FANI TASY RTVITVV Yol. II, No. 12 ONE SIilIITNG DEC.'48-JAN.'49 0LAF STAPLEDON'S vision of INTERPLANETARY MA}I Speciol Interview with Edgar Rice Burroughs A SOY'ET VIEW OF SC'ENCE FICTION HOW'WONDER STORIES' BEGAN Mr. Shaver and the Flying Saueers JOHN BEYNON asks: WHY BLAME WELLS ? FANTASY BOOK REY'EWS AMONG THE MAGAZINES FANIASY FORUM 2 FANTASY As The SCIENCE FICTION THE Soviets - Seelt... WORLD'S }IIGHTMARE ! Science fiction has been prais€d, riili- it flnds the child norrnal, it returns ib culed, and even lightly condemned in the to Lhe arms of the waiting mcther. If pa"st' on the ground of its "morbidity" or it finds a future "superman," the sheer fa,ntasy. But never before has it mother will never see him again; he been thoroughly denounced as monstrous reactionary will be sent to a world "parallel" to Irropaganda' a tool of the he be raised without the fonces seeking to enslave mankind, which ours where will vet reveals the dreadful doom in store for heip of parents. But woe to ttre baby ihe world-or most of it. This remark- the machine flnds defective-it will be able article, which appeared in a recent immediafely desfroyed. According to iseuo of ar Soviet literary journal, is an- the "scientiflc" forecast of author other inetalrce of the notice fa,ntasy- Jones. a netwolk of such machines will fiction is attracting on all sides, even cover tlre world of the future. behind the Iron Curtain. We reproduce This tale, monstrous in its openly It, heret, with all its invective, as a re- flection of quite a new attitude to this fascistic tendency, appears in the Ame- litorature. rican magazine Astoundingr under the optimistic tiUe of "Renaissance." The American Flaymond F. Jones, ex- Jones' fascist revelations are not an perienced writel of "scientiflc" fanta- isolated instance in American science 3ies, attempLs to lift the curtain of the fiction litera.turex. There are numerous future for fhe reader. He uses all his such examples under the brightly col- flaming imagination in describing a ourful covers which enterprising pub- machine which analyses the inclina- lishers throw on the market in millions tions, talents, character and other of ccpies. From their pages glares a potentialities of a new-born infant. If fearful world, apparently conceived. in *Condensed the sick mind of an insane, a world of from "The world of Night- mental mare Fantasies," bv Victor Bolkhoviti- nightmare fantasies. Miasma, nov and Vassilij Zakhartchenko, pub- decay, fear of to-day and horror of the lished in the Literaturnaya Gazyeta. future: all these innurnerable ills of capitalism are clearly reflected. In their science flction delirium, the aulhors reveal the innermost secret of REVIEW capitalism. With sha,meless boldness FANTASY they bring to ttre surface what serious A Journal for Readers, Wfiters and literature still tries to present in a Collectors. of Imaginative Flction veiled form. The lackey of Wali Street, BI.MONTHLY: ONE SHILLING in the livery of a science fiction writer, Editorlal, Advertising and Pub- flrst of all carries out the main order lishing Ofrce: 115 Wanstead Park of his bosses: to persuade the reader of Road. Ilford, Esse)L the iwrrlnerability of the capitalist Subscription rates: In Great system. The wolf-pack laws, the so- Britain and Dominions (except called American Way of Life, are re- Canada) 6/- per year. Single copies presented as inevitable for all people 1/-, post free. In Canada and the on Earth, now and in the futur.e. U.S.A.. $1.50 ]rer Vear. Single No matter to what planet the author copies, 25c., post free. carries his heroes, he describes worlds Yot. 2, No. 12 Dec. '48 : Janr '49 constructed according to the American Editor: Walter Giilings, system. In "The Mysterious World," by Assooie.te Edltors: John Carnell, Eando Binder, the bandit Yorin, fol- J. Micheel llosenblum, D. R,. Smlth, lowing the trade of his Chicago col- Arthul F. Ilillman, Fted C. Brown, leagues, steals an interplanetary taxi' Nlgel Lindsay, Frank Edward Ar- kidnaps the scientist Tom and the nold, J. O. Newman, A. Vincent beautiful Della, and takes them to an Clarke. * only A m e i c a Although this article appeared r n Correspondcnts: recenlly, most of the stories menLioned David Klshi (New York), Fbrrest published years J. ACkehran (Hollywood), Sam were four or five ago, Moskowitz (Newark, N.J.), Jo.seph durinfi the war when, if they had anlv B. Baker (Chicago). propagandist tendencv at aII, tt was more likely to be anti-I'ascist.-Ed. BEVIEW 3 unkno\rn pianet to look for hidden arrive at a belief in the existence of pirate treasure.. In a story by Eric other worlds in the fourttr dimension. Frank Russell, "The Secret of Mr. Thus, in a story by John and Dorothy Wiesel," there is an ecstatic description de Courcy, there appears an immortal of the adventures of a spy from Mars. corpse out of a grave! In Joseph J. Mil- The American science-fantasy, in its lard's "The Crystal Invaders," tlle pro- unbridled racial propaganda, reactres tagonists are bodiless creatures of "con- heights which rnight have made Goeb- centrated pure energy" which by feed- bels envious. The author of "Lilies of ing on the nervous energy of people Life," Malcolm Jameson, tries to im- arouse in them emotions of fear and press on the reader that there is in- hatred. equality on Venus and that there are In huge quantities appears the inferlor and superior races. With the writing of literary fiends like Richard revolting cynicism of a coloniser and a S. Shal'er, consisbing of a mixture of slave owner, he writes: "T'ire natives mysticism and sadism in the fascist of Venus axe lazy, vicious and shame- style. In his novels Shaver constantly less. The native is a born liar and thLief ; avers that a]l the troubles on Earth are he shuns work, is indifierent to physi- caused by an incredibly ancient and cal pain and completely incapable of learned super-race of Lemurians wlro thought." once owned the Earth but who have The dollar, the gun and the flst func- been driven into deep underground tion equally well on the most distant caves with all their machines. They planets, even those in the dust of the operate from ttrese caves with special galaxy. Obeying ttre order of the WaIl rays which inspire anti-social thoughts Street owners, the 'triteis glorify war and actions and invite man to suicidal as the basis of life and as the natural war. condition of the planet. In "Destiny The authors of this arch-reactionary Times Three," FTitz Leiber Jr. describes and screamingly shameless mess can- a cruel, unending war between two not. however. hide their fear of the nations who have swallowed all the future which has seized the entire capi- rest. They are constantly goaded on talistic world. Capitalism, which en- by the thought that the war must be slaves and exploits men, would much continued or all previous sacriflces will prefer that its factories were worked have been in vain. In "The Lights of by uncomplaining automatons. So, to I\fars," the author foresees war not please their bosses, the writers bring only on Earth but also on Mars. forth a whole army of robots who p'ush To foltify the propaganda of the live workers out of the factories. Char- imperiaiists' war machine, the "science" acteristic is a story by Eando Binder, fantasts of America unrestrainedly "Adam Link Saves the World." Adam threaten with the atomic bomb mon- Link is a robot, with a platinum sponge ster. Robert Moore Williams, in "The brain superior to a human's. In a war Incredible Pebbles," describes a future with monsters arrived from Sirius, he atom bomb factory into which, having leads herds of bestial and merciless made a mystdrious leap through time, people. In Lester del Rey's "Though there wanders a moronic liftle boy with Dreamers Die," all humans die out, a slingshot. The little boy shoots while on a faraway planet the robots atom bombs from his slinglhot Uke survive and multiply. pebbles. A hooligan vrith an atomic In the contemporary bourgeois slingshot-isn't this the true s5.'rnbol world, the fruits of the creativeness of of modern imperiaiism? inventors and scientists are turned into To distract the mind of the reader objects for specuiation and robbery or from "harmful" thoughts on the origin the means of slavery and exploitation. of social eviis, American publishers re- Capibalism has chained inventors to its lease a flood of horrifying tales with chariot by its patent laws, and forces "other side" thernes such as telepathy, scientists to do things against hurnan- reincarnation and failure of memory. ity. The hero of the modern scienc€ flc- The authors of these 'lscientiflc-fan- tion story is usually not a scientist but tastic" worts do everything to pervert a business rru[n or s, gangster who uti- and stultify their readers. ?hey fore- Iises the fruits of other people's labous. tell the total destruction of matter, Science, in the opinion of the American which is replaced by a concentration business man, is above all else a means of thought+nergy. Ttrowing in a few of enrichment, crime and tyranny. mathematical theories, the ignora- Capitalism has no future. Time is muses of these Amelican maga"zines working against it. Pessimism shows 4 FA NTASY through all science flction literature, disease of the capitalistic system- The in spite of a show of bravado on the tracks supplying the fantastic drivel parb of its authors.