The first issue of The New Yorker was dated February 21, 1925, one hundred years ago today. Unlike Weird Tales, The New Yorker has been published continuously since its inception. Also unlike Weird Tales, The New Yorker is a general interest magazine. It is and was a slick magazine, too, whereas Weird Tales was a pulp magazine for about as long as pulp magazines lasted. (Weird Tales switched to the digest format in 1953.) Even so, over the years, The New Yorker has published stories by authors of science fiction, fantasy, and horror. Some of them seldom if ever touched the pulps. They include Shirley Jackson, John Collier, Margaret Atwood, and Joyce Carol Oates. Others were actual contributors to Weird Tales, including Ray Bradbury, Stephen King, and cartoonist Gahan Wilson. The New Yorker has written on these pulp genres and their authors, including an article on Robert A. Heinlein in the issue of July 1, 1974. It even had a Science Fiction Issue dated June 4 & 11, 2012, which included a story by Ray Bradbury, who died on June 5, I guess at the time the magazine was available on the newsstand and in the library. There have been lots of flying saucers, aliens, monsters, ghosts, and witches on the cover of the magazine and of course macabre cartoons inside, most famously by Charles Addams. Anyway, there may have been other tellers of weird tales in The New Yorker, but I won't go searching for them. If anyone makes such a search and cares to share his or her results, I'll be here. Just drop me a line.
Happy 100th Anniversary to The New Yorker!
Copyright 2025 Terence E. Hanley
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