Shoemaker's list

[james_davis_nicoll]

In the course of checking Stephenson's debut in the November 1971 Analog, I came across a discussion of Martin Shoemaker's poll of Analog readers. Shoemaker was asking for recommended stories published prior to 1940.



Votes cast: 33

Who Goes There by John W. Campbell, Jr. (25)
Twilight by John W. Campbell, Jr (25)
A Martian Odyssey by Stanley G. Weinbaum (20)
Helen O'Loy by Lester Del Rey (19)
Night by John W. Campbell, (17)
Forgetfulness by John W. Campbell (14)
Black Destroyer by A. E. Van Vogt (13)
The Lost Machine by John Beynon Harris (13)
Marooned Off Vesta by Isaac Asimov (12)
Sands of Time by P. Schuyler Miller (11)
The Machine Stops by E. M. Forster (11)
Promixa Centauri by Murray Leinster (10)
The Color Out of Space by H. P. Lovecraft (10)
Armageddon 2419 by Philip Nowlan (9)
Life Line by Robert A. Heinlein (9)
Robot's Return by Robert Moore Williams (8)
The Adaptive Ultimate by Stanley G. Weinbaum (8)
I, Robot by Eando Binder (8)
The Johnny Black Stories by L. Sprague de Camp (8)
The New Accelerator by H. G. Wells (7)
The Country of the Blind by H. G. Wells (7)
He Who Shrank by Henry Hasse (7)
Politics by Murray Leinster (7)
The Blue Giraffe by L. Sprague de Camp (7)
The Faithful by Lester del Rey (7)
The Golden Egg by H. G. Wells (6)
Shambleau by C. L. Moore (6)
Within the Pyramid by R. de Witt Miller (6)
The Shadow Out of Time by H. P. Lovecraft (6)
The Runaway Skyscraper by Murray Leinster (6)
The Girl in the Golden Atom by Ray Cummings (6)
The Mad Planet series by Murray Leinster (6)
Old Faithful by Raymond Z. Gallun (6)
Seeds of the Dusk Raymond Z. Gallun (6)
He Hath Wings by Edmond Hamilton (6)

Comments

[eagle]

Ah! Thank you, I was being excessively cynical.

[austin_dern]

I'm a little curious what the nomination process was. There's no reason except sentiment for 'Marooned off Vesta' to make any shortlist of great pre-1940 stories, and 'Old Faithful' is kind of a charming idea under a heap of words. Haven't read 'Life-Line' or 'He Who Shrank' or 'He That Hath Wings' recently enough to have a strong opinion but I suspect they're better concepts than stories.

But given that set of stories to pick from yeah, I'd put the Campbells at or near the top.

[austin_dern]

OK, yeah, 'The Runaway Skyscraper' is bad but in a way I could imagine making a decent half-hour episode of an old-time-radio show like Suspense or Escape or something. A little too old-fashioned for X Minus One.