Transcribe
Translate
Fanfare, issue 9, 1942
Page 25
More information
digital collection
archival collection guide
transcription tips
a column* 25 Are you tired of bad news about the progress of the war? Here are a few figures which should make you a tinier bit happier,then altho they concern an entirely different sort of war: the struggle fans are making to keep their collections of the prozines fairly complete. According to my calculations, there aren't quite so many prozine issues being published this year. These statistics aren't precise, since they've been done mostly from memory, but slight errors should have cancelled one another out fairly well. I find that there were 108 issues of professional stf.. weird, and fantasy magazines dated 1940, and 104 dated 1941. During 1942, there should be fewer. Assuming that all prozines will continue putting out issues at the same frequency as when this is written, and disregarding possible future issues of Stirring Science during 1942, there'll be at the end of the year only 93 issues. That still is quite a few more than back in the legendary days of 1937 and thereabouts, when there were only 36 issues per year, and the total cost of this year's editions should turn out to be the same as last year's, since Amazing, Unknown, Astounding, and Fantastic Adventures each cost a nickel more per throw. Too, those figures don't count things like England's Tales of Wonder, Canada's Eerie, or British reprint editions of American prozines. And now we shall see whether fandom has a very small prophet all its own, I here and now trudge out on a limb and predict that by the last months of 1943 (barring end of the war before then) there will be not more than six, and as few as four, regularly appearing professional stf, weird, and fantasy magazines. I'm not rash enough to cite chapter and verse, of course: if I predicted which magazines would still be appearing then, and how frequently they'd be coming out, I'd either make myself ridiculous by being wrong, or if I turned out to be right would be worried by newspapers all the time, desiring my prophecies. However, I think that Street & Smith, Ziff-Davis, and Standard should each have one prozine of the type in which we're interested surviving by then; beyond that - well, just wait and see what happens. This crystal ball is getting pretty hot from overwork. * Speaking of prophets, some comment of the predictions of two might be interesting. I recently ran across two issues of Scientifan, each of which contains an article of comment and prophecy on the fan field. Sam Moskowitz and Doc Lowndes wrote the articles. Both were, to put it mildly, inclined to see things from personal points of view, but the prejudices balanced one another. To quote from the articles, including correct as well as missed predictions, and remember that these articles were written in 1939: Moskowitz: "...the success of 'New Fandom' is a foregone conclusion. If the club did nothing else in the next two years but rest on its laurels, it would still maintain its position of Fantasy Footnotes by Harvey Warner Jr.
Saving...
prev
next
a column* 25 Are you tired of bad news about the progress of the war? Here are a few figures which should make you a tinier bit happier,then altho they concern an entirely different sort of war: the struggle fans are making to keep their collections of the prozines fairly complete. According to my calculations, there aren't quite so many prozine issues being published this year. These statistics aren't precise, since they've been done mostly from memory, but slight errors should have cancelled one another out fairly well. I find that there were 108 issues of professional stf.. weird, and fantasy magazines dated 1940, and 104 dated 1941. During 1942, there should be fewer. Assuming that all prozines will continue putting out issues at the same frequency as when this is written, and disregarding possible future issues of Stirring Science during 1942, there'll be at the end of the year only 93 issues. That still is quite a few more than back in the legendary days of 1937 and thereabouts, when there were only 36 issues per year, and the total cost of this year's editions should turn out to be the same as last year's, since Amazing, Unknown, Astounding, and Fantastic Adventures each cost a nickel more per throw. Too, those figures don't count things like England's Tales of Wonder, Canada's Eerie, or British reprint editions of American prozines. And now we shall see whether fandom has a very small prophet all its own, I here and now trudge out on a limb and predict that by the last months of 1943 (barring end of the war before then) there will be not more than six, and as few as four, regularly appearing professional stf, weird, and fantasy magazines. I'm not rash enough to cite chapter and verse, of course: if I predicted which magazines would still be appearing then, and how frequently they'd be coming out, I'd either make myself ridiculous by being wrong, or if I turned out to be right would be worried by newspapers all the time, desiring my prophecies. However, I think that Street & Smith, Ziff-Davis, and Standard should each have one prozine of the type in which we're interested surviving by then; beyond that - well, just wait and see what happens. This crystal ball is getting pretty hot from overwork. * Speaking of prophets, some comment of the predictions of two might be interesting. I recently ran across two issues of Scientifan, each of which contains an article of comment and prophecy on the fan field. Sam Moskowitz and Doc Lowndes wrote the articles. Both were, to put it mildly, inclined to see things from personal points of view, but the prejudices balanced one another. To quote from the articles, including correct as well as missed predictions, and remember that these articles were written in 1939: Moskowitz: "...the success of 'New Fandom' is a foregone conclusion. If the club did nothing else in the next two years but rest on its laurels, it would still maintain its position of Fantasy Footnotes by Harvey Warner Jr.
Hevelin Fanzines
sidebar
