New Worlds (magazine) - AbsoluteAstronomy.com

New Worlds was a British science fiction magazine

Science fiction magazine

A science fiction magazine is a publication that offers primarily science fiction, either in a hard copy periodical format or on the Internet....

which was first published professionally in 1946. For 25 years it was widely considered the leading science fiction magazine in Britain, publishing 201 issues up to 1971. Since 1971 the name of "New Worlds" has been kept alive with a series of original anthologies and a few magazine-like publications; these totalled 21 by 1997.

Early years

In 1926, Hugo Gernsback

Hugo Gernsback

Hugo Gernsback , born Hugo Gernsbacher, was a Luxembourgian American inventor, writer, editor, and magazine publisher, best remembered for publications that included the first science fiction magazine. His contributions to the genre as publisher were so significant that, along with H. G...

launched Amazing Stories
Amazing Stories
Amazing Stories was an American science fiction magazine launched in April 1926 by Hugo Gernsback's Experimenter Publishing. It was the first magazine devoted solely to science fiction...

, the first science fiction (sf) magazine; it was soon followed by other U.S. titles also specializing in sf, such as Astounding Stories and Wonder Stories. These were distributed in the U.K. and British fan organizations began to appear. In 1936, Maurice K. Hanson, a Nuneaton fan, founded a fanzine

Fanzine

A fanzine is a nonprofessional and nonofficial publication produced by fans of a particular cultural phenomenon for the pleasure of others who share their interest...

called Novae Terrae (Latin for "new worlds") for the local branch of the Science Fiction League. Hanson subsequently moved to London and his fanzine became the official publication of the Science Fiction Association when it was founded in 1937.

Arthur C. Clarke

Arthur C. Clarke

Sir Arthur Charles Clarke, CBE, FRAS was a British science fiction author, inventor, and futurist, famous for his short stories and novels, among them 2001: A Space Odyssey, and as a host and commentator in the British television series Mysterious World. For many years, Robert A. Heinlein,...

, John Carnell

John Carnell

Edward John Carnell , known to his friends as either Ted or John, was a British science fiction editor known for editing New Worlds in 1946 then from 1949 to 1963. He also edited Science Fantasy from the 1950s...

and William F. Temple

William F. Temple

William Frederick Temple was a British science fiction writer. He was a member of the British Interplanetary Society and involved in science fiction fandom before writing. His best known work might be the novel which formed the basis for the film Four Sided Triangle, a novel which Groff Conklin...

all became involved in Novae Terraes production. In 1939 Hanson gave up the editorship to Carnell, who retitled the fanzine New Worlds, and restarted the numbering at volume 1 number 1 with the first issue under Carnell's control dated March 1939. Carnell wanted to turn New Worlds into a professional magazine, and through W.J. Passingham, a writer, had begun discussions with a publisher named The Worlds Says Ltd. In January 1940 Carnell was asked to put together three issues, and Carnell and Passingham each put up £50 towards costs. Carnell solicited material from British authors including John F. Burke, C.S. Youd, and David McIlwain, and acquired Robert A. Heinlein

Robert A. Heinlein

Robert Anson Heinlein was an American science fiction writer. Often called the "dean of science fiction writers", he was one of the most influential and controversial authors of the genre. He set a standard for science and engineering plausibility and helped to raise the genre's standards of...

's "Lost Legion", but in March internal strife led to the collapse of The World Says. Alfred Greig, the Canadian director, returned to Canada without repaying Carnell and Passingham, and no issues were ever printed.

	Spring			Summer			Fall			Winter
	Jan	Feb	Mar	Apr	May	Jun	Jul	Aug	Sep	Oct	Nov	Dec
1946							1/1			1/2
1947										1/3
1948
1949				2/4					2/5
1950			2/6			3/7						3/8
1951			3/9			3/10			4/11			12
1952	13		14		15		16		17		18
1953	19		20			21
1954				22	23	24	25	26	27	28	29	30
1955	31	32	33	34	35	36	37	38	39	40	41	42
1956	43	44	45	46	47	48	49	50	51	52	53	54
Issues of New Worlds from the beginning to 1956, showing volume/issue number. John Carnell was editor throughout this period. Four of the first five issues were dated only with the year; the exception was issue 3, which bore no date. Underlining indicates that the magazine was titled with the season (e.g. "Spring 1951") for that issue.

Carnell joined the army in 1940, serving with the Royal Artillery

Royal Artillery

The Royal Regiment of Artillery, commonly referred to as the Royal Artillery , is the artillery arm of the British Army. Despite its name, it comprises a number of regiments.-History:...

, Combined Operations, and Naval Bombardment. After he returned to civilian life in January 1946 he met writer Frank Edward Arnold, who had been working with Pendulum Publications on a new science fiction line. Arnold introduced Carnell to Stephen D. Frances, Pendulum's director. Frances was a believer in the commercial possibilities of science fiction, and since Carnell still had the portfolio of stories he had put together in 1940, Pendulum soon agreed to make New Worlds into a professional magazine. The first issue appeared in July 1946, though there was no date on the magazine. The initial print run was 15,000, but only 3,000 copies were sold—a very disappointing return. Carnell felt that part of the reason for the difference in sales was the cover artwork, which in his opinion was weak. He put together a new design, based on covers from two U.S. science fiction magazines, and gave it to artist Victor Caesari to complete. The resulting space scene was the cover for the second issue, which appeared in October 1946; in combination with Pendulum's investment in a sales drive this led to much better sales, and the second issue sold out completely. Pendulum rebound the remaining copies of the first issue with the second cover design, and repriced them to 1/6

£sd

£sd was the popular name for the pre-decimal currencies used in the Kingdom of England, later the United Kingdom, and ultimately in much of the British Empire...

(7.5p); the first two issues had been priced at 2/-. The new cover and price were much more popular and the repackaged first issue, like the second, soon sold out.

One more issue appeared from Pendulum Publications, in October 1947, but shortly thereafter Pendulum went bankrupt, and New Worlds was without a publisher. However, starting in 1946, a group of sf fans had begun to meet regularly on Thursday nights at the White Horse pub on New Fetter Lane, near Fleet Street

Fleet Street

Fleet Street is a street in central London, United Kingdom, named after the River Fleet, a stream that now flows underground. It was the home of the British press until the 1980s...

. At one of these meetings it was suggested that the group form a company in order to revive New Worlds. Frank Cooper, one of the attendees, had recently retired from the RAF, and agreed to find out what would be necessary to start a new company.

Nova Publications

In May 1948 Carnell announced at a science fiction convention in London that plans were well underway, and that the company would be named Nova Publications Ltd. Nova raised £600 in capital, and was launched in the spring of 1949. There were initially six directors: the chairman was John Wyndham

John Wyndham

John Wyndham Parkes Lucas Beynon Harris was an English science fiction writer who usually used the pen name John Wyndham, although he also used other combinations of his names, such as John Beynon and Lucas Parkes...

, and the remaining board members were G. Ken Chapman, Frank Cooper, Walter Gillings, Eric C. Williams, and John Carnell. A printer was found near Stoke Newington, where Frank Cooper was based, and the first issue (numbered 4, to follow on from the three Pendulum issues) appeared in June, with plans to move to regular quarterly publication, and subsequently to a bimonthly schedule. To keep costs down Nova decided to handle the distribution themselves; this was not easy but Cooper and his assistant, Les Flood, were sufficiently successful that in July the decision was taken to go ahead with the planned quarterly schedule. A fifth issue duly appeared in September, and the sixth issue the following spring, dated Spring 1950.

In 1950, with New Worlds on a stable quarterly schedule, Nova Publications decided to launch a companion, Science Fantasy
Science Fantasy (magazine)
Science Fantasy, which also appeared under the titles Impulse and SF Impulse, was a British fantasy and science fiction magazine, launched in 1950 by Nova Publications as a companion to Nova's New Worlds. Walter Gillings was editor for the first two issues, and was then replaced by John Carnell,...

. They chose Walter Gillings as the editor; but he was replaced by Carnell after two issues, partly because Nova could not afford to pay two editorial salaries, and partly because of "fundamental differences of opinion". At the end of 1951 New Worlds went bimonthly, and by the middle of the year had reached a circulation of 18,000. The price had been reduced to 1/6 with the third issue, but with paper costs rising Nova decided to look for a cheaper printer. The new printer, The Carlton Press, was supposed to take over production with the May 1953 issue (number 21), but the issue was late, and had to be dated June 1953 instead. The issue was shoddily produced, which dismayed Nova's board; there were also printers' strikes, and this disruption caused further delays. Nova discovered that in fact The Carlton Press was just an agent with no printing facilities; they farmed out work to other printers, but were only able to get their commissions executed when they paid off any prior debts to those printers. Issue 22 was repeatedly delayed; proofs appeared in August, and the issue itself was promised for November. Even this late schedule was not adhered to, and Carnell finally received a copy of the print run in January 1954. The copy was dated 1953 (with no month), and since this made it useless for distribution in 1954, Carnell refused to accept the print run. While the dispute with the printers was going on, Carnell and Maurice Goldsmith, a journalist acquaintance of Carnell's, put together a small conference of well-known science fiction authors, including Arthur C. Clarke

Arthur C. Clarke

and John Wyndham

John Wyndham

. Goldsmith covered the conference for Illustrated, a weekly magazine, and the article caught the attention of Maclaren & Sons Ltd, a technical trade publisher interested in launching a new sf magazine. Carnell turned down the offer because of his loyalty to Nova Publications, but subsequent discussions ultimately led to Maclaren taking control of Nova Publications, with a commitment to produce New Worlds on a monthly basis and Science Fantasy on a bimonthly schedule. By January 1954, when The Carlton Press delivered the incorrectly dated issue 22, the acquisition by Maclaren was complete, and Maclaren's legal department was helpful in resolving the dispute. The printing press who had actually printed the issue were not paid by The Carlton Press, so an injunction was obtained that sequestered the issues to avoid them being sold to recover the printing costs. Carnell retained the copy he had been sent in January, and it is thought that this is the only copy that exists of The Carlton Press's version of this issue, as the remainder of the printing run was destroyed at the conclusion of the court case. The cover painting, by Gerard Quinn, was subsequently used on issue 13 of Science Fantasy, and all the stories and editorial material eventually appeared in later issues of New Worlds over the next year.

The financial support that Maclaren provided meant that once issue 22 finally appeared in April 1954, it was the start of a regular monthly schedule that lasted until 1964 with just one hiccup: a printing dispute in 1959 delayed the August issue; it was ultimately combined with the September issue. Despite this stability, New Worldss circulation began to decline in the early 1960s. Nova Publications had launched a third magazine, Science Fiction Adventures
Science Fiction Adventures (British magazine)
Science Fiction Adventures was a British digest-size science fiction magazine, published from 1958 to 1963 by Nova Publications as a companion to New Worlds and Science Fantasy. It was edited by John Carnell...

, in 1958, but both it and Science Fantasy were also losing readers, and in May 1963 Science Fiction Adventures was cancelled. In September of that year Nova's board decided to close down both New Worlds and Science Fantasy, and in preparation for the change Carnell signed a contract in December 1963 to edit an original anthology series, New Writings in SF
New Writings in SF
New Writings in SF was a series of thirty British science fiction anthologies published from 1964 to 1977 under the successive editorships of John Carnell from 1964 to 1972 and Kenneth Bulmer from 1973 to 1977. There were in addition four special volumes compiling material from the regular volumes...

, for publisher Dennis Dobson.

Roberts & Vinter

	Jan	Feb	Mar	Apr	May	Jun	Jul	Aug	Sep	Oct	Nov	Dec
1957	55	56	57	58	59	60	61	62	63	64	65	66
1958	67	68	69	70	71	72	73	74	75	76	77	78
1959	79	80	81	82	83	84	85	86		87	88	89
1960	90	91	92	93	94	95	96	97	98	99	100	101
1961	102	103	104	105	106	107	108	109	110	111	112	113
1962	114	115	116	117	118	119	120	121	122	123	124	125
1963	126	127	128	129	130	131	132	133	134	135	136	137
1964	138	139	140	141	142		143		144		145
1965	146	147	148	149	150	151	152	153	154	155	156	157
1966	158	159	160	161	162	163	164	165	166	167	168	169
1967	170		171	172			173	174	175	176	177	178
Issues of New Worlds from 1957 to 1967, showing issue number. The colors identify the editors for each issue:

The magazines were unexpectedly saved by David Warburton of Roberts & Vinter, a London publishing house. The printer who had been printing both New Worlds and Science Fantasy happened to meet Warburton in a pub, and mentioned that he was looking for additional work to fill the gaps in his schedule left by the demise of the magazines. Roberts & Vinter were having difficulty getting good distribution for their existing titles, which were violent thrillers, and were interested in acquiring more respectable titles that would help them penetrate the British distribution network, which was heavily dependent on W.H. Smith and John Menzies

John Menzies

John Menzies plc is a Scottish business established in 1833. It has two main divisions: Menzies Distribution and Menzies Aviation. Menzies Distribution is a major distributor of newspapers and magazines throughout the United Kingdom...

, the two main British newsagent chains. Warburton's partner, Godfrey Gold, ran a company that was connected to Roberts & Vinter and published pin-up magazines; like Warburton, Gold needed to improve his ability to distribute his titles.

When Michael Moorcock, who by this time had begun selling stories to Carnell, heard of the impending demise of the magazines, he wrote a letter that appeared in issue 141 lamenting the loss to the British science fiction field of both the magazines and Carnell himself. Carnell did not want to continue to edit the magazines in addition to New Writings in SF, and recommended Moorcock to Warburton. Kyril Bonfiglioli

Kyril Bonfiglioli

Kyril Bonfiglioli was born Cyril Emmanuel George Bonfiglioli in Eastbourne, to an Italo-Slovene father, Emmanuel Bonfiglioli, and English mother, Dorothy née Pallett. Having served in the army from 1947 to 1952, and been widowed, he applied to Balliol College, Oxford where he took his degree...

, an Oxford art dealer who was a friend of Brian Aldiss

Brian Aldiss

Brian Wilson Aldiss, OBE is an English author of both general fiction and science fiction. His byline reads either Brian W. Aldiss or simply Brian Aldiss. Greatly influenced by science fiction pioneer H. G. Wells, Aldiss is a vice-president of the international H. G. Wells Society...

, also expressed an interest. Warburton gave Moorcock the choice of which magazine to edit; Moorcock chose New Worlds, and Bonfiglioli became the new editor of Science Fantasy. Moorcock wanted to switch to a large format, and showed Warburton a dummy issue he had made up, but Warburton insisted on a paperback format in order to fit in with the other titles they were producing, though he agreed to revisit the format in the future if sales improved. The first issue under Moorcock's control was number 142, dated May/June 1964. The schedule was initially bimonthly, but at the start of 1965 it returned to a stable monthly schedule.

In July 1966 Roberts & Vinter's distributor, Thorpe & Porter, went bankrupt while owing Roberts & Vinter a substantial sum. The resulting financial pressure led Roberts & Vinter to decide to focus on their more profitable magazines, and they made plans to close down both Science Fantasy and New Worlds. After hearing of these plans, Moorcock and Warburton began to consider forming a separate company to continue publishing New Worlds, and Brian Aldiss contacted well-known literary figures such as J.B. Priestley, Kingsley Amis

Kingsley Amis

Sir Kingsley William Amis, CBE was an English novelist, poet, critic, and teacher. He wrote more than 20 novels, six volumes of poetry, a memoir, various short stories, radio and television scripts, along with works of social and literary criticism...

, Marghanita Laski

Marghanita Laski

Marghanita Laski was an English journalist, radio panellist and novelist: she also wrote literary biography, plays and short stories.- Personal life :...

, and Angus Wilson

Angus Wilson

Sir Angus Frank Johnstone Wilson, CBE was an English novelist and short story writer. He was awarded the 1958 James Tait Black Memorial Prize for The Middle Age of Mrs Eliot and later received a knighthood for his services to literature.-Biography:Wilson was born in Bexhill, Sussex, England, to...

, to gain support for an application for a grant from the British Arts Council in late 1966. In early January 1967 Aldiss discovered that the grant application would be successful, and that New Worlds would be awarded £150 per issue, though in the event the formal grant certification was delayed until at least May. The grant was enough to enable the magazine to continue, though it would not cover all costs. A publisher still needed to be found, and both Fontana and Panther Books expressed an interest, but the promise of the money and the prestige of an Arts Council grant convinced Warburton to stay involved personally. While these negotiations were going on, two more issues were assembled from backfile material and donated stories. Roberts & Vinter had ceased to exist by this time, so a sister company, Gold Star Publications, became the publisher for both these issues, with Warburton and Aldiss providing Gold Star with personal financial guarantees. These two issues appeared in March and April 1967, but the latter was mistakenly also dated March in the indicia. Science Fantasy was not continued but was merged with New Worlds as of the first Gold Star issue, though nothing of SF Impulse's design or content was visible in New Worlds.

Arts Council

	Jan	Feb	Mar	Apr	May	Jun	Jul	Aug	Sep	Oct	Nov	Dec
1968		179	180	181			182			183	184	185
1969	186	187	188	189	190	191	192	193	194		195	196
1970	197	198	199	200
1971			201					#1			#2
1972			#3			#4
1973	#5							#6
1974												#7
1975			#8								#9
1976								#10
1977
1978			212			213					214
1979			215						216
Issues of New Worlds from 1968 to 1979, showing issue number. From 1971 to 1976 New Worlds was a paperback anthology titled New Worlds Quarterly, numbered from 1 to 10. The colors identify the editors for each issue:

The partnership Warburton and Moorcock formed to continue New Worlds was named Magnelist Publications. Moorcock and Warburton reviewed the dummy issue Moorcock had put together when he first became editor, and persuaded Warburton to switch to the larger format. The first issue from Magnelist appeared in July 1967, beginning a regular monthly schedule. Moorcock remained as editor with Langdon Jones as his assistant, and Charles Platt became the layout designer. Poor sales led Warburton to cease his involvement after the November issue, but the magazine was again saved, this time by Sylvester Stein

Sylvester Stein

Sylvester Stein is a writer, publisher and athlete.Stein grew up in Durban, son of a mathematics professor. His sister and brother are both life scientists....

of Stonehart Publications.

Delays led to a skipped month, with the December 1967 and January 1968 issues being combined into one, but a monthly schedule returned thereafter. The March 1968 issue contained the third instalment of Norman Spinrad

Norman Spinrad

Norman Richard Spinrad is an American science fiction author.Born in New York City, Spinrad is a graduate of the Bronx High School of Science. In 1957 he entered City College of New York and graduated in 1961 with a Bachelor of Science degree as a pre-law major. In 1966 he moved to San Francisco,...

's novel Bug Jack Barron
Bug Jack Barron
Bug Jack Barron is a 1969 science fiction novel written by Norman Spinrad, and was nominated for the 1970 Hugo awards.The book was serialised in the British New Wave science fiction magazine New Worlds during Michael Moorcock's editorship...

, which included some fairly explicit sex scenes. A Member of Parliament

Member of Parliament

A Member of Parliament is a representative of the voters to a :parliament. In many countries with bicameral parliaments, the term applies specifically to members of the lower house, as upper houses often have a different title, such as senate, and thus also have different titles for its members,...

complained in the House of Commons of the United Kingdom that the Arts Council was "sponsoring filth"; and soon W.H. Smith and John Menzies

John Menzies

, the two main retail outlets for magazines in the UK, withdrew the magazine from sale. The complaints came at the time when the Arts Council was considering renewing the grant for another year, and it appeared for a while that New Worlds would have to cease publication, but eventually the grant was renewed. Some private donations also came in, and with money from advertising, and a substantial contribution from Moorcock himself, the magazine was able to survive. The loss of revenue caused by the withdrawal from sale of the March 1968 issue was exacerbated by a temporary ban on the magazine in South Africa, New Zealand and Australia, and by John Menzies' decision to refuse to stock New Worlds after that point. W.H. Smith left it up to their individual branch managers to decide whether to carry it. Stonehart were unhappy with the way things were going, and would not pay the printers, who withheld the printed copies to exact payment. The Arts Council money was supposed to go to contributors since Moorcock could no longer afford to pay them, but a disagreement sprang up over the grant and Stonehart refused to pay the contributors. Some negative coverage appeared in the press as a consequence of the distribution ban. The grant was eventually renewed but by late that year Stein had had enough, and Stonehart ceased their involvement with New Worlds after the July 1968 issue.

Without reliable distribution at the leading newsagents, New Worlds had to rely on subscriptions and donations. The magazine was not profitable, and since Moorcock had not formed a company to publish it, he was personally responsible for its costs. To bring in cash he had been writing fantasy novels at a very rapid rate since early 1968, and from early 1969 the editorial work was given to various others, primarily Charles Platt and Langdon Jones. A regular monthly schedule was adhered to from January until July 1969, at which point came another financial blow when it was discovered that half of the print run of 20,000 was being held back by the distributors. Moorcock attempted to regroup by reducing the number of pages in each issue, and because he was again forced to write as much as he could to earn enough to pay New Worldss bills, he turned over almost all editorial duties to Charles Platt, though others involved with the magazine also took turns at the editorial work over the next few issues. Moorcock was £3,000 in debt, and in combination with the Arts Council's subsequent decision not to renew their grant he found himself with no option but to cease publication. The April 1970 issue, the 200th overall, was the last issue that went out to the distributors; one more issue was prepared and mailed to subscribers in March of the following year.

Later incarnations

When Moorcock realized that the magazine would have to fold, he made arrangements with Sphere Books

Sphere Books

-History:Founded in 1961, Sphere Books began work on its first publication, the 1962 paperback edition of Gottfried Benn's The Trainee Man. Originally part of The Thomson Corporation, Sphere was sold to Pearson PLC in 1985 and became part of Penguin...

to continue New Worlds as a quarterly paperback anthology series. Eight issues appeared from Sphere, though the quarterly schedule was not adhered to after the fourth issue; the eighth issue appeared in 1975. Six of the issues were reprinted in the US. The early issues did well financially, with about 25,000 copies sold, not counting US sales. Moorcock turned over the editorship to Charles Platt with the sixth volume, and to Hilary Bailey thereafter, in order to have more time to devote to his own writing: he also commented that by this time "I no longer had my editorial touch (I couldn't read sf at all)". Sphere cancelled the series after two more issues; it was briefly taken over by Corgi Books, but sales were weak and Corgi dropped the series with New Worlds 10 in 1976, though according to Moorcock he and Bailey decided to end the series when they got into disagreements with Corgi. In the US Berkley Books

Berkley Books

Berkley Books is an imprint of Penguin Group that began as an independent company in 1955. It was established by Charles Byrne and Frederic Klein, who were working for Avon and formed "Chic News Company". They renamed it Berkley Publishing Co. in 1955. They soon found a niche in science fiction...

published volumes 1 through 4, and when they dropped the series Platt, who was a consulting editor at Avon Books, reprinted two further volumes, number 6 and 7 of the UK series.

In 1978 the magazine was revived by Moorcock again, this time in a fanzine format. Four more issues appeared, professionally printed and with various editors, between Spring 1978 and September 1979. There followed a long gap until 1991, when New Worlds again reappeared as a paperback anthology series, this time edited by David S. Garnett

David S. Garnett

David S. Garnett is a UK science fiction author and editor whose novels include Cosmic Carousel, Stargonauts and Bikini Planet. He edited a paperback anthology revival of Michael Moorcock's New Worlds magazine, two Zenith anthologies of original British SF stories, and three Orbit Science Fiction...

. Four volumes appeared between 1991 and 1994, published by Victor Gollancz

Victor Gollancz Ltd

Victor Gollancz Ltd was a major British book publishing house of the twentieth century. It was founded in 1927 by Victor Gollancz and specialised in the publication of high quality literature, nonfiction and popular fiction, including science fiction. Upon Gollancz's death in 1967, ownership...

. Moorcock edited a fiftieth anniversay issue in 1996, and Garnett subsequently edited one more issue of the anthology. Together with the earlier fanzine, magazine and anthology versions, these took the issue numbering from 212 through to 222. As of 2011 a further relaunch is planned as a simultaneous print and online magazine, to be titled Michael Moorcock's New Worlds.

Carnell

The lead story of the first issue of New Worlds was Maurice Hugi's "The Mill of the Gods". John Russell Fearn

John Russell Fearn

John Russell Fearn was a British author and one of the first British writers to appear in American pulp science fiction magazines.-Career:...

contributed four stories, under his own name and three pseudonyms, and William Temple provided "The Three Pylons", a fantasy which turned out to be the most popular story in the issue. The second issue contained John Wyndham's "The Living Lies", under his "John Beynon" alias; the story, about hostility and bigotry shown by settlers on Venus to the Venusian natives, was reprinted in Other Worlds (magazine)
Other Worlds (magazine)
Other Worlds Science Stories was an American science fiction magazine, edited by Raymond A. Palmer with Bea Mahaffey. It was published by Palmer's Clark Publishing in Evanston, Illinois beginning in the late 1940s...

in 1950. The third issue contained "Inheritance", an early story by Arthur C. Clarke that later appeared in Astounding Science Fiction.

The acquisition of Nova Publications by Maclaren in 1954 gave New Worlds the stability to establish itself as a leading magazine. Sf historian Mike Ashley describes the period from 1954 to 1960 as a "Golden Age" for New Worlds. Carnell bought J.G. Ballard's first sale, "Escapement", which appeared in the December 1956 New Worlds; Ballard would go on to become a significant figure in the genre in the 1960s. Ballard was grateful to Carnell for the support he provided Ballard in the late 1950s. Much of Ballard's work appeared in New Worlds and Science Fantasy, and Ballard later recalled that Carnell "recognized what I was on about from a very early stage and he encouraged me to go on writing in my own way." Carnell also published much of Brian Aldiss

Brian Aldiss

's early work in both Science Fantasy and New Worlds. John Brunner

John Brunner (novelist)

John Kilian Houston Brunner was a prolific British author of science fiction novels and stories. His 1968 novel Stand on Zanzibar, about an overpopulated world, won the 1968 Hugo Award for best science fiction novel. It also won the BSFA award the same year...

, later to become one of the most successful British science fiction writers, appeared regularly in the Nova magazines, starting with "Visitors' Book" in the April 1955 New Worlds. James White

James White (author)

James White was a Northern Irish author of science fiction novellas, short stories and novels. He was born in Belfast and returned there after spending his early years in Canada. After a few years in the clothing industry, he worked at Short Brothers Ltd. from 1965 until taking early retirement in...

began publishing with "Assisted Passage" in the January 1953 New Worlds, and in 1957 began his popular Sector General

Sector General

Sector General is a series of twelve science fiction books and various short stories by the Northern Irish author James White. The series derives its name from the setting of the majority of the books, the Sector 12 General Hospital, a huge hospital space station located in deep space, designed to...

series, about a hospital for aliens, with "Sector General" in the November 1957 issue. John Wyndham, who was already well-known outside the genre for works such as The Day of the Triffids
The Day of the Triffids
The Day of the Triffids is a post-apocalyptic novel published in 1951 by the English science fiction author John Wyndham Parkes Lucas Beynon Harris, under the pen-name John Wyndham. Although Wyndham had already published other novels using other pen-name combinations drawn from his lengthy real...

, began a series about the Troons, a space-going family, with "For All the Night" in the April 1958 issue. Arthur C. Clarke

Arthur C. Clarke

, another very successful British sf writer of the period, wrote relatively few short stories for the British market, but did publish "Who's There" in the November 1958 New Worlds. Colin Kapp began his popular "Unorthodox Engineers" series with "The Railways up on Cannis", in October 1959. Other less well-known writers who were prolific during the late 1950s included J.T. McIntosh, Kenneth Bulmer

Kenneth Bulmer

Henry Kenneth Bulmer was a British author, primarily of science fiction.-Life:Born in London, he married Pamela Buckmaster on 7 March 1953. They had one son and two daughters, and were divorced in 1981...

, and E.C. Tubb.

Among the best artists of this period were Brian Lewis

Brian Lewis (illustrator)

Brian Moncrieff Lewis was a British science fiction illustrator, comics artist and animator.Lewis served in the RAF, and became involved in science fiction fandom in the early 1950s. His first professional illustration was for the Radio Times, and he began contributing to New Worlds in 1954,...

, Gordon Hutchings, and Gerard Quinn, whose art is regarded by Ashley as comparable in style to Virgil Finlay

Virgil Finlay

Virgil Finlay was an American pulp fantasy, science fiction and horror illustrator. While he worked in a range of media, from gouache to oils, Finlay specialized in, and became famous for, detailed pen-and-ink drawings accomplished with abundant stippling, cross-hatching, and scratchboard techniques...

's work. However, in 1957 Carnell stopped using interior art, saying that "art work in the digest-size magazines is as out-of-date as a coal fire".

In the early 1960s New Worldss quality began to drop somewhat, in the opinion of Mike Ashley. It still ran popular series such as White's Sector General stories, and printed some well-received stories such as Harry Harrison

Harry Harrison

Harry Harrison is an American science fiction author best known for his character the Stainless Steel Rat and the novel Make Room! Make Room! , the basis for the film Soylent Green...

's "The Streets of Ashkelon", about a clash between an atheist (the protagonist) and a priest, on another planet. Because of the subject matter, it took six years for Harrison to find an editor willing to accept the story; when Aldiss bought it for an anthology, Carnell agreed to print it in New Worlds, where it appeared in September 1962. J.G. Ballard continued to publish in New Worlds, but was now sending his more conventional stories to the US magazines, and submitting his more experimental pieces to Carnell. Examples from 1961 to 1964 include "The Overloaded Man", "The Subliminal Man", "End-Game", and "The Terminal Beach", with themes of psychological stress, and changes to the nature of perception and of reality.

Moorcock

When Roberts & Vinter made the decision to close down New Worlds in 1963, Moorcock and Ballard considered publishing a new magazine that would be willing, as Carnell had been, to publish experimental material. Moorcock assembled a dummy issue, and later described his intentions: "It would be on art paper, to take good quality illustrations; it would be the size of, say, Playboy so that it would get good display space on the news-stands; it would specialise in experimental work by writers like Burroughs and Paolozzi, but it would be 'popular', it would seek to publicise such experimenters; it would publish all those writers who had become demoralised by a lack of sympathetic publishers and by baffled critics; it would attempt a cross-fertilization of popular sf, science and the work of the literary and artistic avant garde." Moorcock also wrote a letter to Carnell setting out his thoughts on what science fiction needed: "Editors who are willing to take a risk on a story and run it even though this may bring criticism on their heads." The letter was published in the final Nova Publications issue, which also carried the announcement that Moorcock would be taking over from Carnell as editor of New Worlds, though Moorcock had been unaware he would be considered for the post when he wrote his letter.

Moorcock's first issue, dated May/June 1964, bore a cover by James Cawthorn illustrating the first instalment of Ballard's novella "Equinox"; Ballard also contributed a book review of William Burroughs' Dead Fingers Talk
Dead Fingers Talk
Dead Fingers Talk, first published in 1963, was the fifth novel published by Beat Generation author William S. Burroughs. The book was originally published by Olympia Press....

, and stories by Brian Aldiss, Barrington Bayley, and John Brunner completed the issue. Moorcock's editorial included a quote from a radio interview with William Burroughs to the effect "If writers are to describe the advanced techniques of the Space Age, they must invent writing techniques equally advanced in order properly to deal with them." Within the first few issues, Moorcock printed stories intended to demonstrate his editorial goals. The most controversial of these was Langdon Jones' "I Remember, Anita ...", which appeared in the September/October 1964 issue; the story contained sex scenes that led to arguments in the magazine's letter column, and some regular subscribers abandoned the magazines, though overall circulation increased.

Moorcock contributed a substantial amount of material, under his own name and under pseudonyms such as James Colvin

James Colvin (pseudonym)

James Colvin was a pseudonym used by Michael Moorcock on several short stories appearing in New Worlds in the 1960s to disguise the amount of material Moorcock was contributing....

; some of these stories were fairly traditional, but contributions such as the Jerry Cornelius

Jerry Cornelius

Jerry Cornelius is a fictional secret agent and adventurer created by science fiction / fantasy author Michael Moorcock. Cornelius is a hipster of ambiguous and occasionally polymorphous sexuality. Many of the same characters feature in each of several Cornelius books, though the individual books...

stories, which began with "Preliminary Data" in the August 1965 issue, were much more experimental. He also printed his novella "Behold the Man" in the September 1966 issue; the story, about a time traveler who returns to the time of Christ, won him a Nebula Award

Nebula Award

The Nebula Award is given each year by the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America , for the best science fiction/fantasy fiction published in the United States during the previous year...

the following year. Ballard also began to write some of his most controversial stories, including "You: Coma: Marilyn Monroe" in the June 1966 issue, and "The Assassination of John Fitzgerald Kennedy Considered as a Downhill Motor Race", in March 1967; both had been previously published in Ambit
Ambit (magazine)
Ambit is a literary periodical published in the United Kingdom. It was founded in 1959 by Dr Martin Bax, a London paediatrician.Uniting art, prose, poetry and reviews, the magazine appears quarterly and is distributed internationally. Notable Ambit contributors have included J. G. Ballard, Eduardo...

, a literary magazine, in 1966.

Many writers now found New Worlds to be a market in which they could publish experimental material; Charles Platt, David I. Masson, and Barrington Bayley were among the British writers in this group; and Moorcock also attracted work from US writers such as John Sladek

John Sladek

John Thomas Sladek was an American science fiction author, known for his satirical and surreal novels.- Life and work :...

, Roger Zelazny

Roger Zelazny

Roger Joseph Zelazny was an American writer of fantasy and science fiction short stories and novels, best known for his The Chronicles of Amber series...

and Thomas M. Disch

Thomas M. Disch

Thomas Michael Disch was an American science fiction author and poet. He won the Hugo Award for Best Related Book – previously called "Best Non-Fiction Book" – in 1999, and he had two other Hugo nominations and nine Nebula Award nominations to his credit, plus one win of the John W...

. Zelazny's contributions included "For a Breath I Tarry" in March 1966; and Disch published several short stories and the novel Echo Round His Bones, which was serialized starting in the December 1966 and January 1967 issues. Disch commented afterwards that he had been unable to find a publisher for the novel in the US. In the mid-1960s, the term "New Wave" began to be applied to the more experimental work that Moorcock was publishing, and New Worlds was soon regarded as the leading publication in the New Wave movement.

In addition to the experimental material, Moorcock attempted to keep the existing readership happy by publishing more traditional science fiction; in the words of sf historian Colin Greenland

Colin Greenland

Colin Greenland is a British science fiction writer, whose first story won the second prize in a 1982 Faber & Faber competition. His best known novel is Take Back Plenty , winner of both major British science fiction awards, the 1990 British SF Association award and the 1991 Arthur C...

, he "changed the contents of the magazine much more slowly than he pretended to". He published Vernor Vinge

Vernor Vinge

Vernor Steffen Vinge is a retired San Diego State University Professor of Mathematics, computer scientist, and science fiction author. He is best known for his Hugo Award-winning novels and novellas A Fire Upon the Deep , A Deepness in the Sky , Rainbows End , Fast Times at Fairmont High ...

's first story, "Apartness", in June 1965, and bought material from Bob Shaw

Bob Shaw

Bob Shaw, born Robert Shaw, was a science fiction author and fan from Northern Ireland. He was noted for his originality and wit. He won the Hugo Award for Best Fan Writer in 1979 and 1980...

, and early stories by Terry Pratchett

Terry Pratchett

Sir Terence David John "Terry" Pratchett, OBE is an English novelist, known for his frequently comical work in the fantasy genre. He is best known for his popular and long-running Discworld series of comic fantasy novels...

. In March 1965 he printed Arthur C. Clarke's "Sunjammer".

Arts Council and after

When Moorcock took over publication of New Worlds from Roberts & Vinter he changed the format from digest to a larger size with good quality paper that allowed better use of artwork. The first issue in this format, July 1967, contained part one of Disch's Camp Concentration
Camp Concentration
Camp Concentration is a 1968 science fiction novel by American author Thomas M. Disch.-Plot introduction:The book is set during a war, projected from the Vietnam War, in which the United States is apparently criminally involved...

, a novel which Disch had been unable to sell in the U.S. because of the explicitness of the language used by the protagonist. Disch afterwards recalled that some of the experimental language in the book was written in the knowledge that New Worlds was available as a market for unconventional fiction. Also in the July 1967 issue was Pamela Zoline

Pamela Zoline

Pamela Zoline or Pamela Lifton-Zoline is a writer and painter living in the United States in Telluride, Colorado.Among science fiction fans, she is known for her controversial 1967 short story "The Heat Death of the Universe"...

's first story, "The Heat Death of the Universe".

From 1967 the magazine became somewhat regarded as a literary magazine and formed a fraternal relationship with Ambit, another London-based little magazine. As well as contributors primarily associated with science fiction, it also published a poem by Christopher Logue

Christopher Logue

Christopher Logue, CBE is an English poet associated with the British Poetry Revival. He has also written for the theatre and cinema as well as acting in a number of films. His two screenplays are Savage Messiah and The End of Arthur's Marriage...

, a story and poems by George MacBeth

George MacBeth

George Mann MacBeth was a Scottish poet and novelist. He was born in Shotts, Lanarkshire.When he was three, his family moved to Sheffield....

a story by Ron Padgett

Ron Padgett

Ron Padgett is an American poet, essayist, fiction writer, translator, and a member of the New York School. Bean Spasms, Padget's first collection of poems, was published in 1967 and written with Ted Berrigan...

and Tom Veitch

Tom Veitch

Tom Veitch is an American writer, best known for his contributions to the Dark Horse Comics line of Star Wars comic books, primarily Dark Empire and Tales of the Jedi. For DC Comics Veitch wrote Animal Man, along with two Elseworlds series featuring Kamandi and an elder Superman...

, cult writers Jack Trevor Story

Jack Trevor Story

Jack Trevor Story was a British novelist, publishing prolifically from the 1940s to the 1970s. His best-known work is the story for Alfred Hitchcock's comedy The Trouble With Harry, the Albert Argyle trilogy , and his Horace Spurgeon novels Jack Trevor Story (30 March 1917 - 5 December 1991) was a...

, Thomas Pynchon

Thomas Pynchon

Thomas Ruggles Pynchon, Jr. is an American novelist. For his most praised novel, Gravity's Rainbow, Pynchon received the National Book Award, and is regularly cited as a contender for the Nobel Prize in Literature...

(Entropy) and Alan Burns (Babel), avant garde publisher John Calder

John Calder

John Mackenzie Calder is a Canadian and Scottish publisher who founded Calder Publishing in 1949.-Biography:John Calder was a friend of Samuel Beckett, becoming the main publisher of his prose-texts in Britain after the success of Waiting for Godot on the London stage in 1955-56...

and experimentalists like Carol Emshwiller

Carol Emshwiller

Carol Emshwiller is an American writer of avant garde short stories and science fiction who has won prizes ranging from the Nebula Award to the Philip K. Dick Award. Ursula K...

. Christopher Finch wrote on Eduardo Paolozzi

Eduardo Paolozzi

Sir Eduardo Luigi Paolozzi, KBE, RA , was a Scottish sculptor and artist. He was a major figure in the international art sphere, while, working on his own interpretation and vision of the world. Paolozzi investigated how we can fit into the modern world to resemble our fragmented civilization...

and Richard Hamilton

Richard Hamilton

Richard Hamilton may refer to:*Richard Hamilton , Irish officer*Richard Hamilton, 4th Viscount Boyne , Irish MP for Navan*Richard Hamilton , American actor...

. The magazine maintained a presence within the era’s underground press

Underground press

The underground press were the independently published and distributed underground papers associated with the counterculture of the late 1960s and early 1970s in the United States, Canada, United Kingdom, and other western nations....

scene alongside publications such as International Times
International Times
International Times was an underground newspaper founded in London in 1966. Editors included Hoppy, David Mairowitz, Pete Stansill, Barry Miles, Jim Haynes and playwright Tom McGrath...

and Running Man. Among the interests that linked New Worlds with the counterculture

Counterculture

Counterculture is a sociological term used to describe the values and norms of behavior of a cultural group, or subculture, that run counter to those of the social mainstream of the day, the cultural equivalent of political opposition. Counterculture can also be described as a group whose behavior...

was a strong regard for the writings of William S. Burroughs

William S. Burroughs

William Seward Burroughs II was an American novelist, poet, essayist and spoken word performer. A primary figure of the Beat Generation and a major postmodernist author, he is considered to be "one of the most politically trenchant, culturally influential, and innovative artists of the 20th...

, psychedelic

Psychedelic

The term psychedelic is derived from the Greek words ψυχή and δηλοῦν , translating to "soul-manifesting". A psychedelic experience is characterized by the striking perception of aspects of one's mind previously unknown, or by the creative exuberance of the mind liberated from its ostensibly...

drug experiences, the mass media theories of Marshall McLuhan

Marshall McLuhan

Herbert Marshall McLuhan, CC was a Canadian educator, philosopher, and scholar—a professor of English literature, a literary critic, a rhetorician, and a communication theorist...

and sexual liberation.

In this phase, authors published included Aldiss and Ballard, who also embraced the new wave enthusiastically, and much work by Moorcock (including some under the pseudonym James Colvin

James Colvin (pseudonym)

James Colvin was a pseudonym used by Michael Moorcock on several short stories appearing in New Worlds in the 1960s to disguise the amount of material Moorcock was contributing....

). A notable feature of the magazine were stories of Jerry Cornelius

Jerry Cornelius

, created by Moorcock, but often written about by others. Other renowned authors include John Sladek

John Sladek

John Thomas Sladek was an American science fiction author, known for his satirical and surreal novels.- Life and work :...

, Norman Spinrad

Norman Spinrad

(whose novel Bug Jack Barron caused particular issues with distribution), Harlan Ellison

Harlan Ellison

Harlan Jay Ellison is an American writer. His principal genre is speculative fiction.His published works include over 1,700 short stories, novellas, screenplays, teleplays, essays, a wide range of criticism covering literature, film, television, and print media...

, Philip José Farmer

Philip José Farmer

Philip José Farmer was an American author, principally known for his award-winning science fiction and fantasy novels and short stories....

, M. John Harrison

M. John Harrison

M. John Harrison , known as Mike Harrison, is an English author and critic. His work includes the Viriconium sequence of novels and short stories, , Climbers , and the Kefahuchi Tract series which begins with Light . He currently resides in London.-Early years:Harrison was born in Rugby,...

, Barrington J. Bayley

Barrington J. Bayley

Barrington J. Bayley was an English science fiction writer.Bayley was born in Birmingham and educated in Newport, Shropshire...

; also an early story (Nightdweller) by Terry Pratchett

Terry Pratchett

, also poems and two stories by D. M. Thomas

D. M. Thomas

Donald Michael Thomas, known as D. M. Thomas , is a Cornish novelist, poet, and translator.Thomas was born in Redruth, Cornwall, UK. He attended Trewirgie Primary School and Redruth Grammar School before graduating with First Class Honours in English from New College, Oxford in 1959...

Influence

There have been a number of magazines that subsequently drew inspiration particularly from the later versions of New Worlds and these have included Samuel R. Delany

Samuel R. Delany

Samuel Ray Delany, Jr., also known as "Chip" is an American author, professor and literary critic. His work includes a number of novels, many in the science fiction genre, as well as memoir, criticism, and essays on sexuality and society.His science fiction novels include Babel-17, The Einstein...

and Marilyn Hacker

Marilyn Hacker

Marilyn Hacker is an American poet, translator and critic. She is Professor of English at the City College of New York....

's shortlived Quark/1-4
Quark (anthology series)
Quark is an anthology book series devoted to avant-garde science fiction and related material, edited by fiction-writer and critic Samuel R. Delany and poet and editor Marilyn Hacker; four volumes were published in 1970 and 1971...

(New York 1970–71), Corridor, later called Wordworks (seven issues in all, 1971–74), published by New Worlds contributor Michael Butterworth

Michael Butterworth

Michael Butterworth is a British author and publisher who has written many novels and short stories, particularly in the genre of science fiction...

, Scott Edelman

Scott Edelman

Scott Edelman is an American science fiction, fantasy, and horror writer and editor. He became the editor of SCI FI Magazine in 2002, and has edited the channel's online magazine Science Fiction Weekly since 2000.He was the founding and only editor of the science fiction magazine Science Fiction...

's Last Wave (1982–85) and Interzone
Interzone (magazine)
Interzone is an award-winning British fantasy and science fiction magazine. Published since 1982, Interzone is the eighth longest-running science fiction magazine in history and the longest-running British SF magazine...

(since 1982) and, more recently, The Edge, both from the U.K. More generally, New Worlds has been credited with "shap[ing] the way science fiction developed" as a genre.

Bibliographic details

The following table shows the editorial succession at New Worlds, and also indicates which issues appeared from which publisher. Note that dates in [square brackets] indicate the approximate date that an issue was released in cases where a month did not appear on the magazine itself.

Issues	Dates	Editor	Publisher
1–3	[July] 1946 – [October] 1947	John Carnell	Pendulum Publications, London
4–141	[April] 1949 – April 1964	John Carnell	Nova Publications, London
142–172	May/June 1964 – March 1967	Michael Moorcock	Roberts & Vinter, Ltd, London
173–177	July 1967 – November 1967		Moorcock/Magnelist Publications, London
178–182	December 1967/January 1968 – July 1968		Moorcock/Stonehart Publications, London
183–188	October 1968 – March 1969		Moorcock privately as New Worlds Publishing, London
189–192	April 1969 – July 1969	Langdon Jones
193	August 1969	Charles Platt
194	September/October 1969	Michael Moorcock
195	November 1969	Charles Platt & R. Glyn Jones
196	December 1969	Graham Hall & Graham Charnock
197–200	January 1970 – April 1970	Charles Platt
201	March 1971	Michael Moorcock
202–206	[June] 1971 – [January] 1973	Michael Moorcock	Sphere Books, London
207	[September] 1973	Sphere Books, London
208	[December] 1974	Hilary Bailey & Charles Platt
209	[March] 1975	Hilary Bailey
210–211	[November] 1975 – [August] 1976	Hilary Bailey	Corgi Books, London
212–214	Spring 1978 – Winter 1978	Michael Moorcock	Michael Moorcock
215	Spring 1979	David Britton	David Britton
216	September 1979	Charles Platt	Charles Platt
217–220	1991–1994	David Garnett	Gollancz, London
221	Winter 1996	Michael Moorcock	Michael Moorcock
222	1997	David Garnett	White Wolf, Stone Mountain GA

There were US reprints of the six of the New Worlds Quarterly anthology series. The first four were published by [{Berkley Books]]; Avon Books picked up two more of the series after Berkley dropped it, but since the fifth volume had been missed by that time, Avon retitled volumes 6 and 7 as New Worlds Quarterly 5 and New Worlds Quarterly 6.

US editions

A US reprint edition of New Worlds ran briefly in 1960, published by Great American Publications, who at the time were the publishers of Fantastic Universe
Fantastic Universe
Fantastic Universe was a U.S. science fiction magazine which began publishing in the 1950s. It ran for 69 issues, from June 1953 to March 1960, under two different publishers. It was part of the explosion of science fiction magazine publishing in the 1950s in the United States, and was moderately...

, edited by Hans Stefan Santesson

Hans Stefan Santesson

Hans Stefan Santesson , was an American editor, writer, and reviewer. He edited the selections of the Unicorn Mystery Book Club in the latter 1940s and early 1950s, the magazines Fantastic Universe from 1956 to 1960, the US edition of the British New Worlds Science Fiction in 1960 and the US...

. The first issue appeared in March 1960; it omitted Carnell's name, and credited Santesson as editor. Although the fiction consisted entirely of reprints, with all but one story coming from the British New Worlds, this was not declared to the reader. Carnell was unhappy with the results of this attempt to break into the US market, but in the event Great American collapsed later that year and only five issues appeared, on a monthly schedule from March to July. The contents of the issues did not correspond to specific British issues: the majority were taken from New Worlds but one story was reprinted from Nova's edition of Science Fiction Adventures
Science Fiction Adventures (British magazine)
Science Fiction Adventures was a British digest-size science fiction magazine, published from 1958 to 1963 by Nova Publications as a companion to New Worlds and Science Fantasy. It was edited by John Carnell...

, and three were taken from Fantastic Universe, which had ceased publication with its March 1960 issue.

Subsequently the British edition was released in the US essentially unchanged, with a cover date delayed by one month, starting with issue 99 (October 1960).

External links

Article by Michael Moorcock on the decision to publish Bug Jack Barron and its consequences; with an insight into the artistic world surrounding New Worlds in 1967, height of the "second phase".
Website of the revived Michael Moorcock's New Worlds, to go online circa November 2011
Documents from Nova Publications.
Images of the Novae Terrae and New Worlds fanzines.

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