by Ward Moore
Moore married Lorna Lenzi in 1942 while he was employed as a shipyard worker building Liberty Ships during WWII. This union resulted in five children: Rebekah, David, Samuel, Benyamin Haninah, and Hannah Rachel. After divorcing Lorna, he married Raylyn Moore (née Crabbe) in 1965. Their daughter, Sarah Rivkeh, is the youngest of Moore’s children. Moore and Raylyn bonded over their shared passion for writing. Raylyn published a novel in 1978, What Happened to Emily Goode After the Great Exhibition, which involved time travel, a theme central to Moore’s most famous work, Bring the Jubilee.
Though best known for his science fiction, Moore wrote in other genres as well, including criticism: book reviews and articles for Harper’s Bazaar, the San Francisco Chronicle, Jewish Horizons, and The Nation, among other publications. His first book, Breathe the Air Again (1942), was an example of the picaresque novel, an episodic storytelling format featuring adventure and, frequently, an amoral lead character (Simon Epstein is said to have been autobiographical).
Moore was known to have had strong influential relationships with his fellow writers. The poet Kenneth Rexroth, who called him “one of the historic eccentrics of American bohemia,” based a character on Moore in An Autobiographical Novel (1964). Rexroth’s depiction differs very little from Moore’s own representation of himself in Breathe the Air Again. The novelist also reportedly appeared as the character Joseph Baer in Jean Ariss’s The Quick Years (1958).
In addition to his novels, Moore wrote several critically acclaimed short stories. His fascinating collection, Lot and Lot’s Daughter, is about a family escaping a nuclear holocaust, whose patriarch abandons his wife and son to start an incestuous relationship with his daughter in their new world. Controversial upon publication, it was later adapted into the film Panic in Year Zero (1962).
Moore passed away on January 29, 1978, in Pacific Grove, California, where he lived with his wife Raylyn. He left behind several unpublished manuscripts, but his iconic novels and short stories continue to influence science fiction and alternate history writers.
Moore smoking a pipe in Topanga Canyon, California, 1953.
Moore at his writing table in Monterey, California, 1957 or 1958.
Moore with his daughter Sara and son Ben in Central Park in New York City, 1966.
Moore sitting with his daughter Sara in Pacific Grove, California, 1969.
All rights reserved, including without limitation the right to reproduce this ebook or any portion thereof in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of the publisher.
These are works of fiction. Names, characters, places, events, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, businesses, companies, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
Copyright © 1953, 1954 by Ward Moore
Cover design by Ian Koviak
ISBN: 978-1-5040-4464-6
This edition published in 2017 by Open Road Integrated Media, Inc.
180 Maiden Lane
New York, NY 10038
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WARD MOORE
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