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The Alchemist, v. 1, issue 5, February 1941

Page 16

16

          SCIENCE-FICTION BACKGROUND

               Otis Adelbert Kline

   I'm afraid a short article on HOW TO WRITE AND SELL SCIENCE-FICTION, as suggested by Ray Hunt, would be rather a difficult order--like trying to paint a panorama on a collar button. However, briefly, I'll tell how I happened to write science-fiction and fantasy.

   When I was still quite small, my father, who took considerable interest in all science, and who had quite a large, well-chosen library, used to take me out in the evenings when the sky was clear, and point out to me the planets and constellations, evoking eager questions which he answered to the best of his ability according to the astronomical knowledge of those days--the middle nineties. We frequently discussed the possibility that planets, other than our earth, might be inhabited, and I read and re-read Proctor's OTHER WORLDS THAN OURS first published in England in 1870, and later reprinted here. It was a great day for us when Wells' WAR OF THE WORLDS came out in 1898. I was seven years old at the time, curious about the planets, and highly imaginative. We both read this excellent novel, Dad and I, and had many talks about it. The science-fiction of Jules Verne also intrigued me mightily in those days.

   An incident which whetted my interest in the history of the earth itself is still fresh in my

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16 SCIENCE-FICTION BACKGROUND Otis Adelbert Kline I'm afraid a short article on HOW TO WRITE AND SELL SCIENCE-FICTION, as suggested by Ray Hunt, would be rather a difficult order--like trying to paint a panorama on a collar button. However, briefly, I'll tell how I happened to write science-fiction and fantasy. When I was still quite small, my father, who took considerable interest in all science, and who had quite a large, well-chosen library, used to take me out in the evenings when the sky was clear, and point out to me the planets and constellations, evoking eager questions which he answered to the best of his ability according to the astronomical knowledge of those days--the middle nineties. We frequently discussed the possibility that planets, other than our earth, might be inhabited, and I read and re-read Proctor's OTHER WORLDS THAN OURS first published in England in 1870, and later reprinted here. It was a great day for us when Wells' WAR OF THE WORLDS came out in 1898. I was seven years old at the time, curious about the planets, and highly imaginative. We both read this excellent novel, Dad and I, and had many talks about it. The science-fiction of Jules Verne also intrigued me mightily in those days. An incident which whetted my interest in the history of the earth itself is still fresh in my