Editors Respond to the First Issue

Out of twenty-six stories published in the first issue of Weird Tales, only four were reprinted in the era before books became something other than books, that is, before the early 2000s. "Ooze" by Anthony M. Rud has been reprinted most often, first in The Moon Terror, the first Weird Tales book, published in 1927. Farnsworth Wright was the uncredited editor of that collection. "Ooze" was also reprinted in the January 1952 issue of Weird Tales when Dorothy McIlwraith was editor. And it was reprinted in the expanded and enhanced edition of The Weird Tales Story, originally edited by Robert Weinberg and edited in this version by Bob McLain (2021).

Hamilton Craigie's detective story "The Chain" was also reprinted in Weird Tales, in November 1952, again under Dorothy McIlwraith. "The Mystery of Black Jean" by Julian Kilman was included in Angels of Darkness: Tales of Troubled and Troubling Women, edited by Marvin Kaye and published in 1995. Finally, "The Grave" by Orville R. Emerson and "The Basket" by Herbert J. Mangham were reprinted in The Best of Weird Tales: 1923, edited by the late Mr. Kaye and John Gregory Betancourt and published in 1997. And that's it as far as I know.

In The Weird Tales Story, Robert Weinberg briefly discussed "Ooze" without offering much of an opinion on it. "Less notable," he wrote, "was 'The Dead Man's Tale' by W.E. Hawkins," continuing with the judgment that "[t]he tale was an overtly sentimental muddle [. . .]." I'm not sure that I would call "The Dead Man's Tale" a muddle, but to me it's an unpleasant and cruel story that disregards the seriousness of the narrator's actions and the suffering of the man whose body he possesses, moreover of the man's wife, who is badly wounded in body and spirit by the dead man's actions.

Otis Adelbert Kline earned mention in Mr. Weinberg's essay. Kline's serial "The Thing of a Thousand Shapes" was his first professional sale. Unfortunately, according to Mr. Weinberg, "His first story was less than exceptional," indeed, "mediocre." (All quotes are from Chapter 4, page 19.)

Marvin Kaye was a dissenting voice when it came to "Ooze." He considered it to be "poorly written." He said as much in his introduction to The Best of Weird Tales: 1923. He also passed on Joel Townsley Rogers' "Hark! The Rattle!", calling it "a purple exercise." Kaye described "The Mystery of Black Jean" by Julian Kilman as "excellent," but he settled on "The Grave" by Orville R. Emerson and "The Basket" by Herbert J. Mangham for inclusion in his anthology.

An early announcement for the coming publication of Weird Tales called "The Dead Man's Tale" "a masterpiece of gooseflesh fiction," comparing it favorably to "The Murders on the Rue Morgue" by Edgar Allan Poe. Editor Edwin Baird was the author of that announcement. It appeared in the February 1923 issue of The Student Writer, which, as it so happens, was edited by Willard E. Hawkins, author of "The Dead Man's Tale." Baird's announcement and Hawkins' publishing of it looks like a case of "You scratch my back, I'll scratch yours." (Source: The Thing's Incredible! The Secret Origins of Weird Tales by John Locke, 2018, p. 31.)

There has been a lot of other opinion on the stories in that first issue. This is the Internet after all and any yahoo can say his piece among all of these electrons. 

Next: A Yahoo says his piece.

Original text copyright 2023 Terence E. Hanley