SCRIPT-TEASE

                           by Norman Masters

There are several elements which combine to give a science fiction magazine its
personality:  the type of story it prints, the editorial, the letters, the
other features, and, of course, the cover and interior artwork.  But -- there's
one other element:  the lowly blurb, which is, at times, the most fascinating
of them all.  In my opinion nothing can match the sheer suggestive melodrama of
a Super Science Stories blurb; in fact, half the time they're more fun to read
than the stories themselves.

For some time now I've been thinking of writing an article on the s-f magazine
blurb, showing how closely related they are to the particular magazines they
appear in, then springboarding into various comments on the magazines
themselves.  This isn't it; it's an interim type of thing until, if and when,
the other is ever done.  Till then, tho, test yourself.  Here are ten
blurbs/introductions to match with their sources.  I maintain that many blurbs
could only apear in one magazine (or chain of magazines) and I've chosen what I
feel are obvious ones.

Test yourself.

SOURCES:  A.) Fantastic (Fairman era)  B.) Planet Stories  C.) Fantasy and
Science Fiction (Avram Davidson era)  D.) Other Worlds  E.) Super Science
Stories (early 50's pulp)  F.) Startling Stories (Sam Merwin era)  G.) Weird
Tales (Farnsworth Wright era)  H.)  Weird Tales (Mc Ilwraith era)  I.)
Astounding Stories (Campbell era)  J.) Wonder Stories (Gernsback era)


1.  "An eldrich fearsome tale of the worship of the fish-god in the ancient
world, and the prowess of a doughty swordsman in old Atlantis"

2.  "Here is a story that will establish [the author] as one of the giants of
the science fiction world!  Here is truly great science fiction:  it is ultra-
modern; it is up-to-the-minute in daring imaginative qualities; it will
challenge your thinking processes; and it will, above all -- excite and
entertain you as no story you have read in recent years!  It's great!"

3.  "To translate writing, you need a key to the code -- and if the last writer
of Martian died forty thousand years before the first writer of Earth was
born... how could the Martian be translated...?"

4.  "...this lovely and horrifying tale of the summer resident, the black ship,
the white, white shipmaster, the thing in the hold which droned and wrought,
and the golden brick..."

5.  "Mists rose from the lake... some in human, other in goblinlike form"

6.  "A man without a world, this 1,000,000-year-old Daryesh!  Once Lord of a
Thousand Suns, now condemned to rove the spaceways in alien form, searching for
love, for life, for the great lost Vwyrdla"

7.  "Perfect counterfeits of imperfect Man, the ultimate machines wept, danced,
loved and died... while in a musty room, Earth's one remaining warrior prepared
the greatest irony of all -- the final chapter in Adam's bloody history,
written in the tears of his last son!"

8.  "Bad Space Opera has been the plague of Science fiction -- good space opera
may be its savior.  In a very real sense, space opera is science fiction at its
best, utilizing fully the terrific concepts of space and time and immensity
which is science fiction's greatest asset.  It affords the greatest scope for
imagination, the most color and movement.  And within its framework, any kind
of additional sub-plot may fit.  It can embody that other controversial child
of science fiction -- the purely cerebral story, the story of complex ideas. 
Or it may offer relief from it.

".... [this story] is a good one.  No blonde priestesses, no BEM's, no
intelligent insects sending short waves from their antennae -- but plenty
doing, and some characters you'll wish you had met before."

9.  "Victoria was due for trouble -- with her love life among other things. 
How could she keep a boy friend around when her softest sigh was likely to blow
him halfway back to town?  And how many guys were likely to climb a hundred
feet for a kiss?  How many?  Well, placed end-to-end they would have reached
the farthest space station without a rocket."

10. "Despite its title, this story is not calculated to appeal especially to
our feminine readers.  For it is a red-blooded story, and a bizarre one; yet it
deals with events that are well within the limits of probability.

"The understanding of how our sex glands function, and their effect upon us is
just beginning to be understood.  When we finally do understand, certainly a
new ra will dawn in the history of the race.

"Some men alredy predict that women will eventually rule the world, and they
will at least make the attempt to overthrow masculine domination.  But suppose
they lose, and man holds undisputable sway, with but one woman left.  Will men
idolize her; will they fight over her like wild beasts; or will they enslave
her?  The answer that one author gives is much different than you will think.  
This is a distinctly original story, and deals with an absorbing idea."

(Answers are on page 59)

SCRIPT-TEASE ANSWERS:

1.) G  2.) D  3.) I  4.) C  5.) H  6.) B  7.) E  8.) F  9.) A  10.) J

                             [pp. 27 - 30, 59, NO-EYED MONSTER #14, Summer 1968]