Search Results for: "Weird Tales"

Weird Tales Deep Read: January 1936

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Another Brundage Pastel I’m going to change the focus of the Weird Tales deep read slightly, to hopefully give a somewhat more coherent view of the magazine by focusing on a particular year, while still maintaining the month-at-a time format. First up is January 1936, followed by the ten subsequent issues published that year. (One issue was bi-monthly, and I’ve already covered the July issue, so you can just check that particular installment in the link provided below if you’re…

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Weird Tales Deep Read: January 1945

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Weird Tales, January 1945. Cover by Margaret Brundage This time we’re jumping ahead in our deep read of the Unique Magazine, to the January 1945 issue. The old guard has largely changed. Howard has been dead for almost six years, Lovecraft out-lived him less than a year. C. L. Moore hadn’t published in WT since 1939, Clark Ashton Smith longer. (Reprints not considered,) That doesn’t mean there were no familiar names. Seabury Quinn, August Derleth, Edmond Hamilton, and others continued…

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Cozy Catastrophes and Sinister Archaeology: Weird Tales #364 edited by Jonathan Maberry

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Weird Tales #364. Cover by Lynne Hansen As I write this, Weird Tales falls just two years short of celebrating its centennial — an astonishing feat, given that the fiction magazines in existence at that time, all considered far more prestigious than this lurid showcase of fantasy and horror, have vanished into time and space as if they never existed. (Only Argosy, revived in 2016 by Altus Press, matches it in longevity.) With such august placement in pop culture history,…

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Evil Space Plants, Lecherous Dragons, and the Mysteries of the Vampire: Weird Tales 364 Arrives

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Weird Tales #364. Cover by Lynne Hansen What’s this? Can it be? Two issues of Weird Tales magazine published in a single year? That hasn’t happened since (hastily checks notes) 2012! There are other changes afoot as well, not just this insanely overambitious publication schedule. Marvin Kaye, who took over as editor in 2012 with issue 360 and managed just four issue in the last nine years, is no longer on the masthead. Replacing him as editor is Jonathan Maberry,…

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Weird Tales Deep Read: July 1936

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Margaret Brundage for Red Nails We return to the golden age of Weird Tales to consider the eleven stories in the July 1936 issue. This time around we’re dealing with many familiar authors, led by the triumvirate of C. L. Moore, Clark Ashton Smith, and Robert E. Howard, one H. P. Lovecraft short of perfection. The big three present classic tales from their popular fantasy series (Northwest Smith, Zothique, Conan). The other familiar names deliver more of a mixed bag,…

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Women Do It Better? The Women of Weird Tales, from Valancourt Books

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The Women of Weird Tales By Everil Worrell, Eli Colter, Mary Elizabeth Counselman and Greye La Spina Introduction by Melanie Anderson Valancourt Books (280 pages, $24.99 hardcover/$16.99 paperback/$9.99 digital, November 3, 2020) It is well known by now that women had a pivotal role in the development of those literary genres called Gothic Fiction, Horror, Dark Fantasy, etc. If we look at the iconic Weird Tales, the golden era of which spanned the ‘20s to the ‘50s, female authors were constantly…

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Weird Tales Deep Read: May 1923

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Cover by William Heitman This time we’re considering another early Weird Tales, the third issue, May 1923. This was one of the oversized bed-sheet sized issues and contained 21 stories by 22 authors. Astonishingly, fourteen of these authors were one and done, with no additional published stories in the sf/fan field. Another two have two stories listed at the Internet Speculative Fiction Database. The two most significant authors in this issue are Vincent Starrett, a long-time newspaper man who produced…

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Weird Tales Deep Read: November 1934

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Weird Tales, November 1934. Cover by Margaret Brundage (for “Queen of the Lillin”) We’re back on more familiar ground with this issue of Weird Tales from its classic period. More familiar authors are represented, and although not every story is a classic the editors at least avoided any real stumbles this. The issue grades out to a 2.1, which all in all is pretty decent. Both Howard and Lovecraft appear, although the Lovecraft tale is a reprint and the Howard is…

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Weird Tales Deep Read: June, 1923

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Cover by Heitman for “Murders in the Rue Morgue” June 1923 was the magazine’s fourth issue, and it was still clearly a magazine in search of itself. There are very few authors who had a major impact on the magazine appeared in this issue. The most notable name, of course, is Edgar Allen Poe with a reprint of one of his most famous tales (“The Murders in the Rue Morgue”) and, secondarily, Otis Adelbert Kline, with a story largely forgotten today, but…

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Weird Tales Deep Read: August, 1934

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Yet another Brundage cover We have another nine stories to consider this time around, but what is particularly noteworthy is that all nine of the authors are at least somewhat well known. The most obscure on the list is probably Anthony Rud (here writing under the name of R. Anthony, perhaps best known for his story “Oooze,” arguably the best offering in WT’s initial issue [3-23]), which is partially due to his passing in 1942 at the relatively young age…

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