I.Asimov: A Memoir

by Isaac Asimov

  I must stress one point, however. There would appear to be some people who are of the opinion that my sole function in these anthologies is to let my name be used and that I get a free ride. This is not so.

  Any anthology on my list is one for which I have done significant work.

  There are indeed books with my name in the title where I have done no work, where I have selected no stories and exerted no editorial function. Those are not listed among my books. If I have written an introduction to a book but have done no editorial work, I do not list it. Any book on the list is a book I have worked on either as a writer or as an editor, or as both.

  But why do I do all these anthologies? Of what value are these endless collections of old stories?

  Remember that many science fiction short stories (even very good ones) tend to fade into oblivion. The issues of the magazines in which they appeared are in landfills somewhere. Collections in which they may have appeared in book form are often out of print and unavailable. Anthologies bring back these old stories to an audience that has never read them, or perhaps to some who have indeed read them years or even decades before and would like the chance to read them again. Furthermore, writers, many of whom may be past their best years and may not be writing much, will have the benefit of having their early stories brought before the public, something that will brighten their fame and earn them a little extra money too.

  I am willing to lend my name, and to do the work necessary to accomplish these things. I am very fortunate to be one of the handful of authors whose books continue to sell and whose stories, however old, continue to be reprinted. It is my pleasure and, even more, my duty to do what I can to help other writers not quite as well situated as I am.

  And it’s Marty who makes it possible for me to do so, and who does his further part in hundreds of anthologies in which I am not in volved. As much as Marty is now appreciated by editors, writers, and readers, I cannot help but think that he is still not appreciated enough.

  preserve the symmetry, and he wanted it, of course, to be a famous name in the field. Inevitably, he thought of me. I was the one science fiction writer

  Isaac Asimovys Science Fiction Magazine

  By the beginning of 1976, I had been writing Black Widower stories for EQMM for four years.

  The publisher of the magazine is loel Davis, not very tall, but slim and rather handsome, something that has not changed just because his hair is finally going gray. He always struck me as a rather proper person who was a little confused at my own raucous improprieties but had somehow grown accustomed to them.

  One of the executives at Davis Publications had attended a Star Trek convention for the sake of his children and was struck by the vast number and the unbounded enthusiasm of die attendees. This, he thought, indicated that a science fiction magazine ought to make a great deal of money for Davis Publications.

  In this, he was not necessarily right. What he failed to understand was that the vast majority of the Trekkies were interested in visual science fiction and not in print science fiction. The results, however, were not catastrophic, so we needn’t be too concerned about that.

  The executive sold Joel on his idea and Joel pondered the matter. He had two fiction magazines, both mystery—Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine and Alfred Hitchcock’s Mystery Magazine. If he was going to have a science fiction magazine he wanted a name in that too, to who had obtruded himself on his notice, since I flirted loudly and outrageously with Eleanor Sullivan, the very attractive managing editor of EQMM, whenever I visited the magazine.

  So on February 26, 1976, he called me into his office and told me he was thinldng of starting a new magazine to be called Isaac Asimov’s Science Fiction Magazine (IASFM).

  I objected on a number of grounds, which I shall list:

  1.

  I had no talent, time, or desire for editing and I simply wouldn’t undertake to edit a magazine.

  2.

  The other magazines were edited by friends of mine, in particular Ben Bova, who was then editor of Analog, and Edward Ferman, who was editor of F&SF. How could I go into competition with my friends?

  3.

  I had a monthly science column in F&SF, which I could on no account abandon, not even for the chance of running a similar column in IASFM. I didn’t try to explain this in detail because I have noticed that there is a certain air of incredulity or amusement in anyone to whom I talk about the importance of loyalty.

  4.

  Authors would refuse to write for a magazine which bore the name of one of their peers. They would feel it beneath them to do so.

  Patiently, Joel took up each of my objections. I wouldn’t have to edit, he said. We would select an editor who would do the real work and I would confine myself to writing an editorial in each issue and answering the letters in the letters column. In that way, I would give an Asimovian flavor to the magazine, which was all that he wanted.

  He agreed that I would continue my science column in F&SF, since that was nonfiction, if I would agree to let IASFM have first refusal on any of my science fiction.

  He stated that since mystery writers were perfectly willing to write for Ellery Queen and for Alfred Hitchcock, science fiction writers would be perfectly willing to write for Isaac Asimov.

  That left only the feelings of Ben Bova and Ed Ferman, and so I consulted each separately. Both said the same thing. An additional magazine would strengthen the field by supplying another major market for writers. Since this would encourage science fiction writing, the number of important contributions to all three magazines would increase.

  Even so, I hesitated, and it took a great deal of persuasion for Joel to get me to sign the necessary contract. The first issue of the magazine, dated Spring 1977, reached the stands in mid-December 1976.

  I mention all this because in 1986 the British science fiction writer Brian Aldiss wrote a history of science fiction, in which he had some harsh things to say about my writing. I didn’t mind that. He is certainly welcome to indulge himself in that fashion if it makes him feel better.

  However, he also made the insulting statement that I had managed to wheedle my way into having a magazine named for myself. I cannot quote his exact words since I discarded his book after reading that. I did, however, write to him and to his publisher in great indignation, for it was not I who had done the wheedling, but Joel. On January 5, 1987,1 received a letter from him, apologizing humbly. That was all I wanted and I dropped the matter thereafter.

  The magazine came out at a time when there had been a long interval since a really successful new magazine had been published. The most recent previous success had been Galaxy, which had appeared in 1950, and If, which had appeared in 1952 and which had eventually become a sister magazine of Galaxy. If, however, had ceased publication a few years earlier, and Galaxy itself was declining toward its demise. A mazing was a feeble shadow of what it had once been and was also on the point of dying. Many other magazines had come, existed briefly, and then ceased publication. In 1976, there were only two strong magazines still in the field, the two I had consulted before my own was started: Analog and F&SF.

  What’s more, the entire magazine field had weakened to some extent, partly because the ascendancy of television had withdrawn the weaker readers from the magazine audience and partly because the advent of hundreds of paperback novels, collections, and anthologies meant a sharper competition for the readers’ money.

  There seemed little reason, therefore, to think that IASFM would be successful and, since I am no phony, I said so in the editorial I wrote for the first issue. (It was all right for me to say so, of course, but not for others. The editor of one fan magazine predicted that the magazine would last for not more than six issues, whereupon I promptly told Joel to make every effort, even if he were losing money, to publish seven.)

  No problem. The magazine is now in its fourteenth year of publication and the latest issue I have at the moment of writing is the 158th.

  It
began as a quarterly in its first year, advanced to a bimonthly in its second, and a monthly its third. It is now a tetraweekly, with one issue every four weeks and, therefore, thirteen issues a year.

  And I have done my part. I have had a 1,500-word editorial in every issue; and I read all the letters to the editor, choose which I suggest be published, and write an answer to each. I show up at the offices every Tuesday morning to pick up letters, deliver editorials (together with stories, which I write for the magazine as often as I can), and discuss problems, when there are any.

  Joel was sufficiently satisfied with science fiction to buy Analog on February 20, 1980, and sufficiently sensible to keep its excellent editor, Stanley Schmidt. I think he would also buy F&SF, if it were up for sale. Joel kept his word to me, by the way. For the full thirteen years-plus of the magazine’s existence, I have continued to write my essays for F&SF. The situation has, I firmly believe, helped F&SF without harming IASFM.

  I have not missed an issue as far as my editorials are concerned, and I do not ever fear that I will run out of things to say. Readers ask if the real editors want to write editorials sometimes, but they don’t. It’s a chore they do not wish to undertake, and that’s a good thing, because (to tell you the truth) I wouldn’t let them. The editorials are mine and I love writing them.

  Sometimes my editorials discuss some phase of writing, sometimes they deal with science fiction. They are often intensely personal, to the point where some readers begin to grumble about my ego.

  Every once in a while, I take up one side of a controversial issue. John Campbell used to do this constantly, to my despair, for he was unrelentingly conservative, and I disliked his biased approach. I, on the other hand, am markedly liberal, and my sort of bias doesn’t bother me at all. It bothers some readers, however, but a little controversy is good, I think, and even essential in an open society such as ours, and I have no hesitation about directing the publication of letters that strongly disagree with me or that even include some uncomplimentary remarks about me.

  The biggest reaction I got was when I owned up to a hatred of rock-and-roll music. The lovers of that vile noise took out after me with a vengeance. On the other hand, I once made the innocent remark that horses smelled (which they do) and I got letters from indignant horse lovers.

  I don’t want to leave the impression that I am responsible for the magazine’s success, though I hope I have contributed to it somewhat. The credit belongs to the editors.

  The first and founding editor was George Scithers, an important science fiction fan and amateur publisher, who had run the Washington convention in 1963, at which I had received my first Hugo. He established the magazine as a viable entity from the start, bringing into prominence such excellent new writers as John Varley, Barry Longyear, and Somtow Sucharitkul. He also strongly favored humorous short-shorts and rather turned away from the obscure and sensational. On September 4, 1978, when only four issues of the magazine had appeared, George won a Hugo as best editor of the year.

  Unfortunately, George somehow never quite got along with Joel. The chemistry was wrong. After four years, George decided the magazine was a going venture and needed him no more. He was succeeded by Kathleen Moloney, a relative unknown in the field, who remained only a year before finding a job she liked better. She was succeeded by Shawna McCarthy, who had been managing editor under the first two. Shawna had amazed the dickens out of me when I licked my lips over having an Irish colleen to flirt with, by telling me that despite her name and her appearance, she was Jewish. She turned the magazine in a new direction, emphasizing the experimental and modernistic.

  With that, the magazine became a critical success among the aficionados of the field, who had previously criticized it as being too light.

  After Shawna left to enter the field of book editing, she was succeeded on May 17, 1985, by the science fiction writer Gardner Dozois, who is still editor and who has continued the Shawna direction. IASFM has come to be generally considered to be at the cutting edge of the field. Both Shawna and Gardner have won Hugos, and stories appearing in the magazine receive more nominations for Hugos and Nebulas than do stories in any other magazine.

  I might also mention that for some seven years the day-to-day running of the magazine has been in the hands of the managing editor, Sheila Williams, a sweet young woman who sees eye to eye with me on all things connected with the magazine.

  I don’t say that my own taste in stories is exactly reflected in the magazine, but it is better that it not be. My taste is firmly rooted in the 1950s and I recognize that fact. I have, therefore, never tried to interfere with editorial decisions, or expressed my opinion on any question whatever unless I was asked to.

  Once, for instance, in the fall of 1988, IASFM had made use of a cover illustration, quite innocently, that was a little too close to one that had earlier appeared in F&SF, painted by a different artist. Ed Ferman wanted a reasonable sum of money to be paid to the first artist, but Davis Publications didn’t want to seem to admit wrongdoing. So I was asked, “What do we do?”

  “Simple,” I said, and sent off a personal check to the first artist and everything ended satisfactorily.

  The stories I write for the magazine are, of course, my kind of 1950-ish stories, but enough readers like them to justify their publication. Besides, I like them, and that’s all that counts as far as I’m concerned.*

  Autobiography

  Through the 1970s, the people at Doubleday were growing more and more impatient with me. They wanted me to return to the writing of science fiction novels, and, as the years passed, they grew more intense about it. The trouble was that I was afraid to write novels and, as those same years passed, I grew more intense about my fears.

  I was quite aware of how the field was changing, of how totally literary the new writers had become, and despite Evelyn del Rey’s assurance to me that I was the field, I dared not compete. The success of The Gods Themselves somehow did not help.

  Therefore, I kept trying to think of ways to divert Doubleday’s attention. On February 3, 1977, when my editor at the time, Cathleen Jordan, put the pressure on me a bit more firmly, I winced, thought rapidly, and suggested I write an autobiography. As soon as I

  · Editor’s note: In his next-to-last editorial in Isaac Asimov’s Science Fiction Magazine, Isaac was pleased to announce to its readers that the magazine had been acquired by Bantam Doubleday Dell Publishing Group.

  mentioned the possibility, I caught fire. Such was my sudden enthusiasm that Cathleen didn’t see much chance of deflecting me and told me to go ahead.

  (Cathleen, a delightful person, had worked for Larry Ashmead and had succeeded him as my editor when he left. Eventually, she left Doubleday too, and began to look for another job. I happened to know that Davis Publications was looking for a new editor for Alfred Hitchcock’s Mystery Magazine at the time, and I mentioned Cathleen’s name. She took the job on August 1, 1981, and has been happily at work there ever since. I’ve even sold her a couple of stories—editors can’t get rid of me just by changing positions.)

  The writing of an autobiography was not exactly a new idea to me. I remember that when I turned twenty-nine I felt that my youth was just about over and done with and that I might now legitimately turn to the writing of an autobiography. However, some cool thought on the matter made it plain to me that since not very much had happened to me, there was not much to say about my life—and besides, no publisher would publish it.

  As my life progressed and I grew older, I eventually reached the point where I knew that if I did write an autobiography, I could get it published, but it still seemed to me that not very much had happened to me. Mine has been a quiet life (I have never complained about that), and I have been involved with little besides my writing, so there was still nothing to write about.

  But an occasional editor would come up with the notion.

  Larry Ashmead, for instance, wondered at one time if I had considered writing an autobiography, but
I just laughed and said that nothing had ever happened to me that would interest anyone. Larry was so pro-Asimov that I couldn’t take him seriously and I doubted that his superiors at Doubleday would support him in this particular project.

  Some time after this, Paul Nadan, of Crown Publishers, was trying to get me to do a book for Crown and we got together to discuss the matter over lunch. I would have liked to do a book for Crown and, particularly, for Paul, who was a very pleasant and likable fellow, but my schedule was crowded and I hated to take on something that I then wouldn’t do. I therefore tried to deflect him by telling him funny stories about various things that had happened to me.

  Suddenly, he said, “Why don’t you write an autobiography, Isaac?”

  I said, “Because nothing of interest has ever happened to me.”

  He said, “But all these things you’ve been telling me are interesting and they would be wonderful in an autobiography. Come, I’ll give you a contract for one.”

  I was tempted, but I resisted. I was terribly afraid I would make a fool of myself, and that I would turn out something that Crown, upon looking it over, would refuse to publish—or, if they published it, that people would refuse to read—or, if they read it, that they would denounce vociferously.

  However, when Cathleen began to put the pressure on me for another science fiction novel, I remembered what Nadan had said, and suggested an autobiography. I was still certain it wouldn’t work, but my enthusiasm grew over the matter, not because I wanted to do it, but because it would shove any question of a novel to one side for at least a year, maybe two. Anything to avoid a novel.

  So I had to get to work. I had two things going for me in this connection. I have a remarkably retentive memory and tend to remember things in full detail. This is not always a good thing, of course. Samuel Vaughan, who was then high in the echelons of Doubleday, told me that the art of autobiography was knowing what to leave out, but he was talking to a brick wall and he probably knew it. I didn’t intend to leave anything out if I could help it, except for items that might needlessly hurt other people.