Meet the Author

Amazing Stories
November, 1938

       Since my science-fiction tales have been coming out for the last thirteen years, the impression may be abroad that Hamilton is an old guy with a beard down to here. As a matter of fact, I'm now thirty-three. Started out to be an engineer, but my college career was terminated after three years by official request. Then the sale of a couple of yarns started me writing steadily, and I'm still at it. Unmarried, and I live in a small Pennsylvania city.

       One of my two chief pleasures is batting around on purposeless trips, from New York to San Francisco and Quebec to Mexico City. My other recreation is arguing with Jack Williamson, and I've been able to combine the two nicely, as Jack has made most of the trips with me. Between arguments, we've had fun navigating a skiff down the entire Mississippi river, batching it for a winter in a Florida shack, branding calves on the New Mexico plains, upsetting a sailboat in the Atlantic, and such like.

       I get keenly interested in a science-fiction story once I've started it, and in fact, I can't imagine anyone writing this kind of fiction who isn't a bug on it. I've had quite a number of detective and horror yarns published from time to time, but don't get the kick out of them that I do out of fantastic tales. I wish, however, that more biological stories would appear -- the possibilities there have hardly been scratched.

       Generally, I read semi-popular scientific works until an idea for a story penetrates my skull. Now and then a title pops into my mind, and I work up a story around it. Every now and then I bog down in the middle of a story, and I swear horribly and vow to quit writing. But after a dozen years, I'm still at it -- nothing else I've tried is as much fun!        -- Edmond Hamilton