That meant that at least I would have the chance to start a new story, my fourteenth.
The memory of Binder's "I, Robot" was clear in my mind, and meeting him three days before had stimulated that memory, so on May 10 I started to write my own story of a sympathetic and noble robot, one that served as a nursemaid for a little girl. I called the story "Robbie," and on May 23 I took it in to Campbell.
3
By now I badly needed something to raise my spirits, for even breaking through the "Campbell barrier" with the sale of "Ad Astra" had not converted me into a successful writer.
When Fred Pohl once again urged me to let him be my agent, I agreed on a three-month tryout period. I reserved Campbell for myself, however, which was an unfair restriction on Pohl, but I couldn't help it. I simply couldn't give up my visits to Campbell. There was also to be no revisions by Pohl of my rejections and no sixty-forty split.
Fred Pohl became a close friend of mine after this, but there was always a shell about him I could never penetrate. He was taller than I, just as thin, had light hair that already looked as though its presence were temporary, and he had a pronounced overbite that gave him a rabbity appearance. His quiet voice was never raised in anger, and he smoked incessantly.
Nevertheless, I never knew anything about his personal life, his parents, his siblings if any, his childhood—except in small, inadvertent allusions over the course of the years. He had a girlfriend at the time I met him, but he never spoke of her particularly.
He did not go to college; in fact, I don't think he finished high school. He was an educational casualty of the Depression. It was a matter of money, but I didn't know the details. I had the impression he had to live by himself and somehow support himself, but he didn't say why or, for that matter, how.
His aborted education was a tragic thing. It didn't stop him in any way. He taught himself all he had to know in a dozen different directions, from science and mathematics to practical politics. He was interesting, clear and logical, bright and rational. It has always seemed to me that the only person in the world he couldn't impress was himself. To himself (and this is only my impression) his status as "high-school dropout" was something from which there seemed no recovery. Too bad!
On May 25, 1939, he came to my home in the evening and I gave him the collection of stories I had written but had not yet sold. I also showed him "Robbie," which was at that time still with Campbell. He read it and said, "It's a good story, Eye, but Campbell won't take it."
I asked why not. He said it was too reminiscent of "Helen O'Loy" by Lester del Rey, which had appeared in the December 1938 Astounding, and which also dealt with a sympathetic and noble robot, albeit one in female guise. 2 Pohl also said that the ending, in which the mother was suddenly converted from being antirobot to being prorobot, was weak.
As a matter of fact Campbell did reject "Robbie," and the news of the rejection reached me first from Pohl himself, who, exceeding his role as my agent, inquired of Campbell as to its fate. Campbell told him it was rejected. When the manuscript still did not come back, I could stand it no more and, on June 6, I visited Campbell and had the news confirmed. What's more, Campbell's reasons were exactly those that Pohl had predicted, and I was impressed by Pohl's acumen. 3 Later on, Amazing rejected "Robbie" because it was too reminiscent of Binder's "I, Robot," which was good judgment on their part, too.
It was at my June 6 visit to Campbell's that I was introduced to a tall, thin, thirty-one-year-old man with a neat, small mustache, a well-bred air, and a precise manner of speech. It was L. Sprague de Camp, one of my favorite science-fiction writers. He wrote not merely science fiction, but fantasy and nonfiction articles as well. I liked his nonfiction even better than his fiction. He had a two-part article, "Design for Life," in the most recent two issues of Astounding, and I had enjoyed it greatly.
It was a pleasant meeting and a fruitful one, for we have been good and close friends ever since and never, I think, in all that time has one cross word passed between us.
4 At the end of May, while I was still waiting to hear about "Robbie," my last tests were taken and passed at Columbia, including a heavy "comprehensive examination" in my major—chemistry. I passed them all, of course, and it meant I was done with college.
2 Lester has always been one of my favorite writers. In the May 1939 Astounding a story of his, "The Day Is Done," reduced me to tears when I read it on the subway on April 29. These days, Lester never stops talking about it and I am forced to say that I wept over the bad writing, but that's not really so. It was a terrific story.
3 By that time, too, Pohl had had a chance to read my stories and he told me "they were the best set of rejections" he had ever seen. That didn't do anything to hurt my opinion of his acumen, either.
It was an anticlimactic finish thanks to my inability to get into medical school, and I didn't value the graduation at all. I refused to attend the graduation ceremonies, which were held on June 7, 1939, but asked, instead, to have my diploma mailed to me. It arrived on June 10, and I put it in a closet.
The only time I ever took it out was nearly three years later, when it was time for me to register to vote for the first time. I had a clear memory of my mother registering to vote for the first time in 1938, shortly after she had obtained her own citizenship. I had accompanied her to the polling headquarters at the neighborhood elementary school and she had been required to take a literacy test. I remember her sitting there at the children's desk as she took the test.
Since I did not want to do that if I didn't have to, I dug out my college diploma and took it with me. I felt they wouldn't test my literacy with that piece of evidence in my favor. As soon as I was up before the clerk behind the desk, I presented my birth certificate, my father's citizenship papers (mentioning me on their face), and my college diploma. It turned out he had no intention of giving me a literacy test; that was only for people who seemed on the face of it to be doubtful; so he stared at my diploma and said, in a shocked voice: "Did you take that diploma out of its frame just to bring it in here?"
"No," I answered, indignantly, "it was just rolled up in the closet."
And he stood up and said, "Do you mean to say that after your parents sacrificed to send you to college, you didn't even frame your diploma?"
Well, I never did. In fact, I don't even possess it anymore. My bachelor's diploma is as gone as "Cosmic Corkscrew."
The degree I was awarded was a B.S., a Bachelor of Science. At the time I thought that was only natural, since my major was chemistry. Many years later, however, I discovered that this was a second-class degree. The gentlemen of Columbia College got a B.A. (Bachelor of Arts), for which university undergraduates such as myself did not qual-
ify.
When I discovered this, I was dreadfully annoyed. I had never appreciated my second-class status as an undergraduate, and the thought that even in graduation I was pettily discriminated against irritated me mightily. After all, I had taken the same courses as the Columbia College students had taken, and had competed with them directly for marks. I might have received the reward of this.
There was something I could do about it. I was annoyed enough to stop all contributions to Columbia. I haven't paid out one cent to the university since. Petty? No pettier than they.
This was not the end of the discrimination, by the way.
At the time I went to Columbia, there was something called "University Extension," which gave evening courses for any person who wished to attend and who could pay the fees. It was essentially an adult-education device and was a valuable service to the community and to all people who wanted to learn something.
Nevertheless, it was considered by regular undergraduates to be declassd. We looked upon it as a kind of glorified night school.
In years to come, University Extension was replaced by the School of General Studies. This school gathered up other disregarded miscellaneous classifications, among other things, the "university undergraduate" group. Th
at meant that I automatically became an alumnus of the school of General Studies, and that also irritated me when I found out what it was.
Some day a biographer, 4 working through the Columbia records, and coming across the fact that I am an alumnus of the School of General Studies, will solemnly record that I worked my way through Columbia's extension courses at night.
Well, not so!
5
Once I completed college, I was faced with a problem.
Virtually all my life I had taken it for granted that I would, in September 1939 (or in September of whichever year I finished college), start my studies at a medical school. Now I was not to do it. Well then, what was I to do?
There was no point in ending my education and looking for a job. I doubted that I could find one any more advanced than my old summer job cutting rubberized fabric three years before, despite my education and my high IQ.
Nor did it occur to me for even a moment that I could simply try to write for a living. It had been just a year since I had begun to submit stories, and in that year I had received three checks, totaling $197.
It was a respectable feat, all things considered, but I couldn't live on that, and so far I had no indication that things would ever get better in that respect.
So I had to continue my education, and the only path that seemed open to me was to continue on with my chemistry and go for my master's degree. I wasn't sure to what end I would do this, but it would
4 You wouldn't think that with this autobiography out there'd be any need for a biography, but undoubtedly there'll be someone who will consider this record of mine so biased, so self-serving, so ridiculous that there will be need for a scholarly, objective biography to set the record straight. Well, I wish him luck.
serve to stave off the evil day when I would have to make a harder decision. I therefore filled out the necessary blanks at school.
I did not, at that time, think that my application was anything more than a matter of going through the motions.
Convention Summer
I wrote two stories in June 1939. One was "Half-Breed/' nine thousand words long, and the other was "Secret Sense." The first I gave to Pohl to peddle, feeling he ought to have a fair chance—but only on the provision he not submit it to Campbell. The other I took in to Campbell on June 21 (the first anniversary of my first visit to his office), and it was back in my hands in six days.
On the way out on that June 21 visit, however, I had a way of celebrating. I passed a pile of July 1939 Astoundings. It was due to reach the store the next day, but it had "Ad Astra" in it—the first story by Isaac Asimov ever to appear in Astounding— and it was more than human flesh and blood could endure to pass the pile and leave it untouched. That was me playing the Palace—so I helped myself to one issue, and discovered at once that Campbell had changed the title to "Trends." 1 It was a better title.
Although "Trends" was the second story I sold, it was the third to appear. Both earlier stories were, however, published in Amazing and, somehow, I find it difficult to count them. It was to Campbell I was always trying to sell my stories, and it was in Astounding that I always wanted them to appear, so that "Trends" always seems to me to be my first significant published story. This is rather ungrateful of me toward Amazing, but I can't help it.
The July 1939 issue of Astounding is sometimes considered by fans of the period to have marked the beginning of science fiction's "Golden Age," a period stretching through the 1940s. In that period, Campbell's views were in full force in the magazine, and the authors he trained and developed were writing with the full ardor of youth. In that period too, Astounding was just about the entire field. There was no competition to speak of in quality anywhere, inside or outside the magazines.
The fact that my first story for Astounding appeared in that issue is undoubtedly a minor factor in marking that as the first issue. What counted much more was the fact that the lead novelette in that issue was "Black Destroyer" by A. E. van Vogt, a first story by a new author
1 See The Early Asimov.
who quickly became a reader favorite. In the next issue, August 1939, there was the first story, "Lifeline/' of another new author, Robert A. Heinlein, who became the quintessence of all a "Campbell author" ought to be.
In time to come, Van Vogt, Heinlein, and I would be universally listed among the top authors of the Golden Age, but Van Vogt and Heinlein were that from the very beginning. Each blazed forth as a first-magnitude star at the moment his first story appeared, and that status never flagged throughout the remainder of the Golden Age. So it also was with some of the other authors.
I, on the other hand (and this is not modesty, for I have none), rose only little by little. I was virtually unnoticed for a while and came to be considered a major author by such gradual steps that despite the healthy helping of self-appreciation with which I was (and am) blessed, I myself was the last to notice.
I'm not sorry. It was more fun that way.
Incidentally, among those who liked "Trends" was a young man named Damon Knight, who is now a respected elder statesman in our field. I received a letter from him on June 26, and he asked for my autograph. He was the first person ever to ask for one, and I don't think he knows that—or will know it until he reads this book. I had forgotten it myself until I came to that page in my diary.
Almost immediately after the publication of "Trends," something even more exciting took place—a special kind of science-fiction meeting.
The idea was Sam Moskowitz's, the Sam Moskowitz who was one of those against whom the Futurians had revolted—a tall, round-faced, serious fellow, whose most noticeable characteristics were a loud voice and an encyclopedic knowledge of science fiction.
Most of the science-fiction clubs in the United States were made up of impoverished teen-agers. Sometimes, members from one club visited another city as guests of a club there, making the trip in jalopies or a bus. It occurred to Sam to organize a "World Convention" that all science-fiction fans from everywhere in the world (if they had the time and money) could attend.
"The First World Science Fiction Convention" took place on Sunday, July 2, 1939, in a hall on Fifty-ninth Street between Park Avenue and Madison Avenue. I had heard about the planned convention from the Futurians who, of course, wanted to attend. Moskowitz, along with
the others who were organizing the convention, felt, however, that the Futurians planned only to disrupt the convention, and it was their intention to exclude them and prevent them from entering.
I did not know whether this exclusion principle included me. At the time of the Futurian revolt, I was not yet a member, and Sam Moskowitz did not know me. He had seen me during my visit to the Queens Science Fiction League the month before, but I had been there as a writer and I was anything but a disruptive influence.
Still, solidarity was solidarity, and it was my intention to stay with the Futurians. I arrived at 10:00 a.m. and found them in an Automat across the street from the meeting house. All were present but Fred Pohl, who was late because of some dental problems.
Finally, we decided to make the attempt, crossed the street, walked up the steps, and there facing us was the burly Sam Moskowitz (whom to this day I wouldn't dream of crossing, and with whom I have been good friends for a long time) and a number of cohorts.
It was useless to try to fight, really, and the Futurians turned and left and remained for the rest of the day across the street. I, however, continued walking up the steps, determined to adopt the role of author rather than fan. No one tried to stop me. I just walked in.
For a moment I hesitated, feeling I ought to join my friends in exile—but I couldn't. The hall was full. I saw Campbell there and others whom I either knew or suspected to be persons of consequence, and I could not resist. I stayed at the convention (and I have suffered pangs of guilt over this ever since).
The morning was an informal session where everyone introduced themselves to each other. I met Frank R. Paul, the famous science-fiction ill
ustrator, who was guest of honor. I also met such authors as Ross Rocklynne, Nelson S. Bond, Manly Wade Wellman, Had Vincent, and John D. Clark. 2 There were well-known fans such as Forry Ackerman, Jack Darrow, and Milt Rothman. I met Mort Weisinger, the editor of Thrilling Wonder Stories, who had rejected everything of mine he had seen, but whom I had never met before.
Also present were people I had already met, such as Campbell, Hornig, de Camp, and Williamson.
At lunchtime I went out and joined the Futurians. They did not berate me for my treason. Rather, they considered me a spy in the enemy's camp, though what good it did them to have a spy, I couldn't say. I told them everything that had happened, then went back in.
2 Some I met only that one time and never again. Some became lifelong friends. It's impossible to tell in advance how it will turn out.
Leslie Perri, which was the name under which Pohl's girlfriend worked as a writer and illustrator, went in with me.
In the afternoon we saw the motion picture Metropolis, a silent movie that had been made in 1926. I thought it was awful.
Afterward there were speeches by the various editors. Weisinger, as a part of his statement, said, "I didn't know you fellows were so sincere!" and that made Time magazine, which ran two columns on the convention in its next issue.
The various notables in the audience were introduced to the general membership, and at about 7:00 p.m. John Clark called out, "How about Asimov?"
There was shouting and I stood up in pleased confusion. I made my way toward the stage and I remember receiving a healthy shove forward by a grinning John Campbell as I passed.
Leslie Perri made gestures and faces at me as I passed, but I didn't know what she meant. Later, she told me with exasperation that she had meant I ought to make a stirring appeal on behalf of the Futurian exiles—but that had never occurred to me. I just blushed prettily, thanked the audience for their applause, and referred to myself in an agony of insincerity as the "worst science-fiction writer unlynched."
In memory yet green : the autobiography of Isaac Asimov, 1920-1954 Page 30
