Avon Fantasy Reader, edited by Donald A. Wollheim
A complete set (18 issues) of Avon Fantasy Reader, edited by Donald A. Wollheim and published 1947-1952
Donald A. Wollheim edited a magazine between the years 1947 to 1952 called Avon Fantasy Reader for Avon Publishers. There were 18 issues, publishing mostly reprints.
Erik Mona reviewed the first issue of Avon Fantasy Reader for Black Gate back in 2023.
I’ve never seen a copy of any of these, but in the late 1960s, George Ernsberger selected some of the best stories from the magazine for two paperback volumes. I believe there were only two. Here are some quick looks at the paperbacks, which I own and have read.
[Click the images for fantastic versions.]
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The Avon Fantasy Reader and The 2nd Avon Fantasy Reader, edited by Donald A. Wollheim
and George Ernsberger (Avon Books, January and February 1969). Covers by Gray Morrow
The Avon Fantasy Reader (1969), Avon Books. Contains,
A very short Foreword by Ernsberger
“The Witch from Hell’s Kitchen” by Robert E. Howard, which features a Conanesque hero named Pyrrhas
A Northwest Smith story by C. L. Moore called “Black Thirst”
“A Victim of Higher Space,” by Algernon Blackwood
A fine story by Nictzin Dyalhis called “The Sapphire Siren” (or “The Sapphire Goddess” in Echoes of Valor III)
“The Voice in the Night” by William Hope Hodgson
“The Crawling Horror” by Thorp McClusky
“The Kelpie” by Manly Wade Wellman, which is one of his better stories
The 2nd Avon Fantasy Reader (1969): Contains “The Blonde Goddess of Bal-Sagoth by Howard, and also has stories by C. L. Moore (Northwest Smith again), Zealla Bishop, Clark Ashton Smith, Donald Wandrei, Edward Lucas White, Robert Bloch, Laurence Manning & Fletcher Pratt, and Sax Rohmer.
“The Black Kiss” by Bloch was excellent, and very Lovecraftian in feel. Several of the stories had that kind of edge to them.
Overall, these two collections are more horror than Sword & Sorcery, although Howard’s two stories fit S&S. The title, “The Witch of Hell’s Kitchen” doesn’t suggest S&S but the tale’s other title perhaps does — “The House of Arabu.” I found both collections generally enjoyable.
I also love these cover illustrations, both of which are by Gray Morrow.
Charles Gramlich administers The Swords & Planet League group on Facebook, where this post first appeared. His last article for us was The Sword & Sorcery of John Jakes. See all of his recent posts for Black Gate here.
I have five of the original issues – 2,4,8,9 and 10. There’s nothing like that rich, musty old-paper smell to enhance the reading experience!
I’m jealous that you have those. I grew up knowing nothing about any of the pulps and it was years into adulthood before I began learning about them.
I have two or three of the original issues of the Avon Fantasy Reader myself. Wollheim really did a service with those magazines — resurrecting some worthwhile older stories (often from without the genre) and publishing very occasional new stories. I have to say I’m a bit disappointed that those anthologies drawn from the magazine didn’t include two of the very greatest stories it published: John Collier’s “Evening Primrose” and Lord Dunsany’s “The Hoard of the Ghibbelins”.
There was also The Avon Science Fiction Reader, which only lasted three (not very good, honestly) issues. And finally The Avon Science Fiction and Fantasy Reader, edited by Sol Cohen (Wollheim had left for Ace by then I think), which published mostly original stories. Some of these were quite good (despite the rather stupid comment at the ISFDB) — Jack Vance’s “DP!”, Kris Neville’s “As Holy and Enchanted” (as by Henderson Starke), a couple stories each by Arthur C. Clarke and John Christopher.
I actually wrote about the Avon Fantasy Reader very briefly in my very first essay for Black Gate — back in the days of the print edition, with issue #2. An excerpt is here: https://www.blackgate.com/black-gate-non-fiction-excerpt-building-the-fantasy-canon-the-classic-anthologies-of-genre-fantasy/
Thanks for the additional information. Much appreciated.