Time for a pulp countdown now, and today I attempt the impossible by picking my top 10 Ed Emshwiller illustrations!
No 10: Crisis in 2140, by H. Beam Piper and John J. McGuire. Ace Doubles, 1957. Emsh paints fantastic villains, and this one is my favourite.
No 9: Ed Emshwiller's alternative cover for Super-Science Fiction, June 1957. The composition is lovely and the spaceship is excellent.
No 8: an interior illustration by Emsh for 'The Visitor at the Zoo' from Galaxy Magazine, April 1963. I just really like these aliens.
No 7: Star Wars, by Poul Anderson. Ace Doubles, 1957. It's easy to miss the details on this cover, but if anyone can get away with drawing a space kilt Ed Emshwiller can.
No 6: Galaxy Science Fiction, June 1951. There's a lot of wit in Emsh's work and this is one of my favourite Galaxy covers.
No 5: Ed Emshwiller's cover illustration for Rat in the Skull, by Rog Phillips. If Science Fiction, December 1958. Creepy and funny at the same time.
No 4: Starship Soldier, by Robert A. Heinlein. The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction, November 1959. Emsh did a lot of Heinlein magazine covers and this captures the essence of what would become Starship Troopers.
No 3: Threshold Of Eternity, by John Brunner. Ace Doubles, 1959. Emshwiller breaks the 4th wall.
No 2: Galaxy Science Fiction, December 1951. Emsh regularly painted the Christmas Galaxy cover, and this one has a great Mid-Mod feel to it.
And No 1: Women's Work, by Murray Leinster. The Original Science Fiction Stories, November 1956. It's just my favourite.
More pulp countdowns another time...
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Today in pulp: a tale of an unintentionally radical publisher. It only produced 42 books between 1968-9, but it caught the hedonistic, solipsistic, free love mood of the West Coast freakout scene like no other.
This is the story of Essex House...
Essex House was an offshoot of Parliament Press, a California publishing company set up by pulp artist Milton Luros after the market for pulp magazines began to decline. It specialised in stag magazines sold through liquor stores, to skirt around US obscenity publishing laws.
By the 1960s Parliament Press was already selling pornographic novels through its Brandon House imprint, though these were mostly reprints or translations of existing work. Luros was interested in publishing new erotic authors, and set up Essex House to do just that.
Today in pulp... one of my favourite SF authors: Harry Harrison!
Harry Harrison was born Stamford, Connecticut, in 1925. He served in the US Army Air Corps during WWII, but became disheartened with military life. In his spare time he learned Esperanto.
Harrison started his sci-fi career as an illustrator, working with Wally Wood on Weird Fantasy and Weird Science up until 1950. He also wrote for syndicated comic strips, including Flash Gordon and Rick Random.
Today in pulp... Blade Runner! Let's look back at the classic 1982 movie and see how it compares to original novel.
"It's not an easy thing to meet your maker..."
Blade Runner is based on Philip K. Dick's 1968 novel Do Androids Dream Of Electric Sheep? However 'inspired' may be a better word, as the film is very different to the book.
In the novel Deckard is a bounty hunter for the San Francisco police. The year is 1992; Earth has been ravaged by war and humans are moving to off-world colonies to protect their genetic integrity. They are given organic robots to help them, created by the Rosen Association.
In the 1970s a fascinating engineering battle took place between America and Japan for control of the future. The prize was the world we live in now. And one of the key battles took place on your wrist.
This is the story of the digital watch...
'Digital' is a magical marketing word. Like 'laser' or 'turbo' it suggests progress, mastery and the future. People like those ideas. They like them enough to spend a lot of money on products that have them, especially if they can be a first adopter.
And so it was with the wristwatch. Electronic quartz watches were already a thing by the 1960s: an analogue movement driven by a quartz crystal resonator, powered by a small button battery.
But one American company was setting out on a new timekeeping odyssey...
Today in pulp... let's look back at a Shōjo manga artist whose work celebrated friendships between women: Jun'ichi Nakahara.
Jun'ichi Nakahara was born in Higashikagawa in 1913 and worked as an illustrator, a fashion designer and a doll maker. His work is highly regarded in Japan and he was a significant influence on modern manga art.
In the '20s and '30s Nakahara often drew for Shōjo no Tomo ("Girl's Friend") magazine. The style at the time was for demure, dreamlike imagery, but Nakahara added to this large expressive eyes, often reflecting the light.
Today in pulp I try to decipher 1980s Japanese street style, with the help of Olive: The Magazine for Romantic Girls!
This may involve frills...
Street style is an ever-changing mix of styles, brands, attitudes and poses with various influences. And you normally have to be in the right place at the right time to capture it.
Which is where magazines come in! Photograping, documenting and deconstructing fashion never goes out of style, and in the late 1970s Japanese youth had one key guide to help them: Popeye!