Pulp magazine
From Freepedia
- "Pulp fiction" redirects here. For the film, see Pulp Fiction.
Pulp magazines (or pulp fiction; often referred to as "the pulps" ) were inexpensive fiction magazines. They were widely published from the 1920s through the 1950s.
Contents |
Terminology and history
The name "pulp" comes from the cheap wood pulp paper on which such magazines were printed. Magazines printed on better paper and usually offering family-oriented content were often called "glossies" or "slicks". Pulps were the successor to the "penny dreadfuls" and "dime novels" of the nineteenth century. Although many respected writers wrote for pulps, the magazines are perhaps best remembered for their fast-paced, lurid, sensational and exploitative stories. Parallels between comic books and pulp magazines can be drawn; for example, magazines often featured illustrated novel-length stories of heroic characters such as The Shadow, Doc Savage, and The Phantom Detective. Pulp covers were famous for their half-dressed damsels in distress, usually awaiting a rescuing hero.
The first "pulp" is considered to be Frank Munsey's revamped Argosy Magazine of 1896. The format eventually declined (especially in the 1950s) with rising paper costs, competition from comic books, television, and the paperback novel. Most remaining pulp magazines are science fiction or mystery magazines now in digest form. The format is still in use for some lengthy serials, like the German science fiction weekly Perry Rhodan (over 2200 issues as of 2005).
Genres
Pulp magazines often contained a wide variety of genre fiction, including, but not limited to, detective/mystery, science fiction, adventure, romance, war, horror/occult, and Série Noire. The American Old West was a mainstay of early turn of the century novels. Many classic science fiction and crime novels were originally serialised in pulp magazines such as Weird Tales, Amazing Stories, and Black Mask.
A common misconception (largely propogated by well-meaning, but misinformed RPG hobbyists) is that 'pulp' is limited in scope to 1940s adventure fiction in the vein of Indiana Jones. While such fiction is, in fact, encompassed under the heading of 'pulp', the heading itself is by no means limited to describing only that type of fiction.
Famous and infamous characters of pulp fiction
Popular regular pulp fiction characters included:
- The Avenger
- Biggles
- Conan the Barbarian
- Philo Gubb
- Doc Savage
- G-8
- Operator No. 5
- Sexton Blake
- The Shadow
- The Spider
- Tarzan
- Thubway Tham
- Zorro
- The Phantom Detective
- The Black Bat
- Kilgore Trout, the perennial character in the work of Kurt Vonnegut, is a fictional pulp fiction writer.
Authors and pulp magazines today
Many well-known authors began their careers writing for pulps under assumed names. A distinction can be made between an author who wrote for the pulps but later went on to transcend the limitations of the genre, and a "pulp author" who did not.
Well-known authors who wrote for the pulps include:
- Poul Anderson
- Isaac Asimov
- Alfred Bester
- Robert Bloch
- Leigh Brackett
- Ray Bradbury
- Edgar Rice Burroughs
- Ellis Parker Butler
- Hugh B. Cave
- Raymond Chandler
- Arthur C. Clarke
- Philip K. Dick
- Erle Stanley Gardner
- Graham Greene
- Dashiell Hammett
- Robert Heinlein
- Frank Herbert
- Robert E. Howard
- L. Ron Hubbard
- Elmore John Leonard
- H. P. Lovecraft
- John D. MacDonald
- Johnston McCulley
- Walt Morey
- Talbot Mundy
- Seabury Quinn
- Richard S. Shaver
- Robert Silverberg
- Clark Ashton Smith
- Jack Vance
External Links
Pulp and Adventure Heroes of the Pre-War Years Jess Nevins' compendium of pulp characters.
