“Our world hangs like a magnificent jewel in the vastness of space… In the perspective of infinity, our differences are infinitesimal.” —Fred Rogers
Ann VanderMeer and I were honored to receive Weird Tales’s historic first-ever Hugo Award at the 2009 World Science Fiction Convention.
Many, many thanks to the brilliant writers, artists, and volunteers whose contributions have re-energized the world’s oldest fantasy magazine.
Our deepest gratitude to WT’s publisher, John Betancourt, and his longtime colleagues George Scithers and Darrell Schweitzer, the three of whom successfully brought Weird Tales back from the dead 20 years ago. (Also pulp guru Robert Weinberg, who’s been keeping the dream alive even longer.)
And, of course, we tip our hats most enthusiastically to H.P. Lovecraft, Robert E. Howard, Margaret Brundage, Farnsworth Wright, Jacob Henneberger, and all the rest of the luminaries of WT’s 1930s heyday; had they not come together to herald the birth of the modern era of fantasy-horror-science fiction culture, we wouldn’t be here holding these rocketships today.
Artwork by Oliver Wetter/Fantasio Fine Arts. Design by Stephen H. Segal.
Original artwork by Vance Kelly. Design by Stephen H. Segal.
Have been getting terrific response to this column that cross-published at Weird Tales and Fantasy-Magazine.com, elaborating on some thoughts from the steampunk discussion panel at Dragon*Con.
On the most basic, most appealing social level, steampunk is a way to masculinize romance. That is to say: Steampunk takes something stereotypically feminine that most boys hate — Victorian lace and frills and tea and crumpets — and says, “Hey, how about some robots with that?” It’s like the Dance Dance Revolution of nerd culture: now we all have something we can play together!
Prime Books, hardcover, 2008. Artwork: professional stock. Design by Stephen H. Segal.
Artwork by Jason Levesque. Design by Stephen H. Segal.
Artwork by Newel Anderson. Design by Stephen H. Segal.
Artwork by Saara Salmi. Design by Stephen H. Segal.
…a conundrum wrapped inside a genius wrapped inside a big scary punk.
[Original publication: InPittsburgh Weekly, October 2000]
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Dan Bern is going out of his way to provoke the crowd at Thursdays nightclub. “I just realized,” he says, letting his guitar drop to his side right in the middle of a song intro. “I just had an epiphany. All the stories I ever heard about Pennsylvania were about people who got away from the mines, the coal mines — people who escaped and went to college and never had to go back down there again. So that means you people — you’re the ones who are still here. So you must all work in the mines.” He fixes his stare on a middle-aged woman in the front row. “You, ma’am, do you still work down there?” She giggles awkwardly, managing a “no.” He refuses to give up: “Do you own a parakeet?” (more…)
Heart researchers know: Biology plays a key role in our lives. But what key is it playing in?
[Original publication: InPittsburgh Weekly, June 1998]
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The heart is an organ. So is the harmonica.
Huh?
One is a fist-sized lump of muscle resting within our chests. It pumps blood throughout our bodies; it is the center of our tenuous grip on existence. The other is a 4-inch long musical toy. It toots.
Again: Huh? (more…)
Stephen H. Segal is a Hugo Award-winning editor, designer, and writer based in Philadelphia. After several years as editorial & creative director of Weird Tales, the pioneering magazine of fantastic literature, he has now joined Quirk Books, the publisher of such awesomely entertaining titles as Pride and Prejudice and Zombies, as its new acquisitions editor. In the past he has contributed work to Tor Books, Viz Media, WQED Pittsburgh, Carnegie Mellon University, the Philadelphia Weekly, and the Interstitial Arts Foundation, among others.