Donald Allen Wollheim

“ It is an effigy of Noom carved out of a single priceless lynquar gem. It is as large as an ordinary man and quite an excellent representation of the squat god of Oo. But like all things in that city, it, too, is unfinished. For where there should be twinkling stone eyes, there gleam forth two black human orbs that stare with an unearthly horror out at the scene before it. And if you place your ear to the hard stone sides you may hear a dull thumping as if of a heart beating eternally in the interior. ”

“ This world of readers' thought, of fantasy life, we choose to term the Fantasy World. This column is here to do justice to the affairs, thoughts, and opinions of that world. If it weren't here, your editors would be deluged with letters and delegations until it appeared. Besides which we're all in favor of it; we're a part of that fantasy world and we love it.
The fantasy world has its own independent amateur press. Dozens of fan magazines, some monthly, some otherwise, usually mimeographed, reach all over the real world binding the active centers of the fantasy world together. ”

“ I thought that none did not know of Oo and its God."
"Indeed, oh most honorable man, my land is so far off that you would not know its name," lied Woth glibly. "But, tell me, why is nothing here perfect?"
The shop-keeper answered sonorously as if repeating something he had learned by heart. "Nothing is perfect save Noom. And Noom is the God of Oo. None but Noom can make anything perfect. We who are only his children and his servants can not make anything truly complete. ”

“ And he didn't ask me whom I meant by "they."
"And what makes the stink?" Ed finally commented. This time I shrugged.
Around us the smell waxed and waned. As if breezes were playing with a stream of noxious vapor. And yet, I suddenly realized, no breezes were blowing. The air was quite still. But still the smell grew stronger at one moment and weaker at another.
It was as if some creature were moving silently about, leaving no trace of itself save its scent.
"Look!" said Ed suddenly. He pointed to the west. I looked and stared at the sky. The whole west was a mass of seething dark clouds. ”

“ It was not our Earth, Mitchell. We were not on Mercury for the duration of one of the little planet's years; we were there only for a Mercurian half-year."
Mitchell's bewilderment grew. "But we saw Earth high in the sky; had we stayed only about forty days, it would have been behind the sun and out of sight."
"Precisely," answered Congreve. "So it was. Our Earth was behind the sun and out of sight. There are two Earths, Mitchell. Our world is one of twins. When, untold ages ago, the planets were cast off the sun, there was a dual explosion when it came to our planet's turn. ”

“ The meteor fall of two days before came as a marvelous excuse to go out into the badlands of the Great Divide Basin. I've always liked to ride out in the glorious, wide, empty Wyoming land and any excuse to spend three days out there was good.
Free also from the routine and monotony of the Weather Bureau as well. Of course I like the work, but still the open air and the open spaces must be bred in the blood of all of us born and raised out there in the West. I know it's tame and civilized today but even so, to jog along with a haphazard sort of prospector's aim was really fine. ”

“ Woth saw their grins grow and spread, and then finally, as a sickly coldness came over him, noticed them laugh outright.
Before the temple of Noom in the city of Oo on the banks of the River Zoon sits a man. He is small and fat and he watches with his strange smile the people going in and out of the Temple of the Perfect One. And sometimes when he sees somebody that is tall and thin, he laughs to himself and glances, still chuckling, to a place inside the temple. ”

“ The writer who writes weird fiction because that is his main interest in life and the type of fiction he esteems above anything else, rarely gets a tumble. The pulp magazines are his field, in them he sets forth his masterpieces of imaginative concepts, in their pages and among their readers he reaps his reward. His stories are read by audiences of hundreds of thousands, his name is known whereever people of an imaginative turn of mind reside. ”

“ Thousands of them collect their fantasy readings, accumulating huge quantities of amazingly interesting magazines, books, motion picture stills, clippings, and what not. Others write long letters to each other and to the editors expounding on every topic under the sun with an erudition that always amazes the outsider. Many form clubs, societies, leagues, international federations and so on. When that happens things really start rolling. Visits are made between fans and between fan groups, wrangles, ideas, a veritable microcosm of activity goes on. ”

“ That the forces of nature were determined to annihilate and utterly rip apart our little region of invading alien air, that the meteor gases were determined to resist to the last to keep their curious stinks intact!
The lightning flashed and flashed. Endless giant bolts yet always outside our region. And we heard them only when a lance of cold or hot storm pierced through to us. The alien air clearly would not transmit the sounds it was standing rigid against the interrupting vibrations!
Ed and I have conferred since then. We both agree that we had the same impressions. ”

“ And Severus fled from the room in frightful terror, the others closely following. Behind them rang out a terrible, hoarse bellow, cut off by a gurgling which they barely heard. The entire company, to a man. fought each other like terrified animals, each struggling to be the first out of that Museum, out the doors into the black streets and away.
For there are parts of the human body which, never having been alive, cannot be preserved in suspended life. They are the bones, the teeth—strong in death, but unable to defy the crushing millenia. ”

“ Constantly your editor has been impressed with the sparsity of our actual knowledge of the world—the things we think we know best so often turn out to be scarcely more than isolated fragments of a great knowledge, our sciences mere segments of other sciences. Biology, chemistry, physics, astronomy, all seem to interlock, and the more we know the more we realize how tenuous our grip on universal understanding is. "Storm" impressed the writer with this observation on even that most prosaic of topics, the weather. ”

“ Possibly it might be the mail plane that usually flew over Staunton's place at this time, en route to New York, some fifty miles away. But with the rapid and astonishing increase in the all-pervading vibration, such conjecture had to be thrown to the winds. The thing screamed down upon the Long Island estate with an overwhelming stridency.
Both men looked up as one. At first they saw nothing, but, in an instant, they spotted the tiny point of light. A speck of brilliance in the soft blue sky above, growing rapidly to a red flare directly overhead. ”

“ The big affair in fantasy fandom in the past few years has been the nation-wide gathering that occurs annually. This gathering, the Science Fiction Convention, usually occurs during the summer, is usually sponsored by a fan organization and is awaited with, baited breath by writers, fans, and yes, editors all over the country. ”

“ One is by way of the Zoon, that narrow, deep river that runs through all the jungle continent of Ild-Chundarath and carries the craft from all the little nations and cities and unnumbered tribes that have their domain along its heavily overgrown banks. It is by way of Zoon that nearly everyone comes to the city, that the little moon-sailed vessels of Gul and Tindorion and Luul come floating down the turgid waters from inland mountains and come to rest at half-sunken, moss-covered wharves that stand on rotting logs sunk in the muddy bottom. ”

“ So I say that if the elements of our life can be boiled down to gases, then why can't gases combine as gases and still have the element of life? Water is always present in the atmosphere as vapor, then why not a life as a sort of water vapor variant? ”

“ The temperature of the chamber would never vary by more than two degrees no matter what the outside conditions were.
Sedgwick strapped himself in and swiveled around to face the planet-level controls. From his central position he was like the base of a will that drives a body from its hidden place in thd skull-encircled brain. His eyes drifted easily over the readings with the skill that came of months' intensive training. Outside temperature on top of the sphere was 85, on the bottom 64. It was a hot day and the sun shining on the metal did that, he knew. ”

“ We were in the midst of a dead center, in the midst of an inexplicable high pressure area, most of whose air did not originate on Earth and the powers of the Earth's atmosphere were hurling themselves against us from every direction. ”

“ The two slipped through to the front chamber, Nadir Khan addressed the silent Congreve. "Your fellow space-man wished enlightenment, and now that we are far from the world behind us, it is time you tell him of our discovery."
Congreve nodded, thought awhile, then began:—
"The universe is a strange place. Mitchell. There are more incredible things, queer things, than ever any of us conceived." He stopped for a moment, then peered ahead as if searching for something.
"You recall our stay on Mercury. ”

“ Why does a storm form at all? We know how it grows, sure, but why did it start and how?
We don't know. We don't know very much at all. We breathe this air and it was only in the last century that we first began to find out how many different elements and gases made it up and we don't know for sure yet.
I think it's possible that living things may exist that are made of gas only. We're protoplasm you know but do you know that we're not solid matter—we're liquid? Protoplasm is liquid. Flesh is liquid arranged in suspension in cells of dead substances. ”

“ No comet, no asteroid, no meteor could change its orbit. No lifeless body could speed itself up and so diabolically and consistently keep its path in space so that it would overhaul and meet up with the sphere no matter what shift the latter made. ”

“ Such books as do contain modern fantasy seek it among the "accepted" writers—the book writers who dabble in fantasy once in a while accompanied by the ohs and ahs of their select little groups of literateurs. When such a man turns out a weird yarn, he exhibits it as a charming little freak, a grotesque to be held up by the tail and exclaimed at by admiring circles of well-mannered literary clubs. And someday to appear in a select volume of weird stories, nestling between Poe and others. ”

“ Yet there are millions of Americans who know that science-fiction short stories are not only good reading and enjoyable literature but that very often they can qualify as true literature by their wealth of ideas, visions, thoughts, scenes and brilliance worthy of the very highest traditions of the imaginative short story. ”

“ Just because you're crazy and think you can fly to the moon, don't think that you can get away with destroying an honest man's property. You may be a hero to kids, but you're a pain to me! And you'll pay for every bit of damage that infernal contraption of yours has done to my estate!" Staunton had arrived upon the scene.
Congreve looked up, startled; Mitchell scrambled to his feet, wiped away some of the dirt that was smeared on him. ”

“ Mitchell and Congreve swung the door of their great space-rocket shut and locked it. Then they crossed the lawns of the estate and entered the officer's blue-green radio car. They seated themselves in the back seat, the officer with them, and a second officer, who had remained in the car, drove off.
The little astronaut thought he knew cars, but he couldn't place this one. "What make of car is this?" he inquired. "I thought you police always used Fords."
The officer grunted. "It's a Royal Six. Never heard of Fords; must be one of your foreign makes." ”