"Teoquitla the Golden" by Ramòn de las Cuevas (Mark R. Harrington) was the cover story for the November 1924 issue of Weird Tales. The issue of January 1925 was the first in which readers had a chance to respond to that issue and its stories. Before printing their responses in the revived letters column, called "The Eyrie," the new editor, Farnsworth Wright, provided some answers to his question about what kind of stories Weird Tales should print. Should they be horror stories or something else? The readers would have their say.
Reader W.S. Charles of Pendleton, Oregon, wrote: "I herewith put in my oar against 'horror stories,' particularly that class that are somber and in the main vicious, beyond the realm of reason." By "beyond the realm of reason," I think he meant "unreasonably" or "extremely." Too bad W.S. Charles and people like him (or her) are not around today to make their demands. I think we would have better and more enjoyable stories, as well as a higher level of art and accomplishment in weird fiction, if they were. Instead we have writers indulging in their sickness for the sake of themselves, their sick friends, and their sick readers.
Farnsworth Wright took the measure of the readers in 1924-1925, responding:
Well, readers, we are going to keep the magazine weird, but NOT disgusting. The votes for the necrophilic tales were so few that we are satisfied you want us to keep the magazine clean. Stories of the [Edgar Allan] Poe type -- scary stories -- spooky stories -- mystic and occult fiction -- thrilling mysteries -- bizarre crime stories -- all these will find place in Weird Tales, but those of you who want tales of blood-drinking and cannibalism will have to make your opinion register a great deal more strongly than you have yet done before we let down the bars to this type of stories [sic]. We repeat here what we have said before: Weird Tales belongs to you, the readers, and we will be guided by your wishes.
That last part bears repeating (and condensing):
Weird Tales belongs to the readers.
Authors, editors, publishers, and critics of today would never allow that, though. Never. For to allow Weird Tales and weird fiction in general to belong to the readers would make of all of this a democratic instead of an elitist thing. They would have to give up control and open up their clique. And as we have seen in election after election, democracy is intolerable to self-anointed elites, for if the people are allowed their say, they will inevitably choose things the elites must hate.
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Also in November 1924, Farnsworth Wright instituted a voting process among readers for their favorite stories in every issue. The first winner was "The Brain in the Jar" by Norman Elwood Hammerstrom (Hamerstrom). Second place went to "Teoquitla the Golden." In the issue of January 1925, Lieutenant Arthur J. Burks wrote to say: "Ramón de las Cuevas is a writing hombre." (Sometimes the accent mark went one way and sometimes the other.) I like that compliment. Having served in the Caribbean, Burks recognized the meaning behind the pseudonym, continuing: "Also keep 'Ramón of the Caves' busy--he knows his stuff! His description of the old beggar woman took me bodily back to the West Indies. In any case my vote for the best story goes to him." In the March 1925 issue, Cecil Fuller of Tulare, California, asked for a second story by Ramón de las Cuevas. Alas, this was not to be.
In its May issue of 1925, Weird Tales observed (obliquely) its second anniversary. Among the letters in "The Eyrie" was one from an anonymous correspondent in Moscow, Idaho, in which he criticized what he termed "impossibilities":
"Just one instance: Teoquitla the Golden was very clever and entertaining, but the permutation of sex described is a biological impossibility. Let me qualify that. Sex has apparently been changed experimentally in certain lower animals; varying degrees of change from female to male are known to take place in cattle (the freemartin phenomenon), and possibly may also occur in other mammals. But the important point is this: such changes can only take place during the embryonic stage of development. After that, they are impossible. Any biologist will tell you that. Of course, fiction of the weird sort is not intended to stick to scientific facts, although realism in any story will be enhanced if the scientific basis is properly regarded. Still, Teoquitla the Golden was clever."
What was true at the beginning of time was also true in 1924 and is still true today: sex in human beings cannot be changed from one to the other. (Yes, there are only two.) A man cannot be a woman and a woman cannot be a man. There are those of us who like to think of history as being a positive progression and people of the past as being primitive, while we are naturally more advanced. But at least in 1924, someone in small-town Idaho knew and wrote the truth. He could have been a grade school dropout, a factory worker, farmhand, or common laborer, and he would still have been smarter and more sensible than so many people of today, including politicians, pundits, commentators, physicians, surgeons, teachers, librarians, college professors and administrators, journalists, authors, artists, and people in entertainment, sports, and the media. The worst of them are vicious, hateful, violent, aggressive, destructive. They wish to carry out--and do--the kind of necrophilic and cannibalistic horrors that readers in 1924 objected to. Worse yet, they wish to do these things to children. And the best of them? Dupes--people too weak in will and in the mind to think for themselves or to stand up for the truth. They are people who have fallen for lies, believe lies, and tell lies, even if it means women and children are harmed in the process. And they're always so sure they're smarter and better than those of us who speak and act on the truth. They are always so sure they're morally and intellectually superior to us. Shame on them all. If there are forces in history, surely the most powerful of these is divine in its origins. This force is expressed directly through truth, fact, unalterable reality, and immutable law, and their most horrible ideas will surely fall before it.
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One thing the anonymous letter-writer here might have missed by a little is that weird fiction need not be scientific, for weird fiction is the fiction of weird. Science fiction is the fiction of science. In reading weird fiction, we seek a departure from strict realism and into weird realms. The whole point in "Teoquitla the Golden" is that it's a story in which Weird has her way. A man who was a hater of a woman meets his weird in being transformed into and living as a woman.
In looking for a candidate writer of that letter in Weird Tales regarding Teoquitla and science, I have come upon Dr. Carl DeWitt Garby (1890 or 1892-1928), lifelong friend of then unpublished but soon-to-be renowned science fiction author E.E. "Doc" Smith (1890-1965). Smith and Garby were roommates at the University of Idaho in Moscow. Both graduated in 1914. Like Smith, Garby was a fan of science fiction. Garby's wife, Lee Hawkins Garby (1890-1957), was, too. She collaborated with Doc Smith on his famed serial, then novel, The Skylark of Space (1928). All three lived and worked in Washington, D.C. Poor Dr. Garby died while quite young, presumably in that city. I can't say that Dr. Garby was the author of that letter to "The Eyrie"--I don't know about the timeline exactly. Could he have been in Moscow in 1924? Or could his friend Doc Smith have been the writer? The world, I guess, will never know.
Original text copyright 2024 Terence E. Hanley
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