages", a direct take-off of Wylie's superb "Gladiator", but incomparably done. The tale of a super-man whom nothing could destroy and his battle for death. If you want to know where Siegal and Shuster got the inspiration for their sensational "Super-Man" comic strip, read this story!

   I deliberated long before including the about-to-be-mentioned author in my list. I considered him a remarkable author when I first read an immortal tale of an immortal person, "The Eternal Man". Was this story good? Well, it was first chouve for reprinting in STARTLING STORIES' "Hall of Fame" department. Can you imagine the story of a man made immortal by an elixer he invented--immortal and paralyzed! And he has as a companion an immortal rat he experimented with. The story of how the Eternal Man is placed in a museum and how the rate visits him, until it is finally mangled underfoot is a little gem. "There was a sequel to this story called "The Eternal Man Revives," and in many ways it was as good as the original, containing many sensational ideas. In a few places the story was handled a little clumsily, for the emotional reactions would have taxed a far greater writer than D.D. Sharp, but he came through all right. And to prove that this was not the last great story in him, D.D. Sharp has appeared with "Faster than Light" in a recent issue of MARVEL SCIENCE STORIES. This is without doubt one of the most beautiful love stories I have ever read. It is a tale of an old man chasing the kidnapper of his betrothed, and the kidnapper twenty light years away! And always light, too slow in these cosmic distances, bears back a vision of a girl, still beautiful--but twenty light years away. The pathetic chase and the realization that he would always be twenty years too late to make this a great story. And the words: "It would be senseless, I knew, chasing on and on after yesterdays..." -- those words are real. That's great fiction, the kind we like to read, but seldom do. That was the story that clinched me on Sharp. 

   There is one man who is an acknowledged master in the field of weird fiction, but who goes unheralded in the science fiction field. That man is Clark Ashton Smith. Always recognized as a "master" through his works in WEIRD TALES, he has not been directly associated with science fiction despite the fact that almost half of his published works show a definite leaning in the direction of science-fantasy. Smith is a master of words. He knows many and knows how to use them properly. Probably you would not be impressed if I simply recounted to you many of the masterful science-fantasies he has had printed in WEIRD TALES. I'll give examples of the ones he has had published in the science fiction magazines and I'll prove to you that Smith is one of the greatest creators of original science fiction of them all. 

   "The Master of the Asteroid". Who that has read it can forget it? The man in the space-ship stranded on a tiny asteroid...no hope for escape...the tiny, fragile inhabitants of the asteroid that came daily to proffer themselves and offer obeisance to their imprisoned God...how they laid fruits before the space ship, and the fruits disappeared nightly, devoured by some strange beast--and finally the

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FANTASCIENCE DIGEST Page 15 ing is damned good, and the characterization all that could be desired?" If they're done like Ziska's two short stories, then Campbell is as right as a man can be. "Succubus", a tale of a plant cultivated by the genius of a biologist that took partially human form and lured the man to his death. Not so original? No, but you haven't read the story Ziska wrote and the manner in which he wrote it. "Man of Ages", a direct take-off of Wylie's superb "Gladiator", but incomparably done. The tale of a super-man whom nothing could destroy and his battle for death. If you want to know where Siegal and Shuster got the inspiration for their sensational "Super-Man" comic strip, read this story! I deliberated long before including the about-to-be-mentioned author in my list. I considered him a remarkable author when I first read an immortal tale of an immortal person, "The Eternal Man". Was this story good? Well, it was first chouve for reprinting in STARTLING STORIES' "Hall of Fame" department. Can you imagine the story of a man made immortal by an elixer he invented--immortal and paralyzed! And he has as a companion an immortal rat he experimented with. The story of how the Eternal Man is placed in a museum and how the rate visits him, until it is finally mangled underfoot is a little gem. "There was a sequel to this story called "The Eternal Man Revives," and in many ways it was as good as the original, containing many sensational ideas. In a few places the story was handled a little clumsily, for the emotional reactions would have taxed a far greater writer than D.D. Sharp, but he came through all right. And to prove that this was not the last great story in him, D.D. Sharp has appeared with "Faster than Light" in a recent issue of MARVEL SCIENCE STORIES. This is without doubt one of the most beautiful love stories I have ever read. It is a tale of an old man chasing the kidnapper of his betrothed, and the kidnapper twenty light years away! And always light, too slow in these cosmic distances, bears back a vision of a girl, still beautiful--but twenty light years away. The pathetic chase and the realization that he would always be twenty years too late to make this a great story. And the words: "It would be senseless, I knew, chasing on and on after yesterdays..." -- those words are real. That's great fiction, the kind we like to read, but seldom do. That was the story that clinched me on Sharp. There is one man who is an acknowledged master in the field of weird fiction, but who goes unheralded in the science fiction field. That man is Clark Ashton Smith. Always recognized as a "master" through his works in WEIRD TALES, he has not been directly associated with science fiction despite the fact that almost half of his published works show a definite leaning in the direction of science-fantasy. Smith is a master of words. He knows many and knows how to use them properly. Probably you would not be impressed if I simply recounted to you many of the masterful science-fantasies he has had printed in WEIRD TALES. I'll give examples of the ones he has had published in the science fiction magazines and I'll prove to you that Smith is one of the greatest creators of original science fiction of them all. "The Master of the Asteroid". Who that has read it can forget it? The man in the space-ship stranded on a tiny asteroid...no hope for escape...the tiny, fragile inhabitants of the asteroid that came daily to proffer themselves and offer obeisance to their imprisoned God...how they laid fruits before the space ship, and the fruits disappeared nightly, devoured by some strange beast--and finally the