Date: Tue, 30 Aug 2005 20:51:42 -0400
From: Ted White <twhite8 at cox.net>
To: WSFA members <WSFAlist at WSFA.org>
Subject: [WSFA] Re: Judging a book by...
Reply-To: WSFA members <WSFAlist at WSFA.org>

Michael Walsh wrote:

[...]
>
>  Here's a decent entry on Elwood:
>  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roger_Elwood . Note the number of
>  anthologies in 1973 and 1974. I think Ernest can appreciate those
>  numbers <g>.
>
>  He was quite a powerhouse in his day... I suspect by shear volume he
>  published some good stuff.

A couple of good ones by me ("Stella" and "Dandy").  He tended to do
things like call me up and tell me he had a hole in a book because
someone hadn't delivered, and could I give him a story over the
weekend.  Then, if he didn't like it, he'd accuse me of "writing
hastily."  I told him a commission was a commission and to buy the story
or pay me a kill fee.  One never knew when one might trip over one of
his prejudices.  Most of them concerned religion (he was a
fundamentalist) and women (fallen creatures, all).  That's why he
rejected my "What Is Happening To Sarah Anne Lawrence?" which was
written to his very precise requirements (and ended up in AMAZING).  I
think it's one of my best, too.   After he rejected that one I refused
any future commissions from him.

But several years later he called me up and wanted a Laser Book.  I sold
him FORBIDDEN WORLD, but had time to write only the first couple of
chapters (chapter 1 appeared in a 1969 AMAZING as "Breaking Point,"
written around a cover) so I brought in Dave Bischoff (who had already
done a Laser Book) to finish it.  Elwood had a conniption fit.  Called
me up on the phone and screamed at me.  "You can't do that!  I have a
contract with *you*!"  I checked my contract.  *All* it called for was
"60,000 words in the English language."  I could've sent him a phone
directory.   FORBIDDEN WORLD ended up at Popular Library.  And Laser
Books folded.

I haven't heard from or of Roger since then.

--Ted White