“And unless the editor is the kind of man who is brave enough to stick for his ideals, regardless of his job, there must be much vacillation, with a consequent loss of valuable material and a depreciation in the reading value of the magazine. I notice that you say you will publish all letters received, providing there is no objection by the writers. Well, really now, old chap, I’ve no possible objection, but I doubt that you have the nerve to do it.”
With no desire to engage in a controversy with Mr. Austin, we must say to him emphatically that the editorial policy of WEIRD TALES is not dictated by the business office. We will stand or fall on our platform of “something new in magazine fiction.” If you support us, we shall be able to give you what you want. If you turn thumbs down, we’ll blow out the gas and go home in the dark. In any event, there will be no compromise. WEIRD TALES, as long as it lives, will always be “The Unique Magazine.”
Here’s another:
“Dear sir: I have just read your new magazine, WEIRD TALES, also The Eyrie by yourself. SOME magazine, I’ll say! There is a real kick to these stories—something that is pitifully lacking in the stories of most magazines. Why editors shy at ‘weird’ and ‘horror’ stories has always been a mystery to me. I like meat in my literature the same as I do in my menu. This willy-nilly stuff of would-be cowboys (when there aren’t any such animals nowadays) is sickening. So is sugar when eaten to excess. Keep this magazine going. There is a demand for such literature. We all love mystery and stories that give us cold spine (we of the public), whether the editors think so or not. This magazine of yours will prove it, I’m sure. Believe me, I’m for it! For the same reason I have always read Poe. And to prove this, I am enclosing a check for a year’s subscription. Money talks. We are always willing to pay for what we like.”
That letter came from Dr. Vance J. Hoyt, suite 818, Baker Detwiler Building, Los Angeles, California, and that’s the sort of letter we particularly like to read. As the doctor says, money talks,—and it speaks with an eloquent tongue!
So, also, do letters of frank criticism such as the following:
“I’m glad to say that I think the first issue of WEIRD TALES very good. I read ‘Ooze,’ ‘The Ghoul and the Corpse,’ ‘Fear,’ ‘The Place of Madness,’ ‘The Unknown Beast,’ ‘The Sequel,’ ‘The Young Man Who Wanted to Die.’ Of these I was mightily taken with ‘The Ghoul and the Corpse,’ which, to my mind, ran a close race with ‘Ooze’—in fact, as to handling, I think the best written, by far, of any that I read. Taylor’s story was good—my wife read it, and liked it—and so did I, as to theme. The handling left something to be desired in the way of smoothness, but, as a story, it was the cat’s whiskers. ‘The Unknown Beast’ was about the poorest, pressed for this honor by Story’s ‘Sequel.’ But, all in all, I am heartily in accord with your editorial dictum that people DO like and want grim stories. I know that I’m one who does. And I read ‘The Grim Thirteen,’ with some amazement that none of these stories had sold previously.
“I think some of our editors are so hide-bound, so cribbed, cabined and confined within the narrow limits of an increasingly myopic purview that, for the life of them, they can see nothing but stereotypes. Or else they’re not really editors, but just hired men who have to pass the stuff up to a ‘business’ boss who doesn’t know a single thing about fiction, or life, either, for that matter. All in all, I congratulate you on something really good—AND new.—H. C., Summit, N. J.”
We have received a considerable number of letters like the following from S. O. B. of Beulah, New Mexico: