Read Online The Engines of the Night by Barry N. Malzberg - Free Book Online Page A
Authors: Barry N. Malzberg
Tags: Literature & Fiction, Education & Reference, History & Criticism, Criticism & Theory, Movements & Periods
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Margaret St. Clair’s “Short in the Chest.” All of these stories appeared in second and third line magazines. It is well understood that as the doomed Kornbluth became better and better, his work drifted from the three most important magazines. His last appearance in Campbell’s magazine was in 1952 with a novelette, “That Share of Glory,” and the Gunner Cade novel collaboration with Judith Merril (“The Quaker Cannon,” a collaboration with Pohl, appeared in 1961 but Kornbluth was quite dead by that time) and although Pohl collaborations appeared in Galaxy well into the 1960s, his single byline was absent after the 1952 Altar at Midnight . The Syndic , perhaps Kornbluth’s best novel, was barely rescued for serial publication by Harry Harrison for the last issues of Science Fiction Adventures . Theodore Sturgeon appeared frequently in Galaxy through 1958 but not nearly so frequently in F & SF and with a single exception (“Won’t You Walk?” in January 1956) not at all in Astounding . And Mark Clifton, who had been Campbell’s most renowned contributor between 1952 and 1955 sold only one novelette, “How Allied,” and a 500-word humorous essay to Astounding after that latter year. Clifton’s last short stories and novel, Pawn of the Black Fleet , appeared in Amazing .
The point of this grim, pointilistic subhistory is that although the fifties were indeed a period of growth, optimism, and experimentation for science fiction writers and readers, they were also characterized by the caution and terror which prevailed elsewhere. As the decade wandered in its sad and predictable way through the shores of political repression and public indifference, science fiction, no less than popular music or the products of General Motors, began to initiate decadence. (Defined most satisfactorily as being the elevation of form over function.) In a 1972 article by Gerald Jonas in The New Yorker , Robert Silverberg remembered why in 1959 he abandoned science fiction for several years. The magazine collapse of the late fifties had left few markets. Silverberg observed, “One of them would let you say only cheerful things about science. Another would only let you say downbeat things about science. And the others wouldn’t let you say anything at all.”
The fifties was a festival—historians are yet to uncover its riches but they will—but it is important to note that in the festival’s wake was left (carnival people know exactly what I mean) an empty landscape, much litter, a few lives not undamaged, a lot of bills not paid and heavy recriminations for those who had tried their luck at the wheel or with the fat lady or had carried their convictions too high for the dazzling night. The editors who lasted out the decade, Gold and Campbell, had become locked into parodies of their original editorial personas (paranoia and psionics) and Anthony Boucher had departed. Campbell pitched the tents of transcendence but by 1959 only the freak show seemed to draw his attention; Gold’s shell game was rigorous but he had turned into a simple cheat. Cynical contributors knew by 1957 that they could sell Gold by toying deliberately with his agoraphobia and contributors equally cynical (there was some overlap) knew that the way into ASF was to make John Campbell himself the hero of a narrative. Meanwhile, F & SF had started a sexed-up companion, Venture (Kornbluth’s last great story, “Two Dooms,” was published there as was Walter Miller’s strong “Vengeance for Nikolai,” but the magazine nonetheless folded quickly), magazines were expiring in clumps and Philip Klass and A. J. Budrys had decided that the universities or the editorial desk were steadier and less humiliating than attempting to do serious work for editors who did not want it or readers who could not tell the difference. Many writers plain broke down; others were incapable of selling in a rapidly diminished market and were driven out. The fifties ended
The point of this grim, pointilistic subhistory is that although the fifties were indeed a period of growth, optimism, and experimentation for science fiction writers and readers, they were also characterized by the caution and terror which prevailed elsewhere. As the decade wandered in its sad and predictable way through the shores of political repression and public indifference, science fiction, no less than popular music or the products of General Motors, began to initiate decadence. (Defined most satisfactorily as being the elevation of form over function.) In a 1972 article by Gerald Jonas in The New Yorker , Robert Silverberg remembered why in 1959 he abandoned science fiction for several years. The magazine collapse of the late fifties had left few markets. Silverberg observed, “One of them would let you say only cheerful things about science. Another would only let you say downbeat things about science. And the others wouldn’t let you say anything at all.”
The fifties was a festival—historians are yet to uncover its riches but they will—but it is important to note that in the festival’s wake was left (carnival people know exactly what I mean) an empty landscape, much litter, a few lives not undamaged, a lot of bills not paid and heavy recriminations for those who had tried their luck at the wheel or with the fat lady or had carried their convictions too high for the dazzling night. The editors who lasted out the decade, Gold and Campbell, had become locked into parodies of their original editorial personas (paranoia and psionics) and Anthony Boucher had departed. Campbell pitched the tents of transcendence but by 1959 only the freak show seemed to draw his attention; Gold’s shell game was rigorous but he had turned into a simple cheat. Cynical contributors knew by 1957 that they could sell Gold by toying deliberately with his agoraphobia and contributors equally cynical (there was some overlap) knew that the way into ASF was to make John Campbell himself the hero of a narrative. Meanwhile, F & SF had started a sexed-up companion, Venture (Kornbluth’s last great story, “Two Dooms,” was published there as was Walter Miller’s strong “Vengeance for Nikolai,” but the magazine nonetheless folded quickly), magazines were expiring in clumps and Philip Klass and A. J. Budrys had decided that the universities or the editorial desk were steadier and less humiliating than attempting to do serious work for editors who did not want it or readers who could not tell the difference. Many writers plain broke down; others were incapable of selling in a rapidly diminished market and were driven out. The fifties ended
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