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Acolyte, v. 2, issue 1, whole no. 5, Fall 1943
Page 33
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immediately noticed both the change in style, and a growing interest in my reading. ALAN CHILD ---o0o--- I've been reading a great deal of stf lately, and I find only rare instances that are fully satisfying. There's too much of this single-handed hero defeating the armies of a dictator of the solar system. My suggestion is that those authors be herded together and dropped via parachute upon Berlin. The war would doubtless be over in five hours. Another thing that impresses me is the monumental emphasis placed upon gadgets and the frank disregard of science. In the old days, an author was content with the simple fact that like poles attract and opposites repel--that's backwards, but you know what I mean. He would whip up a story and use that principle, or one like it, in the denouement. Nowadays, the author invents his cockeyed science. He gets his protagonist into a hole that he could jump out of, but does he? No. He takes the hard way--invents a disintegrator out of hangnails and an unheard-of metal that just happens to be underfoot, and blasts his way out to emerge on the other side of the earth. That's crawling out of your hole with a vengeance! Now me, I can't think that way. These stories leave me in a mental muddle. I am impressed primarily with the stupidity of certain authors, secondarily with the monumental ignorance of the so-called scientific characters. They are lopsided, inhuman, unheard of, and thoroughly out of step with normal behavior patterns. Is this what stf has come to mean? Is this what the rabid fan laps up like so much milk? I don't think so. In scanning the readers' columns, it appears that the stories best liked are the reasonable stories--the stories that soft-pedal the situations to the benefit of the characterizations represented. MANLY BANISTER. ---o0o--- If there is one thing I loathe, it is the idea of having everybody in a story pop-eyed with amazement all the way through. With all due tribute to the memory of Lovecraft, I should like to suggest that type of thing may be all right for beginners, and for those who like to get the quaint old atmosphere of the 1880's; but how about the multitude of readers who accept as commonplace such phenomena as space flight, time-travel, other manifolds and dimensions, reverse entropy, and psychic abilities? We have long since become acclimated to such things; their appearance in a story does not surprise us in the least. We are like drug addicts; a story with no especial scientific or weird element is flat and tasteless, and, unless it bears an emotional or humorous message, is largely wasted....Then why make all the emotion in a stf yarn surprise? You never see five pop-eyed people together at an awing moment; you will find the hysterical type, the religious type, the cynical "so-what" type, etc. Why try to stereotype your characters into overawed, hick farmers? SIDNEY M. DEAN ---o0o--- From van Vogt's letter, it would seem that he does not appreciate the dream fantasies of Dunsany, Lovecraft, Smith, etc. Of course they don't belong in the PRESENT Unknown, but with the decline of WT, this is our last hope for stories of this type, and a mutant editorial policy (as Mr. Campbell might once have termed it!) could give this type of story to the reader, who certainly numbers more than "a half-dozen individuals here and there" R. A. HOFFMAN ---o0o--- If orders for BEYOND THE WALL OF SLEEP keep coming in, I can hope to have the entire book paid for by 1944, and in that case, if the ms. arrives, we'll very likely do THE EYE AND THE FINGER, a collection of Don Wandrei. This should be a $3 book. AUGUST DERLETH -- 33 --
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immediately noticed both the change in style, and a growing interest in my reading. ALAN CHILD ---o0o--- I've been reading a great deal of stf lately, and I find only rare instances that are fully satisfying. There's too much of this single-handed hero defeating the armies of a dictator of the solar system. My suggestion is that those authors be herded together and dropped via parachute upon Berlin. The war would doubtless be over in five hours. Another thing that impresses me is the monumental emphasis placed upon gadgets and the frank disregard of science. In the old days, an author was content with the simple fact that like poles attract and opposites repel--that's backwards, but you know what I mean. He would whip up a story and use that principle, or one like it, in the denouement. Nowadays, the author invents his cockeyed science. He gets his protagonist into a hole that he could jump out of, but does he? No. He takes the hard way--invents a disintegrator out of hangnails and an unheard-of metal that just happens to be underfoot, and blasts his way out to emerge on the other side of the earth. That's crawling out of your hole with a vengeance! Now me, I can't think that way. These stories leave me in a mental muddle. I am impressed primarily with the stupidity of certain authors, secondarily with the monumental ignorance of the so-called scientific characters. They are lopsided, inhuman, unheard of, and thoroughly out of step with normal behavior patterns. Is this what stf has come to mean? Is this what the rabid fan laps up like so much milk? I don't think so. In scanning the readers' columns, it appears that the stories best liked are the reasonable stories--the stories that soft-pedal the situations to the benefit of the characterizations represented. MANLY BANISTER. ---o0o--- If there is one thing I loathe, it is the idea of having everybody in a story pop-eyed with amazement all the way through. With all due tribute to the memory of Lovecraft, I should like to suggest that type of thing may be all right for beginners, and for those who like to get the quaint old atmosphere of the 1880's; but how about the multitude of readers who accept as commonplace such phenomena as space flight, time-travel, other manifolds and dimensions, reverse entropy, and psychic abilities? We have long since become acclimated to such things; their appearance in a story does not surprise us in the least. We are like drug addicts; a story with no especial scientific or weird element is flat and tasteless, and, unless it bears an emotional or humorous message, is largely wasted....Then why make all the emotion in a stf yarn surprise? You never see five pop-eyed people together at an awing moment; you will find the hysterical type, the religious type, the cynical "so-what" type, etc. Why try to stereotype your characters into overawed, hick farmers? SIDNEY M. DEAN ---o0o--- From van Vogt's letter, it would seem that he does not appreciate the dream fantasies of Dunsany, Lovecraft, Smith, etc. Of course they don't belong in the PRESENT Unknown, but with the decline of WT, this is our last hope for stories of this type, and a mutant editorial policy (as Mr. Campbell might once have termed it!) could give this type of story to the reader, who certainly numbers more than "a half-dozen individuals here and there" R. A. HOFFMAN ---o0o--- If orders for BEYOND THE WALL OF SLEEP keep coming in, I can hope to have the entire book paid for by 1944, and in that case, if the ms. arrives, we'll very likely do THE EYE AND THE FINGER, a collection of Don Wandrei. This should be a $3 book. AUGUST DERLETH -- 33 --
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