''Explorers of the Infinite: Shapers of Science Fiction'' is a work of collective
biography
A biography, or simply bio, is a detailed description of a person's life. It involves more than just the basic facts like education, work, relationships, and death; it portrays a person's experience of these life events. Unlike a profile or ...
on the formative authors of the
science fiction
Science fiction (sometimes shortened to Sci-Fi or SF) is a genre of speculative fiction which typically deals with imaginative and futuristic concepts such as advanced science and technology, space exploration, time travel, parallel unive ...
genre by
Sam Moskowitz
Sam Moskowitz (June 30, 1920 – April 15, 1997) was an American writer, critic, and historian of science fiction.
Biography
As a child, Moskowitz greatly enjoyed reading science fiction pulp magazines. As a teenager, he organized a branch of ...
, first published in
hardcover
A hardcover, hard cover, or hardback (also known as hardbound, and sometimes as case-bound) book is one bound with rigid protective covers (typically of binder's board or heavy paperboard covered with buckram or other cloth, heavy paper, or occa ...
by the
World Publishing Company
The World Publishing Company was an American publishing company. The company published genre fiction, trade paperbacks, children's literature, nonfiction books, textbooks, Bibles, and dictionaries,Hyperion Press
Hyperion Press was an American publishing company, based in Westport, Connecticut. In the 1970s, it published science fiction and science fiction studies including reissues of several books first published by World Publ. Co. of Cleveland and cla ...
in 1974. Most of its chapters are revised versions of articles that initially appeared in the magazines ''
Satellite Science Fiction
''Satellite Science Fiction'' was an American science-fiction magazine published from October 1956 to April 1959 by Leo Margulies' Renown Publications. Initially, ''Satellite'' was digest sized and ran a full-length novel in each issue with a ...
'' and '' Fantastic Science Fiction Stories'' from 1958-1960.
The work presents the early history of the genre via a discussion of the lives and works of eighteen of its most important formative authors, followed by a more general discussion of more recent writers.
Contents
#"Introduction"
#" Cyrano DeBergerac - Swordsman of Space"
#"The Sons of Frankenstein" (
Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley
Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley (; ; 30 August 1797 – 1 February 1851) was an English novelist who wrote the Gothic novel ''Frankenstein; or, The Modern Prometheus'' (1818), which is considered an early example of science fiction. She also ...
)
#"The Prophetic
Edgar Allan Poe
Edgar Allan Poe (; Edgar Poe; January 19, 1809 – October 7, 1849) was an American writer, poet, editor, and literary critic. Poe is best known for his poetry and short stories, particularly his tales of mystery and the macabre. He is wide ...
"
#"The Fabulous Fantast,
Fitz-James O'Brien
Fitz James O'Brien (also spelled Fitz-James; 25 October 1826 – 6 April 1862) was an Irish-American Civil War soldier, writer, and poet often cited as an early writer of science fiction.
Biography
O'Brien was born Michael O'Brien in Cork, Irela ...
"
#"Around the Worlds With
Jules Verne
Jules Gabriel Verne (;''Longman Pronunciation Dictionary''. ; 8 February 1828 – 24 March 1905) was a French novelist, poet, and playwright. His collaboration with the publisher Pierre-Jules Hetzel led to the creation of the ''Voyages extraor ...
"
#"The Real Earth Satellite Story" (
Edward Everett Hale
Edward Everett Hale (April 3, 1822 – June 10, 1909) was an American author, historian, and Unitarian minister, best known for his writings such as " The Man Without a Country", published in '' Atlantic Monthly'', in support of the Union ...
)
#"Ghosts of Prophecies Past, or, Frank Reade, Jr. and 'Forgotten Chapters in American History'"
#"The Wonders of
M. P. Shiel
Matthew Phipps Shiell (21 July 1865 – 17 February 1947), known as M. P. Shiel, was a British writer. His legal surname remained "Shiell" though he adopted the shorter version as a ''de facto'' pen name.
He is remembered mainly for supernatura ...
"
#"
Arthur Conan Doyle
Sir Arthur Ignatius Conan Doyle (22 May 1859 – 7 July 1930) was a British writer and physician. He created the character Sherlock Holmes in 1887 for ''A Study in Scarlet'', the first of four novels and fifty-six short stories about Ho ...
- A Study in Science Fiction"
#"To Barsoom and Back with
Edgar Rice Burroughs
Edgar Rice Burroughs (September 1, 1875 – March 19, 1950) was an American author, best known for his prolific output in the adventure, science fiction, and fantasy genres. Best-known for creating the characters Tarzan and John Carter, he ...
"
#"The Marvelous
A. Merritt
Abraham Grace Merritt (January 20, 1884 – August 21, 1943) – known by his byline, A. Merritt – was an American Sunday magazine editor and a writer of fantastic fiction.
The Science Fiction and Fantasy Hall of Fame inducted him in 1999, ...
Hugo Gernsback
Hugo Gernsback (; born Hugo Gernsbacher, August 16, 1884 – August 19, 1967) was a Luxembourgish–American editor and magazine publisher, whose publications including the first science fiction magazine. His contributions to the genre as publ ...
: 'Father of Science Fiction'"
#"The Lore of H. P. Lovecraft"
#"
Olaf Stapledon
William Olaf Stapledon (10 May 1886 – 6 September 1950) – known as Olaf Stapledon – was a British philosopher and author of science fiction.Andy Sawyer, " illiamOlaf Stapledon (1886-1950)", in Bould, Mark, et al, eds. ''Fifty Key Figures ...
: Cosmic Philosopher"
#"Space Opus:
Philip Wylie
Philip Gordon Wylie (May 12, 1902 – October 25, 1971) was an American writer of works ranging from pulp science fiction, mysteries, social diatribes and satire to ecology and the threat of nuclear holocaust.
Early life and career
Born in Beve ...
"
#"Dawn of Fame: The Career of Stanley G. Weinbaum"
#"How Science Fiction Got Its Name"
#"The Future in Present Tense"
Reception
Theodore Sturgeon
Theodore Sturgeon (; born Edward Hamilton Waldo, February 26, 1918 – May 8, 1985) was an American fiction author of primarily fantasy, science fiction and horror, as well as a critic. He wrote approximately 400 reviews and more than 120 sh ...
, although noting the book's many imperfections, praised ''Explorers of the Infinite'', saying "no one has surveyed the roots of SF as well as Mr. M.; probably no one ever will; prossibly , no one else can."
Kirkus Reviews
''Kirkus Reviews'' (or ''Kirkus Media'') is an American book review magazine founded in 1933 by Virginia Kirkus (1893–1980). The magazine is headquartered in New York City. ''Kirkus Reviews'' confers the annual Kirkus Prize to authors of fic ...
, while recognizing Moskowitz's tracing of the genre to "Odysseus' Trojan horse and such devices as Arthur's incredibly able sword Excalibur, the Houyhnhnms of Gulliver's Travels, Mary Shelley's Frankenstein, Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, the historical Cyrano de Bergerac's A Voyage to the Moon (1650), Robinson Crusoe, and even ... Moby Dick," saw the book largely as the author's paen to ''
Amazing Stories
''Amazing Stories'' is an American science fiction magazine launched in April 1926 by Hugo Gernsback's Experimenter Publishing. It was the first magazine devoted solely to science fiction. Science fiction stories had made regular appearances i ...
'', "the great si-fi pulp mag of the Thirties, which ehere apostrophizes as an American efflorescence of the scientific imagination." It noted with apparent approval the fact that "Jules Verne and H. G. Wells get whole chapters, but lso thata fantastically vast up-literature of sci-fi exists from the turn of this century and before Amazing started in 1926 (all of it composed by authors less than amazingly memorable to many a living librarian)."Kirkus Reviews - Explorers of the Infinite /ref>