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Last Testament, issue 18, December 1941

31858063105013_004

The Conversion of a Skeptic

Or -- The True Account of the Remarkable Denconversion

When I was a little lad with fur upon my lips I did long to sail over the briny sea in briny ships. But when I was a greybeard with pants upon my hips did I fear to sail the briny sea in even brinier ships. This dilemma left me in a terrible quandry for a time but it finally occurred that I could write about the briny seas without ever going near a briny ship. So I became a Writer and learned that I couldn't write about the briny etc and without etc.

Not long after, in the 8th grade, an English teacher decided to acquaint me with the classics. She place reverently in my hands a copy of the most collosal literachewer (got its name, we suppose, from the charming expression, "to chew bull" or somepm!) of that super slan Englishman, Bill Shakespeare. Bill was not an SF fan and neither was I. In fact, I wasn't much of anything in Bill's day. The book was printed on beautiful think paper and bound in bright red leather -- well, it looked like leather. But I couldn't figure out which end to start from. It seemed like it didn't make no sense nohow, not from either end. When I returned it, she took one look at it and said, "Oh, you smart child. Why you must have practically memorized the whole book."

Then I moved to Columbia. In Columbia I found Main Street, Crane Creek and Joseph Gilbert. I never did like Main Street; there were too many people on it. But Crane Creek had fish in it and the pools were deep under the shadows of Little Mountain in the summer and the water was cool and there weren't any people in it. If there were, the creek was full of other good holes. But JG wasn't so easy to classify and it took me several years to discover how completely alike we were in our individual dopiness.

Joe moved onto my block during the height of the DOG SAVAGE PERIOD of his life and we used to kid him unmercifully about his red (bronze) hair and other supposed resemblances to the Bronze Man. He tried to follow Doc's program for physical improvement but we kidded him out of that. We were horrid. He tried to make me read Doc Savage but I only turned my nose up at him. I used to stay up half the night reading copies that John (twin brother) dragged in. Joe naturally moved soon; he has spent all of his life one jump ahead of the sheriff in the very best of artistic traditions. I have spent all my life one jump behind art in the very best of Eastman traditions. I have been encouraged by various people on a number of occasions to stay behind.

I read SFiction when I was 8 years old -- American Boy SF -- and I liked it but liked the stories of the little bears that swiped the beans even more. There was a story about a dope who burned a hole to the middle of the earth and found a lot of -- you guessed it -- just plain gold. This wasn't one of the first ones. I misrecall them. I read "When Worlds Collide" when it first appeared in serial form, gosh knows where. I read several stories by Edgar Rice Burroughs -- about the hollow middle of this earth and some hunk of land out in space but I never would read Tarzan and I never did until after I graduated from High School. There were time machine stories and space travel stories and invasions of the earth by horrible creatures who succumbed to the germs of earth diseases and stories of human monsters (?) and there was the man who speeded up his reactions till he could catch a bullet in his gloved hand. The American Boy was a wonderful magazine in those days. I learned to read in it and it was almost all I did read up to the 5th grade. Some of those old

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The Conversion of a Skeptic Or -- The True Account of the Remarkable Denconversion When I was a little lad with fur upon my lips I did long to sail over the briny sea in briny ships. But when I was a greybeard with pants upon my hips did I fear to sail the briny sea in even brinier ships. This dilemma left me in a terrible quandry for a time but it finally occurred that I could write about the briny seas without ever going near a briny ship. So I became a Writer and learned that I couldn't write about the briny etc and without etc. Not long after, in the 8th grade, an English teacher decided to acquaint me with the classics. She place reverently in my hands a copy of the most collosal literachewer (got its name, we suppose, from the charming expression, "to chew bull" or somepm!) of that super slan Englishman, Bill Shakespeare. Bill was not an SF fan and neither was I. In fact, I wasn't much of anything in Bill's day. The book was printed on beautiful think paper and bound in bright red leather -- well, it looked like leather. But I couldn't figure out which end to start from. It seemed like it didn't make no sense nohow, not from either end. When I returned it, she took one look at it and said, "Oh, you smart child. Why you must have practically memorized the whole book." Then I moved to Columbia. In Columbia I found Main Street, Crane Creek and Joseph Gilbert. I never did like Main Street; there were too many people on it. But Crane Creek had fish in it and the pools were deep under the shadows of Little Mountain in the summer and the water was cool and there weren't any people in it. If there were, the creek was full of other good holes. But JG wasn't so easy to classify and it took me several years to discover how completely alike we were in our individual dopiness. Joe moved onto my block during the height of the DOG SAVAGE PERIOD of his life and we used to kid him unmercifully about his red (bronze) hair and other supposed resemblances to the Bronze Man. He tried to follow Doc's program for physical improvement but we kidded him out of that. We were horrid. He tried to make me read Doc Savage but I only turned my nose up at him. I used to stay up half the night reading copies that John (twin brother) dragged in. Joe naturally moved soon; he has spent all of his life one jump ahead of the sheriff in the very best of artistic traditions. I have spent all my life one jump behind art in the very best of Eastman traditions. I have been encouraged by various people on a number of occasions to stay behind. I read SFiction when I was 8 years old -- American Boy SF -- and I liked it but liked the stories of the little bears that swiped the beans even more. There was a story about a dope who burned a hole to the middle of the earth and found a lot of -- you guessed it -- just plain gold. This wasn't one of the first ones. I misrecall them. I read "When Worlds Collide" when it first appeared in serial form, gosh knows where. I read several stories by Edgar Rice Burroughs -- about the hollow middle of this earth and some hunk of land out in space but I never would read Tarzan and I never did until after I graduated from High School. There were time machine stories and space travel stories and invasions of the earth by horrible creatures who succumbed to the germs of earth diseases and stories of human monsters (?) and there was the man who speeded up his reactions till he could catch a bullet in his gloved hand. The American Boy was a wonderful magazine in those days. I learned to read in it and it was almost all I did read up to the 5th grade. Some of those old