dream world where he is ruler, but is magicked by an evil priest and put through the death rites while alive but (here too) paralyzed. He returns to hospital, starts to go again, then dies, and Dr. Schrodinger (honest) says, “My God! That’s it! The silver plate was the cause. Silver is a conductor. It made an electrical bridge over the Fissure of Sylvius! Even the three membranes, Pia Mater, Dura Mater and Arachnoid Membrane could not short-circuit it!” The House Surgeon says, “Well, he’s at rest now, poor devil. He won’t zing again.” Carnell says in his editorial that Hugi has recently died at age 43 and knew he was dying when he wrote this story. If so, he was a serious pessimist—at the end of the story it is hinted that the protagonist has actually zinged off a third time to another fantasy world, from which—having died—he will not be able to escape.
We reach the bottom of the barrel with John Brody’s “The Inexorable Laws,” in which space captain Leroy is chasing down space captain Bronberg, who stole his wife, terminal vengeance in mind. They fetch up on a planet where a gang of vile aliens, never seen but holed up in a pyramid, seize both ships with a powerful magnetic field. Leroy bows to “the ethical laws,” i.e., in the cold cruel cosmos Terrans stick together, abandon revenge, and cooperate in getting Bronberg off the planet. Having nothing more to live for, Leroy blows up his own ship and the alien pyramid. The writing is as crude as the story: “Mankind was such a small facet of the vast universe, such a weak growth amid so many perils, that every man who went beyond the field of Terra must be constantly on his guard.”
In this dubious company the quietly elegant “Inheritance” by Arthur C. Clarke (under the Charles Willis pseudonym, for no apparent reason) is a considerable relief. An experimental rocket pilot is confident he will survive because he has dreamed of the future—except it’s not his future he’s dreaming of. It’s a piece of modest ingenuity, modestly presented, and is the best thing in these three issues.
“Inheritance” prompts a question and an observation. The story subsequently appeared in the September 1948 Astounding—the only previously published story ever to appear in Astounding—and I wonder how and why that happened, and whether it has anything to do with the fact that Clarke, after one more story in the September 1949 issue, did not appear in Astounding again until “Death and the Senator” in 1961. It is also worth noting that Clarke published almost no original fiction in New Worlds after this, the only exceptions being “The Forgotten Enemy” in 5 (1949) and “Who’s There” in 77 (1958), with “Guardian Angel” in 8 (1950) being half an exception, since New Worlds published Clarke’s original version and not the one revised by James Blish that appeared in Famous Fantastic Mysteries.
Clarke’s other fictional appearances in New Worlds were all reprints: “The Sentinel” in 22 (1954), reprinted from Ten Story Fantasy; “?” in 55 (1957), reprinted from Fantasy & Science Fiction (as “Royal Prerogative”); and, believe it or not, “Sunjammer” in 148, into the Moorcock era, reprinted from Boys’ Life. It’s striking that the leading UK SF writer of the 1950s appeared so seldom in the leading UK SF magazine, especially since Clarke for some reason was not appearing in the highest-paying US magazines either. As noted, he was out of Astounding from late 1949 to 1961; he didn’t hit Galaxy until 1958; he had only half a dozen stories in Fantasy & Science Fiction through 1970; instead he tended to show up in Thrilling Wonder, If, Infinity, Satellite, etc.
In summary: the beginning of New Worlds appears inauspicious from this distance—although it surely seemed momentous back in the day, and back at the place.
8. One shilling was 1/20th of a Pound, and 6d or sixpence was half a shilling. In 2012 inflated currency, two shillings in 1946 were worth roughly US $4.50.
9. Bibliographic and historical information not from the magazine itself, and not otherwise attributed, is from The Science Fiction, Fantasy, & Weird Fiction Magazine Index by Stephen T. Miller and William G. Contento and Contento’s Index to Science Fiction Anthologies and Collections (both on CD-ROM from Locus Publications); from Mike Ashley’s article on New Worlds in Science Fiction, Fantasy and Weird Fiction Magazines, edited by Marshall B. Tymn and Ashley (Greenwood Press 1985); from Ashley’s recent histories of the SF magazines, The Time Machines and Transformations (Liverpool University Press, 2000 and 2005); from John Carnell’s brief memoir, “The Birth of New Worlds,” Vision of Tomorrow, September 1970, pp. 61-63; and from Rob Hansen’s web site, available on-line. http://www.fiawol.org.uk/FanStuff/THEN%20Archive/NewWorlds/NewWo.htm (visited 9/8/11). Occasional references to the Encyclopedia of Science Fiction are to the Second Edition by John Clute and Peter Nicholls (St. Martins, 1995), the latest available at time of writing.
Also notable is Philip Harbottle’s Vultures of the Void: The Legacy (Cosmos Books, 2011), published as we were completing our work. This book, very much expanded from an earlier, long out-of-print version, is a survey of UK SF publishing which emphasizes book publishing (especially paperbacks) but also includes useful information on the Nova magazines, some of which we have referred to.
10. See these covers at http://www.sfcovers.net/mainnav.htm. That URL takes you to the main page and you’ll have to navigate from there, but how to do so is self-explanatory. Among this site’s virtues is an artist index. Another handy source—and probably easier to use—is http://www.philsp.com/mags/newworlds.html (both sites visited 9/8/11).
11. Carnell, “The Birth of New Worlds,” p. 62.
12. Slack was a pseudonym for Kenneth Passingham, son of Bill Passingham, who played a key role in the aborted effort to start New Worlds in 1940. Id. at 63.
13. Carnell later recounted: “Fearn responded to my urgent request for material by sending over one quarter of a million words and in all those first few months produced over half a million, all of which had to be read and from which a selection had to be chosen for that first vital issue.” John Carnell, “The Birth of New Worlds,” p. 61.
14. Wait a minute! How did an expanding circle become a swinging pendulum? Isn’t that what the Dean Drive was about? At least it didn’t turn into a seesaw—that had been done, by A. E. van Vogt.
15. In fact, as Philip Harbottle reports, Fearn in 1950 signed a contract with Scion Books to write SF exclusively for that publisher for five years. Vultures of the Void: The Legacy, p. 123.
16. This recurrent phrase reflects the view of members of the listserv on which this material was first aired that Attention Must Be Paid to the obscure and forgotten producers of decades-old magazine fiction, a preoccupation in which I enthusiastically joined.
17. http://www.dcs.gla.ac.uk/SF Archives/Then/then_1 2.html (visited 9/8/11).
18. “Camouflage,” Astounding Science Fiction, April 1943. The Probability Zero items were essentially tall tales, brief vignettes that stretched credulity and often amounted to parodies of SF method and logic, some written by Astounding’s regular contributors, others by readers and fans who had few or no other credits in the field, or only obtained them later, like Ray Bradbury. Even New Worlds editor Ted Carnell published one, “Time Marches On,” in the August 1942 issue of Astounding.
2: RESURRECTION (1949-50)
Sunk
