The Golden Age (c. 1938-46): dominated by editor John W. Campbell and his stable of writers.

• John W. Campbell
• Campbell's Stable of Writers
  • Robert A. Heinlein
  • Isaac Asimov
  • Others

Isaac Asimov divided the history of modern science fiction, i.e., works written after 1926, into four types of stories:

• 1926-38--adventure dominant
• 1938-50--science dominant
• 1950-65--sociology dominant
• 1966-present--style dominant

In January 1930, the first issue of Astounding was published.

With the advent of this magazine more analytical stories began to appear.

The Golden Age itself dates roughly from the summer of 1939 with the publication of the July issue of Astounding to the end of 1950 when other magazines such as Galaxy and the Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction began to appear.

Author and editor John W. Campbell (1910-1971), educated as an engineer at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Duke University, essentially shaped the Golden Age of Science Fiction.

Campbell became editor of Astounding in 1938 when he was 27 years old. Here is where he inaugurated the Golden Age of Science Fiction.

Campbell perceived of and adhered to a hierarchy of knowledge:

1. physics, chemistry, astronomy--sciences in which laws are mathematically verifiable
2. biological sciences--disciplines which are in part descriptive or impure because they deal with living creatures
3. social sciences such as anthropology, economics, political science, and experimental psychology
4. humanities such as theology, philosophy and clinical psychology

Campbell was one of the field's true intellectuals.

Under Campbell Astounding not only had lots of aliens; it also had faith that space travel was possible.

Campbell believed that the universe was not essentially hostile to mankind and that human action and decisions counted in the universe.

These beliefs were reflected in the fiction he chose to publish.

He maintained a taboo against adult sexuality in his publications.

He could also be xenophobic, elitist, racist, and psychologically naive.

As an author Campbell wrote mainly space opera.

Under the pseudonym Don A. Stuart he wrote more meditative Wellsian fiction such as "Twilight" and "Who Goes There?," a seminal story that was the basis for the film The Thing and its remake.

In 1944 Campbell published "Deadline" by Cleve Cartmill, dealing with the explosion of an atomic bomb.

When investigated by the FBI, Campbell argued that all the factual information in the story was available in pre-war unclassified sources and that since Astounding had been publishing atomic war stories all along, the Germans would get suspicious if he suddenly stopped.

Werner von Braun, mastermind of the German rocket program, arranged to continue to receive Astounding throughout the war.

Campbell encouraged and trained some of science fiction's strongest genre writers.

He maintained a stable of writers with whom he worked and to whom he pitched story ideas and made suggestions for long-term projects.

Heinlein (1907-88) was a right wing anarchist and libertarian.

He demonstrated the way to incorporate scientific and cultural information efficiently and unobtrusively into the development of plot and characters.

Key stories include:

• "Life-Line" (August, 1939)
• "If This Goes On" (1940)
• "The Roads Must Roll"
• "All You Zombies"

A prolific author, Heinlein wrote a series of well received juvenile novels, and eventually invented a Future History series and set his stories in this universe.

Heinlein's juveniles include:

• Podkayne of Mars
• Citizen of the Galaxy (1957)

A graduate of the Naval Academy discharged from the service for health reasons, Heinlein was a conservative who developed a strong interest in free sex in the latter half of his career.

Key adult novels include:

• Starship Troopers (1959), a right-wing, but extremely influential future war novel
• Methusaleh's Children (1958) which introduces the Howard Family and their most long-lived member, Lazarus Long
• Stranger in a Strange Land (1961), his breakthrough novel and an underground classic; winner of the Hugo
• The Moon is a Harsh Mistress (1966), winner of the Hugo

From this point on, though increasingly popular, Heinlein's work deteriorates:

• I Will Fear No Evil (1970)
• Time Enough for Love (1973), more adventures of Lazarus Long
• The Number of the Beast (1980)
• Friday (1982)
• Job, A Comedy of Justice (1984)

Heinlein's earlier novels are his best. I think he stopped being an entertaining and interesting writer about halfway through Stranger in a Strange Land except for a brief return to top form with The Moon is a Harsh Mistress.

Asimov (1920-92) began writing science fiction while still a teenager. Incredibly prolific, he was a non-stop writer who wrote over 500 books in his lifetime.

Key works include:

• "Nightfall," written at Campbell's suggestions and often voted the best science fiction story of all time
• the Robot stories, beginning with "Robbie," (originally published as "Strange Playfellow") "Reason," and "Runaround," which formally introduced Asimov's positronic robots and the Three Laws of Robotics that were probably a collaboration between Asimov and Campbell.
• the Foundation series (1942-50), inspired by Campbell who asked Asimov for an open-ended serial.

Asimov wrote a series of juvenile novels featuring a character named Lucky Starr.

Asimov's first two robot novels, are also interesting for being murder mysteries:

• The Caves of Steel (1954)
• The Naked Sun (1957)

My favorite novel from this period is a time travel tale: The End of Eternity (1955).

After a lengthy hiatus from science fiction during which he wrote numerous popular non-fiction books on topics ranging from the hard sciences to the Bible, Asimov returned to the field with the publication of The Gods Themselves (1973), his most scientifically-oriented novel and the winner of both the Hugo and the Nebula.

He then began to write a series of sequels to his Foundation and Robot series and eventually attempted to tie the two storylines together:

• Foundation's Edge (1982), winner of the Hugo
• The Robots of Dawn (1983)
• Robots and Empire (1985)
• Foundation and Earth (1986)
• Prelude to Foundation (1988)
• Forward the Foundation (1992)

Others, most notably Gregory Benford, continue to publish stories set in the universe of the Foundation.

Key Works:

• "Microcosmic God"
  "Killdozer!," the basis for Steven Spielberg's first feature, a made-for-television movie called Duel
• "Thunder and Roses"
• "And Baby is Three," expanded and novelized as More Than Human (1953)

Key Works:

• Slan (1940), told from the point of view of the Superman
• "The Weapon Shops of Isher" (1941)
• The World of Null-A (1945), the first novel for the science fiction magazines to be published later in hardcover (by Simon and Shuster in 1948)

published in Astounding's companion magazine Unknown

Key Work: "The Roaring Trumpet" and "The Mathematics of Magic," a pair of comic short novels later gathered as The Incomplete Enchanter (1941)

Padgett is the pseudonym of Henry Kuttner and Catherine L. Moore.

Their stories are characterized by the intrusion of strange alien or alternative environments on everyday Earth

Their most famous work is "Mimsy Were the Borogoves" (1943).

Leinster is the pseudonym of William Fitzgerald Jenkins who also wrote a few stories as Will F. Jenkins.

Leinster's most famous work is probably "First Contact" (1945).