pulp magazines project – My Life, or Something Like It

Generating Genre: The Legacy of Early Pulp SF

Before going too in-depth into my reflection on Sci-Fi and genre building, I just have to relay two facts: a) that there was a TV series in the mid-80s called Amazing Stories, created by Steven Spielberg, and b) that somehow I didn’t know this existed. In the same vein as the pulp magazine of the same name, the show apparently covered Fantasy, Horror, and Sci-Fi themes. It’s also apparently looking for a reboot. Crazy. Here I thought I was knowledgeable of these kinds of programs having watched The Twilight Zone (old and new) as well as The Outer Limits. Alas, I digress…

The creation of genre was not really something I had considered before this week’s class. Naturally I had considered that genres had origins — I have even studied the development of Greek and Roman theatre genres extensively — however, I have rarely considered that literary genres too, have origin stories. In particular, that there are more ‘recent’ genres like Sci-Fi that have a much longer legacy than what it feels like they should.

Perhaps it all comes down to definitions, however. We discussed this week how when Amazing Stories first published, the editor basically made it up as he went along. There were no established Sci-Fi pulps at this time, nor, apparently, had the genre been established as a literary area. Romances and Adventure stories are common throughout literary history, but Sci-Fi apparently presented something new. While I’d prefer not to quote Wikipedia, but the first few lines of “Science Fiction”‘s entry rings true, perhaps because they’re quoting Gernsback:

Science fiction is difficult to define, as it includes a wide range of subgenres and themes. Hugo Gernsback, who suggested the term “scientifiction” for his Amazing Stories magazine, wrote: “By ‘scientifiction’ I mean the Jules Verne, H. G. Wells and Edgar Allan Poe type of story—a charming romance intermingled with scientific fact and prophetic vision… Not only do these amazing tales make tremendously interesting reading—they are always instructive. They supply knowledge… in a very palatable form… New adventures pictured for us in the scientifiction of today are not at all impossible of realization tomorrow… Many great science stories destined to be of historical interest are still to be written… Posterity will point to them as having blazed a new trail, not only in literature and fiction, but progress as well.”

To me it seems then, more that the development of SF as a genre was more about its kairos than its content. Alongside the development of advanced science and technology, we see something labeled accordingly. But even in the early days of writing (in terms of ancient plays), we see themes of instruction, knowledge transfer, and speculative/imaginative forms. While Gernsback cites Poe et al., we discussed in class the existence of Mary Shelley and other female authors before that also would fit into the SF genre (sadly calling again to those gender issues in scholarship and social acknowledgement). If these themes existed for longer than the existence of the genre, what else can we attribute the development of the genre to other than kairos? Someone surely could have “decided” to do so, as Gernsback did before Amazing Stories, and yet, no one did. Intentionality does not appear to be enough then, but rather, the timing not only of an increase in science and technology, but also the existence of pulp magazines themselves, that allowed for such a thing to develop.

blade-runner-2049-796x398 — *Blade Runner 2049*

Launching a new “genre” within literature would have been too risky. Books take a lot of time and finances in order to be successful, on top of necessary marketing and appeals to readership. Pulp magazines rose and fell seemingly at will — they were willing to take a chance, even if it meant failure — because they weren’t as expensive to produce. All of this explains why SF came when it did — easy to take a chance, lots of technology and science popping up everywhere…but it doesn’t account for all the reasons why they were successful…

I think the key here is the readership engagement. We’ll talk about this more during our presentation, or rather Sue will, but I think it’s worth spoiling a bit here on the subject. SF was successful as a genre due to its kairos as well as its ability to engage its audience. It’s quite a clever advertising move actually. The best way to establish yourself as a genre is to get people interested in your genre, to get them engaged in its development. People always love talking about themselves, and by extension, they love putting their mark on things. The actual amount of influence the readership had on Amazing Stories is up for debate, however, the magazine’s active push for any show of dialogue I think helped to make them boom as long as they did and really helped to engrain SF as a genre as a result.

One might argue that any genre could have been created in this way, which is true I suppose, but SF latched on at the exact right nexus of context to blossom into what it became–further evidenced by how much SF developed after Amazing Stories gave it a label. We see the first SF film Metropolis hit theatres as early as 1927. Then in 1938, Orson Wells converts his then-40 year old book The War of the Worlds into an infamous audio drama that briefly causes real panic and fear in the populace (The Smithsonian has a good piece on that and kairos/”an magnificent fluke” for the record). Meanwhile Astounding Stories kicks off in the 1930s as well. From this point forward, we see an increased basis for Futurism taking shape in art and design, especially leading through the 1950s and 1960s. Something we see revisited and taken to the extreme in the Fallout series.

In the end, I wonder what would have happened without this nexus of readership engagement and appropriate timing? Where would Sci Fi have started without pulp magazines? For how popular and how fast SF spread like wildfire in the last century, I feel fairly confident that simultaneous invention would have happened somehow, give or take a few years. But isn’t that all what SF is about anyway? Speculating the unknown?

The Good of the Many

After class this week, I was elated to receive our pulp magazine in the mail, timely and well-packaged. I slipped it carefully out of its protective sleeve of cardboard and plastic, before gently flipping through its pages. Hints of stories to read flashed before my eyes as I gingerly touched its fragile pages. Then it struck me, I needed to document this magazine–to scan its pages, and upload them to the PMP. While I had known this all along, I was suddenly disheartened. The well-preserved mag possessed a very deliberate spine that didn’t seem to want to give way, even to read it wide open. Conservation would be troublesome at best, and I feared that I would have to break the spine in order to scan it properly. What is lost in breaking the original so that a digital copy may live?

A very à propos question to be sure, following our discussions from this week. What is lost in the digital preservation of pulp magazines? What is gained? We spent a great deal of time analyzing the ways in which scholarship and individuals could benefit from a database like the PMP. For my MA thesis I spent a great deal of time looking at archaeological artifacts and 3D replicas. In order to do this, I analyzed the semantics and meaning-networks of ‘originals’ vs. their digital replicas. While my thesis was focused on actual material replicas, I briefly touched upon purely digital replicas as well. Mass-access, availability, and production were all benefits to such a phenomenon. While not going into the ethics of digital replication (mainly of cultural objects you may have no authority to duplicate), I came to the conclusion that the benefits of digital reproduction and preservation outweighed the costs, at least for educational purposes. Most relevant to our topic this week however, I found that meanings and that something extra held within an original artifact only has meaning because we give it meaning. While something can be argued for seeing ‘the real thing,’ many people would not know any different if presented a reliably produced replica. While the old must of a vintage pulp magazine may be hard to duplicate, I wouldn’t be surprised if there were propmasters who could come up a solid approximation for the layperson, which would be indistinguishable, save for perhaps having them side by side.

Suffice to say, there are dangers to certain kinds of object-replication. In the case of the PMP, and something that never occured to me before I held one in my hand, is the potential need to break the spine in order to accurately scan the magazine. In this way, the original is broken, is altered due to digitization. My research explored non-invasive digitization of artifacts, and as a result, this adds an entirely new element to such a study. Do the scales shift when the act of digitization destroys, or at least alters, the thing we’re trying to save? Does the good of the many [scholars] outweigh the needs of the few [magazines]?

FLASHFORGE_Flyer_FRONT — 3D Replica of the Winged Victory of Samothrace

I have to say I’m philosophically at a loss as to the most correct answer in this regard. My inner archaeologist wants me to preserve the original at all costs. That being said, my inner scholar would rather see it digitized before the original crumbles to dust. That’s the thing about paper objects versus stone tools or clay pots–they deteriorate so much faster, and are in so much more need of early digitization to preserve their integrity. It would seem to me that in this case, that Spock was more correct than Kirk at the end of The Wrath of Khan. Sacrificing the physical integrity of the original object for a prolonged digital life, feels as though it’s the right thing to do. The paper copy will ultimately fade and fall apart, even with perfect preservation. It will deteriorate. Pulps were not made to last after all–it’s a miracle we have as many as we do. A digital replica, at least we hope, will never fade beyond the moment the original is scanned. It can be transmitted, duplicated, and shared without fear of lost pages or damages. In an ideal world, one can save both the magazine and create a perfect replica, but I have yet to see if we can pull off a proper Kobayashi Maru. Or are we, like Starfleet officers in training, meant to accept defeat for the greater good?

It seems to me that it’s good our group chose sci-fi after all. It has so much to teach us.

That feel when…

You receive your 1936 Sci-Fi pulp fiction magazine in the mail at last.

With only minor (and careful) flipping through of the issue, I’m very excited to get engaged with it. I think we made a good choice.

Also, there’s a literal story about “gaslighting.” However, it’s quite literally about the history of Gas Lighters (by the looks of things). And let’s not forget the existence of a circa 1930’s science questionnaire. I’m hyped.

Ready to Party

Things got a little more lively this week as we started to really get into thinking about how to analyze pulp magazines. Class discussion was fruitful and I was very engaged with how much people pulled from the day’s readings. While we covered both Christine Bold’s introduction to The Oxford History of Popular Print Culture Vol. 6: U.S. Popular Print Culture 1860-1920 and the introduction to Mussell’s Nineteenth-Century Press in the Digital Age, we spent the majority of our discussion working through an anatomical study of Popular Magazine, where people got really into things.

Something that came out of our discussions, which I really carries forward from my initial topic area last week, is the problematic history of pulp magazines. In class last week we discussed the origins of pulp magazines in Dime and Nickel magazines, which were predominantly of a “dangerous” and “sensational” variety, governed by a white and male master narrative.

bioshock_history_2 — One of the many areas where racial tensions are highlighted in an alternative history setting in *BioShock Infinite.*

Pulp magazines, coming out of this tradition, had to struggle to establish themselves as a quality source of reading material, away from the juvenility of the Dime mags. As we see in pulp magazines however, this was not entirely possible to get away from, as a lot of the master narrative elements continued. This is something that is picked up in BioShock Infinite, a game that explores issues of race and class extensively, mirroring issues of the pulp magazine era, while forcing us to analyze our own cultural perspectives (e.g. as explored more fully by Waypoint or HowManyPrincesses).

For now I’d like to hold off on the contemporary comparisons to pulps, and instead focus on the analysis of pulps themselves. As demonstrated by Bold, pulps historically fell into a low culture motif, despite their attempt to remove themselves from the Dime and Nickel days.

While this worked, somewhat, to elevate their cultural status, the dichotomous approach to culture remained a dominant force in their ‘place’ in the world — including in academic study. While ‘high’ culture is as much culture as ‘low’ culture, the social elites have continued to try to defame ‘low’ culture in order to keep social groups separate. This has been a problem for academic study in particular, as often ‘low’ cultural elements have trouble being studied in any depth–believed to be lacking any cultural relevance. Naturally, this is far from the truth.

With a large surge of literate Americans and ease of access to printing via the industrial revolution, pulp magazines became a tool of expression for the public at large. This was not without some sort of control however, that as much as pulps were avenues of expression for the non-elites (especially as more sub-genres developed), so too did they serve to normalize and establish a desirable master narrative of Americana. We saw this clearly when we performed an “anatomical study” on The Popular Magazine from December of 1908.

In this early pulp magazine we found a steady theme of adventure…but only so far. Quite frequently the stories in the magazine conveyed a sense that adventure can be found anywhere for the everyman–even just outside of the city. It is oriented towards this everyman, who is capable of reaching his own potential, if only he tries hard enough (read like traditional Americana or what). The advertisements (at this time) reinforce this theme, with promotions of becoming a better business man, family values, as well as patriotism and nationalism, naturally. This is quite literally laid out at the end of the magazine, where “A Chat With You” leads potential writers into how they should tailor their stories for the magazine. Underpinning these normative performances, we also see simplified and stereotypical representations of People of Colour and immigrants–quite often negative ones at that.

Finally, we took to buying our very own pulp magazines. Searching the e-racks of Ebay, we tried to find an authentic, interesting, and affordable magazine to call our own, and to document for the rest of the term. As a group, we readily decided on a sci-fi theme, as the stories they promised were sure to be entertaining, if only just to see how people saw the future. Luckily, we had a lot of potential options, and settled on a copy of “Amazing Stories” from the mid-1930’s. Sadly we weren’t able to get a synopsis of any of its contents but its cover alone was enough to draw us in. Some sort of squid people rolling people in a Christmas-ornament style orb–what isn’t to love? Here’s hoping its as interesting as its cover suggests–but wasn’t that the hope of all pulp cover art? To draw you in? Well, this one surely has us hooked, and luckily, it follows a nautical theme with “The Maelstrom of Atlantis.”

I’m ready to dive in.

Breaking into Pulp Reading

I have always been a fan of detective fiction, mystery, and sci-fi novels. This has extended to movies and video games that delve into these topics from a variety of levels. For me, pulp fiction magazines highlight some ways in which these genres came to be developed in a different, more easily digestible, way.

BioShock Infinite Ad — Advertisement from *BioShock* Infinite

In particular, some of my favourite games feature art, themes, and graphical styles based on the same styles seen in pulp magazines (BioShock series, Fallout, etc.), and there’s a

real movement towards narration or satire based on the themes originated in pulp. I would love to trace how some of these things are enacted and developed in pulp magazines, versus how they are manifest in video game contexts. I am curious to see if the tropes and imagery are blatantly pulled from these precursors, or if they are used and adapted to fit the motivations of the game. I know in many cases the themes are adapted, but I am sure there are places that are near recreations of pulp-styles. It’s also interesting to consider how pulp motifs play out in a video game setting, that is often the opposite of quick and digestible.

In considering this possibility, I spent a great deal of time pouring over various magazine covers from the Pulp Magazine Project (PMP), and doing a visual overview of various art and media messages found in the BioShock and Fallout series. It was of no surprise that there were a lot of similarities in advertising and message. There are a ton of background advertising stills, videos, and audio clips played throughout both the BioShock and Fallout universes–aimed at creating a very specific type of atmosphere. It is at once ‘nostalgic’ but also a little surreal as they both take what’s familiar (Art Deco, 1950’s suburbia, etc.) and twist them to fit the worlds they want to represent. We buy in because we recognize these cultural markers, but we are carried along by how those markers are shifted and inverted to show us entirely new and often self-reflexive perspectives.

One of the things that I enjoy so much about these worlds, and why I find them so important for informing my study of pulp magazines, is that the visual motifs used from these video games are derived quite deliberately from the eras that pulps come from. Not only do they play on nostalgia, but they outright present alternative history representations of the same visual style.

“[Developers] also [make] use of a game’s atmosphere to support narrative–the architecture of the cities, the ambient conversations of the citizens, the advertising of the time period” (Fast Company).

In developing BioShock Infinite, the third BioShock in the series, creator Ken Levine “…was drawn to the time between the Civil War and World War I, a time of scientific progress that saw the development of electricity and the telephone but also religious belief and nationalism. Specifically, he cited, ‘Devil in the White City, which is a great book about the 1893 World’s Fair, and then certain movies give you a feel–There Will Be Blood gave me the weird vibe of revivalism and frontierism'” (Fast Company). As Levine highlights, movies like There Will Be Blood or tv shows like Downton Abbey sensationalize and stylize the eras these pulp magazines represent. They create a feeling–a feeling that I experience simply by looking at the real covers in the PMP. I’m curious if that feeling is because of the pre-conceived cultural understandings I have of those eras, or if any impression is at all factual.

From a more technical angle, I’ve always been interested in typography and layout in magazines, print media, and advertising of all kinds. I would also be interested in exploring how pulp developed their genre visually and typographically. What threads exist between sub-genres, and how do those tie into larger visual symbols.

While we ultimately discussed in class that advertising could not necessarily be tied to a sub-genre of pulp magazine due to mass-sales of advertising space across a publishing company, it remains interesting to see what kinds of advertising entered into pulps at all. What did companies think the readers of pulp wanted to buy? What did they want them to buy? What can we learn from their sales attempts (including how advertisements are placed throughout a magazine, etc.).

I’m excited to find out.