Otto Willi Gail was a German science journalist and author.

Gail was born in Gunzenhausen

Gunzenhausen

Gunzenhausen is a town in the Weißenburg-Gunzenhausen district, in Bavaria, Germany. It is situated on the river Altmühl, 19 km northwest of Weißenburg in Bayern, and 45 km southwest of Nuremberg. Gunzenhausen is a nationally recognized recreation area. The city was mentioned first in the...

, Mittelfranken. He studied electrical engineering

Electrical engineering

Electrical engineering is a field of engineering that generally deals with the study and application of electricity, electronics and electromagnetism. The field first became an identifiable occupation in the late nineteenth century after commercialization of the electric telegraph and electrical...

 and physics

Physics

Physics is a natural science that involves the study of matter and its motion through spacetime, along with related concepts such as energy and force. More broadly, it is the general analysis of nature, conducted in order to understand how the universe behaves.Physics is one of the oldest academic...

 at the Technical University Munich. He worked for newspapers and radio broadcasting and wrote non-fiction

Non-fiction

Non-fiction is the form of any narrative, account, or other communicative work whose assertions and descriptions are understood to be fact...

 books about physics, astronomy

Astronomy

Astronomy is a natural science that deals with the study of celestial objects and phenomena that originate outside the atmosphere of Earth...

 and space travel

Spaceflight

Spaceflight is the act of travelling into or through outer space. Spaceflight can occur with spacecraft which may, or may not, have humans on board. Examples of human spaceflight include the Russian Soyuz program, the U.S. Space shuttle program, as well as the ongoing International Space Station...

. He also wrote science fiction

Science fiction

Science fiction is a genre of fiction dealing with imaginary but more or less plausible content such as future settings, futuristic science and technology, space travel, aliens, and paranormal abilities...

 novels to delight the youth for these themes. He had good relations to the German space pioneers Max Valier

Max Valier

Max Valier was an Austrian rocketry pioneer. He helped found the German Verein für Raumschiffahrt that would bring together many of the minds that would later make spaceflight a reality in the 20th century.-Biography:Valier was born in Bozen , South Tyrol and in 1913 enrolled to study Physics at...

 and Hermann Oberth

Hermann Oberth

Hermann Julius Oberth was an Austro-Hungarian-born German physicist and engineer. He is considered one of the founding fathers of rocketry and astronautics.- Early life :...

. As a result of these relationships he acquired special knowledge that influenced his books and gave them much details. His novels were translated into American English

American English

American English is a set of dialects of the English language used mostly in the United States. Approximately two-thirds of the world's native speakers of English live in the United States....

 and influenced early American utopia

Utopia

Utopia is an ideal community or society possessing a perfect socio-politico-legal system. The word was imported from Greek by Sir Thomas More for his 1516 book Utopia, describing a fictional island in the Atlantic Ocean. The term has been used to describe both intentional communities that attempt...

n literature. He died in Munich

Munich

Munich The city's motto is "" . Before 2006, it was "Weltstadt mit Herz" . Its native name, , is derived from the Old High German Munichen, meaning "by the monks' place". The city's name derives from the monks of the Benedictine order who founded the city; hence the monk depicted on the city's coat...

.

R. D. Mullen noted that Der Schuß ins All is "justly famous for the realistic detail with which it depicts the construction of a rocket ship, its launching into space, and the experiences of its crew."

Of (the English version of) Hans Hardts Mondfahrt, Richard Godwin writes "this novel for young adults is an accurate mirror of many of the space travel concepts that have been discussed by pre-war European experts," and continues, "Otto Willi Gail was one of the most popular science fiction authors in Germany during the early 20th century."

Novels

• Der Schuß ins All (1925) (translated as The Shot into Infinity)
• Der Stein vom Mond (1926) (translated as The Stone From the Moon}
• Hans Hardts Mondfahrt (1928) (translated as By Rocket to the Moon)
• Die blaue Kugel (1929)
• Der Herr der Wellen (1949)

Non-fiction books

• Mit Raketenkraft ins Weltenall (1928)
• Wir plaudern uns durch die Physik (1931)
• Der Griff nach dem Atom (1947)
• Ebbe und Flut (1947)
• Physik der Weltraumfahrt (1948)
• Was weißt du von der Welt? (20 booklets, Bayerischer Schulbuch-Verlag, München since 1947)