<
https://www.tor.com/2022/11/16/five-vintage-sf-anthologies-that-are-too-good-to-be-forgotten/>
"To round out my nostalgia trilogy, consider the anthology. In olden days—long
before the heyday of the Furby, the Tamagotchi, and the soulful crooning of
Milli Vanilli—there were many successful SF paper periodicals. Not every fan
could read every periodical: distribution may have skipped some areas, readers
had less spare time than they might have wanted, not to mention less money for
subscriptions. Anthologies, collecting the best stories, were a fan’s shortcut
to reading satisfaction.
Here are five pre-1960 anthologies that I think are worth reading. I would
recommend that you buy them brand new, if that were possible, but… Still, paper
books can be astonishingly durable and there are many used book purveyors
(online even).
As is my custom, I will omit quality anthologies mentioned in previous essays.
There’s so much good stuff out there that repetition isn’t necessary.
The usual “Wow, people sure thought differently back then” disclaimer applies.
As well, the one-sided gender ratio may leave readers wondering if the
population during this era was composed almost entirely of men, reproducing via
spores. Or perhaps budding. No, it’s just that many editors were sexist and
declined to acquire or reprint works by women, or even works that might not
appeal to male readers. This was also true of stories by authors of colour.
Still, even though these collections are old and reflect now excoriated (but
alas, not unpopular enough) biases, there are still some dangerous visions here
that are worth exploring."
Via Kenny Chaffin and Susan ****
Share and enjoy,
*** Xanni ***
--
mailto:xanni@xanadu.net Andrew Pam
http://xanadu.com.au/ Chief Scientist, Xanadu
https://glasswings.com.au/ Partner, Glass Wings
https://sericyb.com.au/ Manager, Serious Cybernetics
