SF Masterworks checklist post with downloadable lists vintagesf.ca/2024/06/13/sf-masterworks-checklists/ Vintage SF website www.vintagesf.ca The Outlaw Bookseller @outlawbookselleroriginal
@@joebrooks4448 And no Bob Shaw. One of the limiting factors to this series is the rights to print. Orion and Gollancz have the rights to a large catalogue of SFF authors but not all. The rights might be owned by another UK publisher or the author's estate may not be willing to sell or is asking too much. They do continue to acquire rights as shown by Sterling E. Lanier coming back into print.
@@vintagesf I am pretty sure all of Van Vogt and most Laumer is public domain? If you type in your search engine: "Prospero's Isle A. E. van Vogt" , you should get to a fantastic site devoted to Van Vogt. These boys are serious; reviews, vv stories you cannot find anywhere else, and they even tracked down the original "The Weapon Makers", which I had never seen before. I agree with them, it is superior to the mass market version. I could try sending the essay to you as a word attachment? That may not jumble the text, if our Word versions are compatible. It was running out of control, I have cut it to 10 pages!
Thanks for the credit, Richard, enjoyed the video. You're right, of course, until now the only reliable source for listings of the Masterworks was on Wikipedia- and whomever did that work did a sterling job. As you will have found, there is no complete list anywhere on Gollancz' website- which is basically a blog- which really shows how little major publishers think about their sites: they tend to be constructed by web-like people rather than bibliophiles, which is clearly absurd. The result: lost sales opportunities. A couple of points I'd like to add: 1) There is a typo in my comment on the first video- what I meant to type was that Gollancz did publish some SF in the 1950s- Theodore Strurgeon is one example - and some of these books would have been in yellow jackets, since the yellow livery was Gollancz' standard livery per se. To reiterate, Gollancz published no mass market paperbacks at all until 1986 when the SF Classics line was launched, which I remember being very excited by at the time: at last an SF list that was designed for adults, that made the books look sophisticated rather than pulpy. 2) The Golden Age: I know Joe Brooks has issues with a 'reading' of this that begins in 1939 and ends somewhere between 1946 and 1950, so I thought I'd address it again here. The 'Golden Age' to clarify again refers to the period when Campbell's editorial standards on 'Astounding' raised the bar for the genre and was ushered in with the July 1939 issue of the magazine. Yes, 'Astounding' was still going in the 1950s and its typical authors still successful and popular, BUT once 'The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction' and 'Galaxy' launched, they changed the tenor of the field and brought in a freshness that Campbell's stable lacked- in particular, the normalising of Dystopian backgrounds in much Genre SF, which allowed contemporary satire to become a near-default setting and thus compete with SF in the mainstream (such as the Dystopian and Satiric trends set by books such as 'Nineteen Eighty-Four' and 'Brave New World'). These innovations also linked Genre SF to the two originating forces in Proto SF - satire (arising from travel narratives that were fantastic- Lucien's 'The True History' is the cardinal example of this) and Dystopia, which grew out of mentions of Atlantis in Socratic dialogues recorded by Plato and in his own 'The Republic', oft regarded as the key Proto dystopia). In short, no-one disputes that Campbell, 'Astouding' and his stable - Asimov, Heinlein etc- ceased to be popular and influential, just that the 'Golden Age' of these influences was stagnating and that the essential 'Evolution and Revolution' we see in the history of Genre SF entered a new phase in which the all important innovative forward movement was led by Boucher's 'Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction' and 'Galaxy'. Silveberg's statement that the 1950s was the true golden age of SF refers largely to the work published in these magazines. Finally on this point, 'The Encyclopedia of Science Fiction' is clear on the start and end of the Golden Age. To use 'Golden Age' as a term after 1950 in the sense that it was used by early fandom and Historians of the genre - the dominant sway of Campbellian influences between 1939 and 1950 - is simply misleading. The 1950s is very much the age of Dystopia and Social Satire in Genre SF.
Excellent points OB! I would like to take this opportunity to go on record and say that I too think that the 1980s Mass Market paperback SF Classics line had great covers, (as you say; less pulpy more sophisticated) that were exciting and inspired sales (in part) due to their livery.
Your hard work will remove much consternation from enthusiast's searches for all of these, Richard. Very thorough and comprehensive. Did not know you had some graphic design background! Kudos for the Outlaw Bookseller review. Personally, I didn't see this episode of his you quoted back when it was posted. Well done sir on all counts. Cheers.
Love your thorough and academic approach. SF Masterworks series got me back in to reading (from video games) in general and not just SF so they have a special place in my heart.
Well, it had to happen sooner or later. You have gone down the academic rabbit hole, searching for and documenting knowledge. I can see you, now, wearing a pith helmet, carrying a swagger stick, leading a column of safari workers, being closely fallowed by Gunga Din. In other words, well done and I'm glad to see it. 😄
Thank you for this and the other videos in the series! I value the work you and the mysterious Wikipedia editor put into this! Likewise, I am grateful to any of the commenters who stand up to Gollancz for misusing the fandom. Sometimes it feels like the emperor has no clothes!!
Excellent Richard. I have also been working on a bibliography of this series, I'll email it over to you in case it sheds any new light on your comprehensive new version. Thanks for pulling this together.
Hi Richard. You are providing such a valuable resource here. Thank you. I’m a retired English teacher who has come to SF late in the game, but I’m having a wonderful time. I’ve just recently started collecting this SF Masterworks series, and I have found your channel to be invaluable. Thank you for all of your devoted work! 😊
Quick answer, yes! I've had access to a couple other lists and want to incorporate things like copyright and ISBN #s into my spreadsheet before a re-release.
Great background and information on a aspect you don't often see detailed. Very interesting! And nice spreadsheet! It looks like Lord of Light is on the list. I'd love to hear your thoughts on Zelazny's novel.
They're handsome books. Thanks, Richard, for not just sharing your books, but what you've learned. I've learned a lot, and I'm starting to take my "collecting" (I'm not a true collector yet) a little more seriously. I'm going to start dusting and bagging some of my expensive first editions, and just the ones I really care about (which, is really, all of them, eventually). Cheers.
Hi Richard, this is wonderful stuff, thank you for putting the work in to creating this highly useful resource for us Masterworks fans. While trying to pick them up as and when I see them I currently only have 30 - 21 yellow spines (my personal favourites), and 9 black spines. Only one of these 30 is in hardcover (yellow) - Arthur C Clarke' s Childhoods End. I do have a question though. I have one black spine - Dick's Flow My Tears... which is unnumbered. It's the only black spines I've ever seen which does not have a number. It does have a red circle on the spine and cover in which the number would normally appear. The edition is from 2001. So did Gollancz at some point drop the numbering of the black spine editions? Thanks again, and BTW the website is excellent... Peter
Hi Peter, glad to see you back posting some book hauls. According to Wikipedia: * Some printings do not include a number stamp, or the incorrect number stamp appears on the cover. Looks like you have one of those printings.
@@JosephReadsBooks What saddens me is that we don’t have a North American publisher doing the same thing. Gollancz seems to be uniquely positioned in the UK with the rights to many classics.
Great work, Richard! Three small corrections on Page Two, 139, 184, 197: in the last column all three of these should have the description 'Short Stories'.
Thank you! I forgot to mention in the video that proofreading is welcome! This is a work in progress. I plan to add copyright years and possibly ISBN #s.
Hey Richard. I am rarely up at this time of day! I see you are discussing John W. Campbell Jr's "The Golden Age of Science Fiction". Or maybe not? Maybe a somewhat different definition. I have thought for 55 years, the arbitrary "end" of Campbell's influence was bizarre because it clearly does not have a sudden end, except for his demise. I also noticed, I am certainly not alone, regarding this position. I have completed my research and analysis (with surprising numerical and multiple highly regarded SF Historian results) and the first, second, and third drafts on this topic. Due to a several page graphic list, it does not email well. I am working on that. My next step will be a pdf conversion to see if the numbers presented will remain stable thru emailing. I will be posting on Academia, too. PS, I have had no time to work on YT channel, this project was a 2 month effort. I have done a little prep. Great video, have fun!
Looking forward to reading your article. Perhaps you could use something like Google Drive or Dropbox for your article. Then you could share a link so people could download the article.
@@vintagesf Great Heavens. My old sharing site I used when writing essays for Economy in Crisis and Coalition For A Properous America no longer exists. It has been 9 or 10 years! I guess I will check out Google
It was less an 'end' of his influence as much as a diminution of his impact and dominance of 'How you wrote Genre SF' that arbitrarily puts a close to the Golden Age. Campbell's work was thrown into the shadows gradually by what Anthony Boucher and Horace Gold did with their magazines: this is interestingly reflected in Hugo Winners in that first decade of the awards. Campbell's rigidity would have caused stagnation to spread and prevent SF from evolving, so the Golden Age had an end as the new Social Satirists emerged.
@@outlawbookselleroriginal Hey Stephen! Good to hear from you. As usual, I am busy! I deal with all of that in my long, boring and pretty critical review of the Social Satrists, who by taking over SF nearly completely, nearly destroyed hard Science Fiction by 1970. That turned out very badly for SF as a whole, stagnating it for decades, and it has never fully recovered. In the 1950s and early 1960s, there was a balance between the two, and that was good for the genre. I can show you a Pohl and Del Rey response to fan from IF 1968, that discusses this very issue. Monolithic Science Fiction is no good from either side, no debate going on. I have to fly, be back in several hours, sorry!
Hi Richard. Thanks for all the effort that produced this information. Invaluable. I do believe that this series is invaluable to modern SF readers because it provides many classic books that might be tricky to find - and relatively cheap too if you can find the deals. I would collect them myself but a) I'm otherwise engaged at the moment and b) I have a lot of the books in vintage printings. I do pick up all the numbered black spines when I see them however. Us collectors eh?
SF Masterworks checklist post with downloadable lists
vintagesf.ca/2024/06/13/sf-masterworks-checklists/
Vintage SF website
www.vintagesf.ca
The Outlaw Bookseller
@outlawbookselleroriginal
No Van Vogt?
@@joebrooks4448 And no Bob Shaw. One of the limiting factors to this series is the rights to print. Orion and Gollancz have the rights to a large catalogue of SFF authors but not all. The rights might be owned by another UK publisher or the author's estate may not be willing to sell or is asking too much. They do continue to acquire rights as shown by Sterling E. Lanier coming back into print.
@@vintagesf I am pretty sure all of Van Vogt and most Laumer is public domain?
If you type in your search engine: "Prospero's Isle A. E. van Vogt" , you should get to a fantastic site devoted to Van Vogt.
These boys are serious; reviews, vv stories you cannot find anywhere else, and they even tracked down the original "The Weapon Makers", which I had never seen before. I agree with them, it is superior to the mass market version.
I could try sending the essay to you as a word attachment? That may not jumble the text, if our Word versions are compatible. It was running out of control, I have cut it to 10 pages!
@@vintagesfit's weird, Gollancz puts out a yellow jacket paperback of Orbitsville, so you would think they have rights to *some* Shaw.
@@salty-walt At least they did back in the late 1980s.
Thanks for the credit, Richard, enjoyed the video. You're right, of course, until now the only reliable source for listings of the Masterworks was on Wikipedia- and whomever did that work did a sterling job. As you will have found, there is no complete list anywhere on Gollancz' website- which is basically a blog- which really shows how little major publishers think about their sites: they tend to be constructed by web-like people rather than bibliophiles, which is clearly absurd. The result: lost sales opportunities.
A couple of points I'd like to add:
1) There is a typo in my comment on the first video- what I meant to type was that Gollancz did publish some SF in the 1950s- Theodore Strurgeon is one example - and some of these books would have been in yellow jackets, since the yellow livery was Gollancz' standard livery per se. To reiterate, Gollancz published no mass market paperbacks at all until 1986 when the SF Classics line was launched, which I remember being very excited by at the time: at last an SF list that was designed for adults, that made the books look sophisticated rather than pulpy.
2) The Golden Age: I know Joe Brooks has issues with a 'reading' of this that begins in 1939 and ends somewhere between 1946 and 1950, so I thought I'd address it again here. The 'Golden Age' to clarify again refers to the period when Campbell's editorial standards on 'Astounding' raised the bar for the genre and was ushered in with the July 1939 issue of the magazine. Yes, 'Astounding' was still going in the 1950s and its typical authors still successful and popular, BUT once 'The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction' and 'Galaxy' launched, they changed the tenor of the field and brought in a freshness that Campbell's stable lacked- in particular, the normalising of Dystopian backgrounds in much Genre SF, which allowed contemporary satire to become a near-default setting and thus compete with SF in the mainstream (such as the Dystopian and Satiric trends set by books such as 'Nineteen Eighty-Four' and 'Brave New World'). These innovations also linked Genre SF to the two originating forces in Proto SF - satire (arising from travel narratives that were fantastic- Lucien's 'The True History' is the cardinal example of this) and Dystopia, which grew out of mentions of Atlantis in Socratic dialogues recorded by Plato and in his own 'The Republic', oft regarded as the key Proto dystopia).
In short, no-one disputes that Campbell, 'Astouding' and his stable - Asimov, Heinlein etc- ceased to be popular and influential, just that the 'Golden Age' of these influences was stagnating and that the essential 'Evolution and Revolution' we see in the history of Genre SF entered a new phase in which the all important innovative forward movement was led by Boucher's 'Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction' and 'Galaxy'. Silveberg's statement that the 1950s was the true golden age of SF refers largely to the work published in these magazines.
Finally on this point, 'The Encyclopedia of Science Fiction' is clear on the start and end of the Golden Age. To use 'Golden Age' as a term after 1950 in the sense that it was used by early fandom and Historians of the genre - the dominant sway of Campbellian influences between 1939 and 1950 - is simply misleading. The 1950s is very much the age of Dystopia and Social Satire in Genre SF.
Excellent points OB!
I would like to take this opportunity to go on record and say that I too think that the 1980s Mass Market paperback SF Classics line had great covers, (as you say; less pulpy more sophisticated) that were exciting and inspired sales (in part) due to their livery.
What can I say Richard? IMPRESSIVE!
Thank you!
Your hard work will remove much consternation from enthusiast's searches for all of these, Richard. Very thorough and comprehensive. Did not know you had some graphic design background! Kudos for the Outlaw Bookseller review. Personally, I didn't see this episode of his you quoted back when it was posted. Well done sir on all counts. Cheers.
Thank you Rick! I really enjoyed putting this together.
Love your thorough and academic approach. SF Masterworks series got me back in to reading (from video games) in general and not just SF so they have a special place in my heart.
That's great to hear! Gollancz has done a great service to SF readers by keeping these books in print.
SF Masterworks 👌
🚀👾🌍👍
Well, it had to happen sooner or later. You have gone down the academic rabbit hole, searching for and documenting knowledge. I can see you, now, wearing a pith helmet, carrying a swagger stick, leading a column of safari workers, being closely fallowed by Gunga Din. In other words, well done and I'm glad to see it. 😄
Thank you Paul! Wait until you see where my pith helmet and I go next video! Or maybe it’s more like Indiana Jones’s fedora.
Richard, your videos and website are a great resource for fans who read and collect! Thanks for all the work you do!
Appreciate your comments. It’s great fun to share what I’m reading and collecting.
I do love a good spreadsheet Richard!! Admirably thorough and great that you've shared that useful resource. 👍
I seem to gravitate towards publisher series. I may continue to make spreadsheets for other series I collect.
Thank you for this and the other videos in the series! I value the work you and the mysterious Wikipedia editor put into this!
Likewise, I am grateful to any of the commenters who stand up to Gollancz for misusing the fandom. Sometimes it feels like the emperor has no clothes!!
As my knowledge grows I will continue to update the Gollancz story and the spreadsheet.
@@vintagesf You are a river to your people!
What a great piece of work here. I've always wanted a comprehensive SFM list. Thanks!
Glad to hear this list will be used by others!
Excellent Richard. I have also been working on a bibliography of this series, I'll email it over to you in case it sheds any new light on your comprehensive new version. Thanks for pulling this together.
Thank you Jules. Look forward to seeing your bibliography!
Wow!!! A spreadsheet, background, and great info; coupled with the synergy with Outlaw's knowledge and and care.
The grand slam of SF YouTubing!
Hi Richard. You are providing such a valuable resource here. Thank you. I’m a retired English teacher who has come to SF late in the game, but I’m having a wonderful time. I’ve just recently started collecting this SF Masterworks series, and I have found your channel to be invaluable. Thank you for all of your devoted work! 😊
Your welcome! Your channel and expertise are appreciated.
@@vintagesf Thank you!😊
Great work!
Thank you! I had a lot of fun with it!
This is great Richard. Question, do you plan to release the actual spreadsheet at some point?
Quick answer, yes! I've had access to a couple other lists and want to incorporate things like copyright and ISBN #s into my spreadsheet before a re-release.
@@vintagesf 👍
Great background and information on a aspect you don't often see detailed. Very interesting! And nice spreadsheet! It looks like Lord of Light is on the list. I'd love to hear your thoughts on Zelazny's novel.
I haven’t read a lot of Zelazny but what I have read is fascinating. Looking forward to reading his books.
They're handsome books. Thanks, Richard, for not just sharing your books, but what you've learned. I've learned a lot, and I'm starting to take my "collecting" (I'm not a true collector yet) a little more seriously. I'm going to start dusting and bagging some of my expensive first editions, and just the ones I really care about (which, is really, all of them, eventually). Cheers.
I think once you start to dust and bag you are a collector, or at least a collector in denial. 😀
Hi Richard, this is wonderful stuff, thank you for putting the work in to creating this highly useful resource for us Masterworks fans.
While trying to pick them up as and when I see them I currently only have 30 - 21 yellow spines (my personal favourites), and 9 black spines. Only one of these 30 is in hardcover (yellow) - Arthur C Clarke' s Childhoods End.
I do have a question though. I have one black spine - Dick's Flow My Tears... which is unnumbered. It's the only black spines I've ever seen which does not have a number. It does have a red circle on the spine and cover in which the number would normally appear. The edition is from 2001. So did Gollancz at some point drop the numbering of the black spine editions?
Thanks again, and BTW the website is excellent... Peter
Hi Peter, glad to see you back posting some book hauls. According to Wikipedia: * Some printings do not include a number stamp, or the incorrect number stamp appears on the cover.
Looks like you have one of those printings.
Thank you so much for all this work. I now have a checklist to spend way too much money on!
@@JosephReadsBooks What saddens me is that we don’t have a North American publisher doing the same thing. Gollancz seems to be uniquely positioned in the UK with the rights to many classics.
Great work, Richard! Three small corrections on Page Two, 139, 184, 197: in the last column all three of these should have the description 'Short Stories'.
Thank you! I forgot to mention in the video that proofreading is welcome! This is a work in progress. I plan to add copyright years and possibly ISBN #s.
Hey Richard. I am rarely up at this time of day!
I see you are discussing John W. Campbell Jr's "The Golden Age of Science Fiction". Or maybe not? Maybe a somewhat different definition. I have thought for 55 years, the arbitrary "end" of Campbell's influence was bizarre because it clearly does not have a sudden end, except for his demise. I also noticed, I am certainly not alone, regarding this position.
I have completed my research and analysis (with surprising numerical and multiple highly regarded SF Historian results) and the first, second, and third drafts on this topic.
Due to a several page graphic list, it does not email well. I am working on that. My next step will be a pdf conversion to see if the numbers presented will remain stable thru emailing. I will be posting on Academia, too.
PS, I have had no time to work on YT channel, this project was a 2 month effort. I have done a little prep.
Great video, have fun!
Looking forward to reading your article. Perhaps you could use something like Google Drive or Dropbox for your article. Then you could share a link so people could download the article.
@@vintagesf Great Heavens. My old sharing site I used when writing essays for Economy in Crisis and Coalition For A Properous America no longer exists. It has been 9 or 10 years!
I guess I will check out Google
It was less an 'end' of his influence as much as a diminution of his impact and dominance of 'How you wrote Genre SF' that arbitrarily puts a close to the Golden Age. Campbell's work was thrown into the shadows gradually by what Anthony Boucher and Horace Gold did with their magazines: this is interestingly reflected in Hugo Winners in that first decade of the awards. Campbell's rigidity would have caused stagnation to spread and prevent SF from evolving, so the Golden Age had an end as the new Social Satirists emerged.
@@outlawbookselleroriginal Hey Stephen! Good to hear from you.
As usual, I am busy! I deal with all of that in my long, boring and pretty critical review of the Social Satrists, who by taking over SF nearly completely, nearly destroyed hard Science Fiction by 1970. That turned out very badly for SF as a whole, stagnating it for decades, and it has never fully recovered.
In the 1950s and early 1960s, there was a balance between the two, and that was good for the genre. I can show you a Pohl and Del Rey response to fan from IF 1968, that discusses this very issue. Monolithic Science Fiction is no good from either side, no debate going on. I have to fly, be back in several hours, sorry!
@@joebrooks4448 I shall look forward to your research, Joe, even if it doesn't marry with my paradigm. Benefit of pure research and all that, cheers!
Hi Richard. Thanks for all the effort that produced this information. Invaluable. I do believe that this series is invaluable to modern SF readers because it provides many classic books that might be tricky to find - and relatively cheap too if you can find the deals.
I would collect them myself but a) I'm otherwise engaged at the moment and b) I have a lot of the books in vintage printings. I do pick up all the numbered black spines when I see them however. Us collectors eh?
Can’t collect everything … but it’s tempting.
Subscribed
@@sgs6991 Thank you!