Astounding
Page 41
“What we need is a simple test” Ibid.
“good science fiction” A decade later, Asimov might have used the term “hard science fiction” for works with an emphasis on technical accuracy, as opposed to the “soft” social sciences. The term, which became popular in the seventies, first appeared in a review by P. Schuyler Miller of JWC’s Islands of Space in the November 1957 issue of ASF, and it is sometimes used interchangeably with “Campbellian science fiction,” although the stories that JWC actually published resist any such categorization.
“that branch of literature” Asimov, Asimov on Science Fiction, 76.
“the most powerful force” Asimov, I. Asimov, 73.
the golden age of science fiction “There is one golden age of science fiction that has actually been institutionalized and frozen in place, and that is the period between 1938 and 1950, with its peak years from 1939 to 1942.” Asimov, Gold, 212. This book follows the convention of dating it to the July 1939 issue of ASF, which is “sometimes considered by fans of the period to have marked the beginning of science fiction’s ‘Golden Age,’ a period stretching through the 1940s.” Asimov, In Memory Yet Green, 242.
“the brain of the superorganism” Asimov, Asimov on Science Fiction, 196.
“the single most important formative force” Ellison, Again, Dangerous Visions, 9.
Neil Gaiman Neil Gaiman, foreword to Doctorow, Information Doesn’t Want to Be Free, viii.
“The Campbell that influenced me” George R. R. Martin, comment on blog post “Next Year’s Hugos,” August 31, 2015, https://grrm.livejournal.com/440444.html (accessed December 2017).
Hermann Göring JWC to Robert Swisher, February 11, 1937.
the Shadow Dickson Hartwell, “Mister Atomic,” Pic, February 1946, 20. In a letter to RAH dated May 27, 1951, JWC claimed to have plotted stories for The Shadow in collaboration with Walter B. Gibson and John Nanovic.
he was hated Kingsley Amis called JWC “a deviant figure of marked ferocity,” while the writer John Lafferty thought he was “the worst disaster ever to hit science fiction.” Amis, New Maps of Hell, 98, and Lafferty, “The Case of the Moth-Eaten Magician,” in Greenberg, Fantastic Lives, 68.
“In the essential characteristics” Asimov, In Memory Yet Green, 201.
“the hand of John Campbell’s mind” Algis Budrys, quoted in Bova, “John Campbell and the Modern SF Idiom.”
“[it] carried in it the seeds” Virginia Heinlein, “Science Fiction and John W. Campbell,” biographical essay in the RAH Archives, UC Santa Cruz.
“The real golden age of science fiction is twelve” Hartwell, Age of Wonders, 13. The earliest version of this quote is attributed to the fan Peter Graham.
Albert Einstein “As to sending Dr. Einstein a reprint of the December Astounding—not necessary. He’s a subscriber.” JWC to Robert D. Dooley, M.D., January 5, 1953.
the scientists of Bell Labs “And you know at that time one of the things we did [at Bell Labs] was to read Astounding Science Fiction. Even some of us wrote for it.” Philip W. Anderson, oral history interview with Lillian Hoddeson, May 10, 1988, https://www.aip.org/history-programs/niels-bohr-library/oral-histories/30430 (accessed December 2017).
“A glance at the cover” Sagan, Broca’s Brain, 161.
Paul Krugman “I grew up wanting to be Hari Seldon.” Seldon was the inventor of the science of psychohistory in the Foundation series. Paul Krugman, “Asimov’s Foundation novels grounded my economics,” The Guardian, December 4, 2012.
Elon Musk “[Musk] was influenced, he says, by Isaac Asimov’s Foundation series, a science fiction saga in which a galactic empire falls and ushers in a dark age.” Rory Carroll, “Elon Musk’s mission to Mars,” The Guardian, July 17, 2013.
Newt Gingrich “While Toynbee was impressing me with the history of civilizations, Isaac Asimov was shaping my view of the future in equally profound ways. . . . For a high school student who loved history, Asimov’s most exhilarating invention was the ‘psychohistorian’ named Hari Seldon.” Gingrich, To Renew America, 24.
“We have called for a Campbellian revolution” Vox Day, “Racists vs. Child Rapists,” May 21, 2015, http://voxday.blogspot.sk/2015/05/the-campbell-delany-divide.html (accessed December 2017).
This book is not a comprehensive history of the genre It also omits any discussion of the artists whose work was a vital part of ASF, including Hubert Rogers, Charles Schneeman, H. W. Wesso, Frank Kelly Freas, and many others. As Freas observed, “There are fewer tales about [JWC’s] artists only because there have been fewer artists—it took a certain amount of resiliency in an artist to keep from being worn down to a mere nub on the grinding wheel of the Campbell brilliance.” Frank Kelly Freas, in Locus, July 12, 1971, 9.
one man was thought to oversee it JWC is sometimes quoted as saying: “Science fiction is what I say it is.” The closest approximation to this statement in his published work was his proposal for a “general definition” of science fiction: “The kind of stories I personally like to read when I want to read ‘science fiction.’ ” JWC, Brass Tacks, ASF, August 1952, 132.
“I even told myself stories” Asimov, In Memory Yet Green, 102n.
PART 1: WHO GOES THERE? (1907–1937)
“You may have had troubles” JWC to Asimov, December 2, 1955.
CHAPTER 1: THE BOY FROM ANOTHER WORLD (1910–1931)
“Do not take on a Junior” LRH, Dianetics, 305.
trouble remembering his childhood JWC to Dr. W. Grey Walter, unsent, May 1, 1953.
no visual memory JWC to RAH, November 4, 1949.
“The prize case in difficulty” LRH, Dianetics, 343.
“a permanent—but useful!—scar” JWC to William R. Burkett, Jr., July 1, 1968.
They decided to try drugs JWC described their use of drugs in letters to G. Harry Stine, March 1, 1953, and Eric Frank Russell, July 11, 1953.
Four mirrors were arranged JWC recounted the experience in letters to G. Harry Stine, March 1, 1953; Raymond F. Jones, April 29, 1953; Eric Frank Russell, July 11, 1953; Bill Powers, November 4, 1953; and Gib Hocking, February 24, 1954.
“I’d been scared before in my life” JWC to Raymond F. Jones, April 29, 1953.
they never used it again JWC to Gib Hocking, February 24, 1954.
his brain’s alpha rhythms Ibid.
electroshock therapy or the use of drugs JWC to Dr. W. Grey Walter, unsent, May 1, 1953.
“Do I know things” JWC to RAH, November 4, 1949.
“The cord is caught around his neck” JWC to RAH, September 15, 1949.
salt water to make him sick JWC to RAH, November 4, 1949.
drowned at age three . . . swallowed morphine pills JWC to RAH, September 15, 1949.
“a shrew” JWC to Susan Douglas, November 9, 1954. Susan was the daughter of JWC’s aunt Josephine and Samuel B. Pettengill.
Harry Strahorn An article in the February 17, 1888, issue of the Chicago Tribune, “Hyde Park Society Astonished: Clifford Strahorn’s Secret Marriage All Forgiven,” implies that Laura Harrison eloped with Strahorn, who was at least six years her junior, after “passing the winter at the Strahorn mansion.” JWC later suggested to his cousin Susan that their grandmother had gotten married “in a hurry.” JWC to Susan Douglas, November 9, 1954.
“somewhat involved” JWC to Dwight Wayne Batteau, November 20, 1954.
His ancestors “[William W. Campbell’s] Scotch forebears went to New England during the colonial period, and many of its members served in the French and Indian Wars and in the Revolution. One of his ancestors fell at Saratoga during the Burgoyne invasion, another died at Fort Edwards, and others were at the battle of Bunker Hill. . . . His grandfather, Horace Campbell, was born in Connecticut and married Sallie Martin, who was from the original Mayflower stock in direct line.” Winter, A History of Northwest Ohio, 1201. JWC added in a letter to Ron Stoloff on May 1, 1969: “One of my great-grandfathers was an M.D. in the Union Army. One hadn’t left Germany at that time. One was a Vermont leg
islator and active abolitionist, and one was a minister operating an Underground Railway station.”
both sides of the Salem witch trials “My father was amusedly interested in genealogy, and discovered with delight that one ancestress was tried and condemned as a witch in Salem—by a judge who was also, on another line, an ancestor!” JWC, Brass Tacks, Analog, February 1965, 92.
Irish, Dutch, Hungarian, English “My ancestry is typically American; that is, it’s a mixture of Irish, Dutch, Hungarian, English, French, German, and some indeterminate North European stocks.” JWC to Sten Dahlskog, February 14, 1956.
16 Treacy Avenue Moskowitz, Seekers of Tomorrow, 36. Moskowitz incorrectly gives the street as “Tracey,” stating that it bordered the “fashionable Clinton Hill section,” although it was actually part of the West Side neighborhood.
“Every individual starts out in life” JWC to RAH, November 4, 1949.
Bell Telephone John W. Campbell, Sr.’s career is described in detail in The Michigan Alumnus, January 29, 1949, 232.
a religious conservative JWC to Gotthard Gunther, June 11, 1953.
“Mentally speaking, I was brought up in hellfire” JWC to Raymond F. Jones, August 13, 1953.
two women in the neighborhood JWC to Gib Hocking, May 8, 1954.
his father learned to leave the house JWC to Laura Krieg, October 20, 1952.
a legendary arguer in the courtroom JWC to James C. Warf, July 29, 1954.
“It is necessary” Moskowitz, Seekers of Tomorrow, 37.
“The boy stood on the burning deck” JWC to Laura Krieg, October 20, 1952.
“a good and sincere guy” JWC to Dwight Wayne Batteau, July 27, 1955.
a crowbar from a thread JWC to Laura Krieg, November 12, 1957.
“I feel there must be a wise creator” Ibid.
his father reviewed his homework Moskowitz, Seekers of Tomorrow, 38.
to solve math problems in two different ways JWC to Perry Chapdelaine, February 24, 1970.
“a good beginner” JWC to John W. Campbell, Sr., June 11, 1953.
“Well, it was a good idea, John” JWC to Bernard I. Kahn, December 15, 1957.
“a would-be aesthete” Ibid.
Episcopalian upbringing Sam Moskowitz, handwritten notes for Seekers of Tomorrow, Sam Moskowitz Collection, Texas A&M University, Series VIII: Subject Files, Box 3-150, “Campbell, John W.”
Campbell compared to brainwashing JWC to Bernard I. Kahn, August 6, 1957.
Laura learned to independently verify JWC to John W. Campbell, Sr., November 28, 1954.
who identified as agnostic JWC to “Pease,” February 10, 1953.
“She was a very brilliant woman” JWC to “Spring,” June 19, 1957.
“a failure in human living” JWC to Gotthard Gunther, September 29, 1953.
“They clawed each other viciously” JWC to Bernard I. Kahn, October 8, 1954.
“cordially detested” JWC to Kenneth Pecharsky, April 12, 1971.
she was afraid of reptiles JWC to Susan Douglas, November 9, 1954.
the single most famous anecdote Moskowitz, Seekers of Tomorrow, 37.
she introduced him to science fiction and fantasy Bretnor, Modern Science Fiction, 3.
Campbell turned to books for escape Moskowitz, Seekers of Tomorrow, 38.
either a genius or a criminal JWC to John Scott Campbell, March 2, 1964.
“[I was] the damn fool” JWC to Raymond F. Jones, October 28, 1953.
“Kids who don’t get angry” JWC to RAH, October 5, 1951.
“I was unpopular with local kids” JWC to Eric Frank Russell, May 9, 1958.
“heart set on dismemberment” JWC to Gotthard Gunther, November 24, 1954.
he built a catapult in his yard JWC, “Meet the Authors,” Air Trails Pictorial, December 1946, 17.
He loved his Meccano set Dickson Hartwell, “Mister Atomic,” Pic, February 1946, 21.
a radio receiver JWC, “It’s been a long, long time,” Analog, February 1966, 158.
he put together his first car JWC to G. Harry Stine, October 11, 1953.
his basement chemistry lab Moskowitz, Seekers of Tomorrow, 38.
an eavesdropper JWC to Welsford Parker, July 27, 1954.
“The old son of a bitch” JWC to Joseph Winter, January 27, 1953.
“mental beating technique” JWC to Susan Douglas, November 29, 1954.
“My childhood battles with her” JWC to Gotthard Gunther, October 12, 1954.
Lemon Grove Avenue JWC to RAH, February 26, 1940.
“had her so thoroughly scared” JWC to Susan Douglas, November 9, 1954.
Kittatinny Campground JWC to Dorothy (Campbell) Middleton, October 9, 1954.
“Everybody is trying to be nice to me” Ibid.
“I’d have gotten a higher score” JWC to “Mrs. McCormick,” September 18, 1955.
to correct his teachers in class Moskowitz, Seekers of Tomorrow, 38.
joined no teams or societies Ann Williams, Blair Academy, e-mail to author, October 31, 2017.
“hiking” Ann Williams, Blair Academy, e-mail to author, November 1, 2017.
In tennis . . . When he played chess JWC to Gotthard Gunther, November 24, 1954.
Campbell plowed through two years of French JWC to John Arnold, April 21, 1953.
“I’ve felt a vast need for love and affection” JWC to Joseph Winter, June 21, 1953.
an unassuming appliance salesman JWC to Susan Douglas, November 9, 1954.
“You and Mother between you” JWC to John W. Campbell, Sr., June 18, 1955.
Cambridge JWC lists his address as 38 Bigelow Street in Cambridge in a letter to Amazing Stories, May 1930, 89. His roommates included Rosario Honore Trembley and Richard Rush Murray, the latter of whom published a few stories in Amazing. Moskowitz, Seekers of Tomorrow, 38, and Bleiler, Science-Fiction, 304.
“a little, dingy town” JWC, “Invaders from the Infinite,” Amazing Stories Quarterly, Spring/Summer 1932, 193.
“I found a bunch of rather bewildered men” JWC to John Arnold, November 29, 1952.
the department of physics Nathaniel Hagee, MIT Office of the Registrar, e-mail to author, September 2, 2016.
a course in analytical chemistry JWC to Gotthard Gunther, November 24, 1954.
to prove a professor wrong JWC to Gotthard Gunther, April 10, 1959.
“dearest antagonist” Wiener, dedication to The Human Use of Human Beings.
the worst teacher he had ever seen JWC to Nils Aall Barricelli, April 16, 1970, and Bud Herrmann, January 21, 1971.
dirty limericks JWC to Gib Hocking, February 24, 1954.
chemicals on locker room benches JWC to Joe Poyer, April 27, 1966.
“Anything that can go wrong, will” JWC to Gunther Cohn, August 11, 1969.
rowed crew, played tennis JWC to Asimov, July 24, 1958. There is no mention of him in any of the team rosters in yearbooks from MIT.
a fan of the pulps since high school Moskowitz, Seekers of Tomorrow, 39.
Campbell’s decision to major in physics JWC, “Meet the Authors,” Air Trails Pictorial, December 1946, 17.
“I owe you a good education” JWC, “In Memoriam,” Analog, August 1968, 177.
Incredibly, it was accepted Moskowitz, Seekers of Tomorrow, 39.
Campbell decided to visit the editor Ibid., 39–40.
“material energy” Ibid., 40.
a thousand times greater Sam Moskowitz, handwritten notes for Seekers of Tomorrow, Sam Moskowitz Collection, Texas A&M University, Series VIII: Subject Files, Box 3-150, “Campbell, John W.”
“I’m waiting anxiously for all comments” JWC, letter to Amazing Stories, November 1930, 764.
prostituting his talents JWC to Gotthard Gunther, April 10, 1959.
William Chace Greene, Jr. JWC to Mark Clifton, October 3, 1952. “Green” is mentioned in Sam Moskowitz’s notes for Seekers of Tomorrow.
The only professor who ever helped him Sam Moskowitz, handwritten notes for Seekers of Tomorrow, Sam Mosk
owitz Collection, Texas A&M University, Series VIII: Subject Files, Box 3-150, “Campbell, John W.”
“It isn’t The Saturday Evening Post” Ibid.
eight hours on twisty roads Budrys, Benchmarks Continued, 62.
His grades had been good but unexceptional JWC to John Arnold, April 21, 1953.
“constitutionally opposed to math” JWC to Gib Hocking, October 20, 1953.
he failed to pass after three tries JWC to John Arnold, April 21, 1953.
the repressed memory of the doctor “I dimly remember a bit about some engram concerning the German language that was giving you trouble.” Jesse Bruce Hopkins to JWC, September 12, 1958.
“If das Haus means ‘the house’ ” JWC to Jane Kearney, May 4, 1954.
an unclassified student Nathaniel Hagee, MIT Office of the Registrar, e-mail to author, September 2, 2016.
CHAPTER 2: THREE AGAINST THE GODS (1907–1935)
“The adventurer is an outlaw” Bolitho, Twelve Against the Gods, 4.
Swope Park in Kansas City RAH told this story in a speech, “The Future Revisited,” at the 19th World Science Fiction Convention in 1961, reprinted in Kondo, Requiem, 178–80. He also recounted it in an address at Annapolis in 1973, reprinted as “The Pragmatics of Patriotism” in Expanded Universe, 469–70.
“This is how a man lives” RAH, “The Future Revisited,” reprinted in Kondo, Requiem, 180.
William Tanner was killed Hagedorn, Savage Peace, 335–36.
a high school debate on shipping regulations JWC to Laura Krieg, September 25, 1954.
he had nightmares about the beatings Virginia Heinlein, “The Years at the Naval Academy,” biographical essay in the RAH Archives, UC Santa Cruz.
“a grandmother” RAH to Poul Anderson, September 6, 1961.
“Had you not been engaged” RAH to Mary (Briggs) Collin, August 6, 1962.
“sexually adventurous” Patterson, Learning Curve, 113.
“poisonous, like mistletoe” RAH to Cal Laning, August 1, 1930, quoted in Patterson, Learning Curve, 129.
Leslyn MacDonald In addition to Patterson, Learning Curve, 144–46, the most comprehensive account of Leslyn’s early life appears in James, “Regarding Leslyn” and “More Regarding Leslyn.”
Theosophy For references to Theosophy in RAH’s “Lost Legacy,” see Patterson, “The Hermetic Heinlein.”