Probably the best known story in this collection is Alfred Bester’s classic “Star Light, Star Bright” about a gifted but dangerous child. I enjoyed Charles L. Harness’s clever time-travel story, “Child by Chronos.” Anthony Boucher’s story about a little demon, “Snulbug,” has lost none of its charm over the decades.
In these early The Best From Fantasy and Science Fiction volumes, the editors were partial to L. Sprague de Camp and Fletch Pratt’s Gavagan’s Bar stories (like “The Untimely Toper”) and Manly Wade Wellman’s Silver John stories (like “Vandy, Vandy” where an obsessive brand of Love leads to strangeness). This Third Series volume contains several excellent stories and Boucher’s wonderful Introductions to all the stories. GRADE: B+
TABLE OF CONTENTS:
Introduction / [Anthony Boucher, J. Francis McComas] — 7
Attitudes / Philip José Farmer — 13
Maybe just a little one / R. Bretnor — 35
The star gypsies / William Lindsay Gresham — 51
The untimely Toper / L. Sprague de Camp and Fletcher Pratt — 69
Vandy, Vandy / Manly Wade Wellman — 79
Experiment / Kay Rogers — 96
Lot / Ward Moore — 100
Manuscript found in a vacuum / P.M. Hubbard — 131
The maladjusted classroom / H. Nearing, Jr. — 134
Child by Chronos / Charles L. Harness — 153
New ritual / Idris Seabright (aka,Margaret St. Clair — 172
Devlin / W.B. Ready — 182
Captive audience / Ann Warren Griffith — 197
Snulbug / Anthony Boucher — 213
Shepherd’s boy / Richard Middleton — 230
Star light, star bright / Alfred Bester — 233
This brings back memories …
When I walked by the bookstore in the early 60s I always had to look at these crazy (lurid?) covers on the magazines and the books, SF as well as detective stories.
And I only had money for buying one or two a month …
Give me story from Gavagan’s bar and anything by Bester or Farmer!
Wolf, you were the perfect audience that THE BEST FROM FANTASY AND SCIENCE FICTION was trying to reach! Your tastes and theirs aligned closely!
There’s a lot to like in this one, George. Beside those you mentioned, a number of my favorite writers are included. H, Nearing’s Professor Ransom stories are always a delight. “Idris Seabright”/Margaret St, Clair should be essential reading for any SF fan. Ward Moore’s LOT is a classic, and I’ve never gone wrong with Reginald Bretnor. I need to read more of W. B. Ready’s Irish fantasies. Kay Rogers published only a handful of stories in F&SF; all were interesting. Boucher and McComas certainly knew how to pick them. Although ASTOUNDING still reigned in the science fiction field, F&SF (along with Gold’s GALAXY) was nipping at its heels.
Jerry, the Professor Ransom story in this anthology was new to me. I was surprised that Boucher and McComas actually wrote was essentially was an ad for the “upcoming” H. Nearing collection of Professor Ransom stories. When I GOOGLED H. Nearing I discovered he stopped writing fiction in 1954. Too bad…
Fans wanted to believe that ASTOUNDING was the dominant sf magazine in the early ’50s, but GALAXY was both outselling and out-fictioning it–just reread Robert Silverberg’s essay on “the Real golden age of sf” (the 1950s, from his POV), and he notes as a fannish reader he was most drawn to GALAXY in those years as well…didn’t help that John Campbell was already supporting crackpottery of various sorts bigtime by the ’50s, such as Dianetics, psi powers, etc.
Todd, I loved GALAXY in the 1950s! Great cover artwork and wonderful writers!
One interesting side note: William Lindsay Gresham was most well known for his first novel, NIGHTMARE ALLEY, made into a hit film with Tyrone Power. He was married to (and had two sons with) Joy Davidman, who, after their divorce, vconverted to Christianity, later moving to England and, ultimately, marrying C. S. Lewis four years before her death from cancer. Gresham then married her first cousin, with whom he had been having an affair. According to Wikipedia, Gresham was an “early enthusiast” of Scientology, but later denounced it as a “spook racket.” He had cancer of the tongue and committed suicide at the Hotel Carter (or Hotel Dixie, as it was first called) on West 43rd Street in Manhattan (which I always assumed was the model for the “Blaine Hotel” on the early years of SNL), one of at least four suicides and four murders that happened at that troubled place. He was only 53.
Jeff, you are a fount of Information! I had no idea of the background of William Lindsay Gresham and all that went on back then!
Shall have to look up “Blaine Hotel”–rings no bells. Clearly this is Scientology week on the blog.
Todd, I watched a Tom Cruise movie that I was tempted to review on the blog…but I figured Cap’n Bob didn’t need any more excitement this week!
A lot of great stories here-Bester, Farmer, Moore, Wellman, St. Clair, de Camp & Pratt, Boucher. This is much better than the first two volumes.
Steve, I think Boucher and McComas hit their stride with SERIES THREE. No reprints of Charles Dickens stories, no “filler” stories. The quality went up…way up!
Sounds like Gresham’s life would make a good novel. Was the death of Lewis’ wife the story they made a play about. Can’t remember the title.
Yes, SHADOWLANDS. One of the few plays Phil saw without me at a conference in New York.
We saw SHADOWLANDS too. Hmm, checked and I was wrong. We did NOT see it on stage. Rather, we saw the original made-for-television movie version with Joss Ackland and Claire Bloom, the basis for the play. That was 1985. The play was 1989 London, 1990 New York (with Nigel Hawthorne in both, Jane Alexander in the Broadway production). There was a 1993 movie with Anthony Hopkins and Debra Winger, but I much preferred the original with Ackland and Bloom.
Jeff, all of this is news to me! I dimly recall when SHADOWLANDS was in the movie theaters in the early 1990s but we didn’t see it.
One more thing, about Joss Ackland (now 93) this time. He was married for 51 years, and despite having SEVEN children and a far-flung acting career, he said that he and his wife never spent a night apart. In 1963 their house caught fire. His wife saved the five (then) children but broke her back jumping from the window. The doctors told her she would miscarry and never walk again, but she delivered the baby and walked after two years of rehab. She died of motor neurone disease in 2002.
Jeff, you are amazing! Fascinating facts about Joss Ackland and his wife!
Not a bad anthology, though F&SF was not my favorite mag at the time. I’d like to try that Nearing story.
Rick, all of Nearing’s Professor Ransom stories were collected in THE SINISTER RESEARCHES OF C. P. RANSOM. Copies are available online and some Libraries still have it in their collections.
“Snulbug” (a reprint from UNKNOWN), “Lot” (disturbing as it can be), and “Vandy, Vandy” were strong contenders, then and now, as at least as famous as the Bester story, even given he titled one of his retrospective story collections in the ’70s for it.
Glad you’re enjoying this march through the Series! Are you also going to do the “supplements” such as ONCE AND FUTURE TALES?
Todd, I’m considering ONCE AND FUTURE TALES after I read the 25 BEST FROM F & SF volumes.