Cyril M. Kornbluth

C. M. Kornbluth

Cyril Kornbluth c. 1955
Born July 23, 1923(1923-07-23)
New York City, New York, United States
Died March 21, 1958(1958-03-21) (aged 34)
Levittown, New York, United States
Pen name Cecil Corwin
S.D. Gottesman
Edward J. Bellin
Kenneth Falconer
Walter C. Davies
Simon Eisner
Jordan Park
Occupation Novelist, short story author, Editor
Nationality United States
Genres Science fiction

Cyril M. Kornbluth (July 23, 1923 – March 21, 1958) was an American science fiction author and a notable member of the Futurians. He used a variety of pen-names, including Cecil Corwin, S. D. Gottesman, Edward J. Bellin, Kenneth Falconer, Walter C. Davies, Simon Eisner and Jordan Park. The "M" in Kornbluth's name may have been in tribute to his wife, Mary Byers;[1] Frederik Pohl confirmed the lack of any actual middle name in at least one interview.[2]

Contents

Biography

Kornbluth was born and grew up in Inwood in New York City.[3] As a teenager, he became a member of the Futurians, the influential group of science fiction fans and writers. While a member of the Futurians, he met and became friends with Isaac Asimov, Frederik Pohl, Donald A. Wollheim, Robert A. W. Lowndes, and his future wife Mary Byers. He also participated in the Fantasy Amateur Press Association.[4]

Kornbluth served in the US Army during World War II (European Theatre). He received a Bronze Star for his service in the Battle of the Bulge, where he served as a member of a heavy machine gun crew. Upon his discharge, he returned to finish his education, which had been interrupted by the war, at the University of Chicago.

Work

Kornbluth began writing at 15. His first solo story, "The Rocket of 1955," was published in Richard Wilson's fanzine Escape (Vol 1 No 2, August 1939); his first collaboration, "Stepsons of Mars," written with Richard Wilson and published under the name "Ivar Towers," appeared in the April 1940 Astonishing. His other short fiction includes "The Little Black Bag", "The Marching Morons", "The Altar at Midnight," "MS. Found in a Chinese Fortune Cookie," "Gomez" and "The Advent on Channel 12."

"MS. Found in a Chinese Fortune Cookie" (1957) is supposedly written by Kornbluth using notes by "Cecil Corwin", who has been declared insane and incarcerated, from where he is smuggling out in fortune cookies the ultimate secret of life. This fate is said to be Kornbluth's response to the unauthorized publication of "Mask of Demeter" (as by "Corwin" and "Martin Pearson" [Donald A. Wollheim]) in 1953.

"The Little Black Bag" was first televised as a live act on the television show "Tales of Tomorrow" on May 30, 1952. It was later adapted for television by the BBC in 1969 for its Out of the Unknown series. In 1970, the same story was adapted by Rod Serling for an episode of his Night Gallery series. This dramatization starred Burgess Meredith as the alcoholic Dr. William Fall, who had long lost his doctors license and become a street wino/alcoholic. He finds a bag containing advanced medical technology from the future (2098), which, after an unsuccessful attempt to pawn it, he uses benevolently — reclaiming his career and redeeming his soul... but not that of the guttersnipe he takes in as his money hungry assistant.

"The Marching Morons" is one of Kornbluth's most famous short stories; it is a satirical look at a far future in which the world's population consists of five billion idiots and a few million geniuses — the precarious minority of the "elite" working desperately to keep things running behind the scenes. Part of its appeal is that readers identify with the beleaguered geniuses (which is entirely compatible with science fiction fans' broadly held opinion of their relationship with the mundane majority). In his introduction to The Best of C.M. Kornbluth, Pohl states that "The Marching Morons" is a direct sequel to "The Little Black Bag": it is easy to miss this, as "Bag" is set in the contemporary present while "Morons" takes place several centuries from now, and there is no character who appears in both stories. The titular black bag in the first story is actually an artifact from the time period of "The Marching Morons": a medical kit filled with self-driven instruments enabling a far-future moron to "play doctor." A future Earth similar to "The Marching Morons" - a civilisation of morons protected by a small minority of hidden geniuses - is used again in the final stages of Kornbluth & Pohl's Search the Sky.

Many of Kornbluth's novels were written as collaborations: either with Judith Merril (using the pseudonym Cyril Judd), or with Frederik Pohl. By far the most successful and important of these were the novels Gladiator-At-Law and The Space Merchants. The Space Merchants contributed significantly to the maturing and to the wider academic respectability of the science fiction genre, not only in America but also in Europe.[5] Kornbluth also wrote several novels under his own name, the most successful being The Syndic and Not This August.

Death

Kornbluth died at age 34 in Levittown, New York. Scheduled to meet with Bob Mills in New York City, Kornbluth had to shovel out his driveway, which left him running behind. Racing to make his train, he suffered a heart attack on the platform of the train station.

A number of short stories remained unfinished at Kornbluth's death; these were eventually completed and published by Pohl. One of these stories, "The Meeting" (The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction, November 1972), was the co-winner of the 1973 Hugo Award for Best Short Story; it tied with R. A. Lafferty's "Eurema's Dam."[6] Almost all of Kornbluth's solo SF stories have been collected as His Share of Glory: The Complete Short Science Fiction of C. M. Kornbluth (NESFA Press, 1997).

Personality and habits

Frederik Pohl, in his autobiography The Way the Future Was, Damon Knight, in his memoir The Futurians, and Isaac Asimov, in his memoirs In Memory Yet Green and I. Asimov: A Memoir, all give vivid descriptions of Kornbluth as a man of odd personal habits and vivid eccentricities. Among the traits which they describe:

Bibliography

Novels

Collections

Anthony Boucher praised the collection, saying "Kornbluth's sharp observation is everywhere present, and in most of the stories his bitter insight."[7] P. Schuyler Miller reviewed the collection favorably for Astounding Science Fiction.[8]

Spider Robinson praised this collection, saying "I haven't enjoyed a book so much in years."[9]

Non-science fiction

Uncollected short stories

Collected and uncollected articles

Legacy

Kornbluth's name is mentioned in Lemony Snicket's Series of Unfortunate Events as a member of V.F.D., a secret organization dedicated to the promotion of literacy, classical learning, and crime prevention.

References

  1. ^ Rich, Mark (2009). C. M. Kornbluth. Jefferson, NC: McFarland. pp. 127–8. ISBN 9780786443932. 
  2. ^ Webster, Bud. Cyril With an M (or, I'm As Kornbluth as Kansas in August). Baen's Universe, 5 February 2009
  3. ^ Rich, Mark (2009). C. M. Kornbluth. Jefferson, NC: McFarland. pp. 20. ISBN 9780786443932. 
  4. ^ Fancyclopedia
  5. ^ See for instance: Zoran Živković, Contemporaries of the Future - Savremenici budućnosti, Belgrade, Serbia, 1983, pp. 250-261.
  6. ^ http://www.worldcon.org/hy.html#73
  7. ^ "Recommended Reading," F&SF, December 1954, p.91.
  8. ^ "The Reference Library," Astounding Science Fiction, March 1954, pp.160
  9. ^ "Galaxy Bookshelf", Galaxy Science Fiction, August 1977, p.143.

Sources

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