Date: Sat, 23 Mar 2002 19:57:16 -0500
From: "Michael Walsh" <MJW at mail.press.jhu.edu>
To: <WSFAlist at keithlynch.net>
Subject: [WSFA] Re: Talking SF, oh my;
Reply-To: WSFA members <WSFAlist at keithlynch.net>

Sam Lubell charged in again with:
>At 09:11 AM 3/22/02 -0500, Mike wrote:
>>Sam Lubell cut a swath with this:
>>
>>>Actually Sword of Shanara is responsible for the birth of the modern
>>>fantasy genre.
>>I would suggest two different names: Donald Wollheim and Lin Carter
>>
>>DAW for taking advantage of the strangeness of US Copyright law which
>cast =
>>the LOTR into the public domain (this was changed with a court ruling I =
=
>>believe), thereby forcing the hand of JRRTs US & UK publishers to =
finally =
>>authorize a lowly mass market edition of the books.
>
>I disagree. Tolkien, even in his mass market edition, merely showed what =
a
>genius could do.  And there's always a shortage of geniuses.  Brooks =
showed
>that any idiot could *copy* that genius' world and have a big hit.  That
>opened the gates for a flood of Tolkien clones.

The mass market editions of Toliien opened the door, the Lancer re-issues =
of the Conan books kicked it open even more.  Lester Del Rey ripped the =
door from it's hinges with the Sword of Shanana.
>
>>>Lin Carter for his Adult Fantasy series which showed that there was a =
=
>>market for good solid fantasy, a lot of classics, plus some new writers. =
 =
>>In general a set of carter's Adult Fantasy novels is a fine selection of =
=
>>fantasy.  Carter himself could barely write himself out of a wet =
paperbag, =
>>and it's bizarre to know that posthumous sequels to the Thongor books =
are =
>>being planned.
>
>It was my impression that none of the Ballentine Adult Fantasy books sold
>anywhere near as well as as Sword of Shanahara and most of the modern
>fantasy genre appears to follow the copy Tolkien mode rather than the
>original and lyrical fantasy of the Adult Fantasy series.

The series ceased about 1974, Shanana oozed onto the shelves in 1977

As for sales, most were fairly acceptable for their time, with the rarest =
of the series being of all things G. K. Chesterton's "The Man Who Was =
Thursday" with prices starting at $20.00 and going to $`100.   There are =
many reprints out there, and well worth reading.  Not what you'd expect =
from the Father Brown mysteries.  Here's an online version, should you =
have time, money & bandwidth: http://www.ccel.org/c/chesterton/thursday/thu=
rsday.html.  Go buy the damn book, check it out of your library.

A decent survey of the series: http://home.epix.net/~wallison/bafs.html

mjw