[Transcriber's Note: Extensive research did not uncover any
evidence that the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.]
FORWARD
by Ye Ed
You will notice that this is theSpecial Weird Poetry Number.
The next issue will be theSpecial Short Story Number,
and the March issue will be dedicated to Weird Tales. By the way,F. Lee Baldwin, the author of our well-liked department, "Within theCircle," has compiled an excellent biography of H. P. Lovecraft whichwill appear in the Weird Tales number with a special wood-cut of thefamed writer by Duane W. Rimel. Coming up is also volumes of materialfrom Seabury Quinn, H. P. Lovecraft, Clark Ashton Smith, Robert E.Howard, R. H. Barlow, Robert Nelson, and all your other favoritewriters.
Upon suggestions from many of our readers, we are dropping "Our ReadersSay" department with this issue. As H. Koenig points, continuousrepetition of "I liked this" and "I liked that" does not make veryinteresting reading. Therefore, "Our Readers Say" will be replacedby this "Forward" each month besides fan articles made from the mostinteresting of our readers' communications.
Due to the huge influx of contributions, we find it very difficultto oblige all of our contributors by placing their material in printpromptly. We intend to use the best material first and must ask thepatience of all those who have sent us articles. Please remember ourlimited space.
MR. KOENIG CORRECTS
I have just had an opportunity to check up on Blackwood's "The Wolvesof God," (writes H. Koenig). The book was written by Blackwood andWilson as I indicated in my last letter. I find, however, that theonly story credited directly to Blackwood was the last story in thebook entitled "Vengeance is Mine" and not the title story. Hence,if you should publish my earlier letter, please make the correction.Incidentally, it may be well that Blackwood had a hand in the otherstories. But if so, the Table of Contents does not so indicate.
A GRAND SLAM
You will remember that in our editorial for the November, 1934, number,we stated casually that the average intelligence of the general publicwas that of a moron. We have received a post-card containing thefollowing from "One of the 'General Public'," post-marked Newark,N. J.:
"In recently wasting time glancing through that collection of wastepaper which you honor with the title of a magazine, I noticed that youconsider the general public—of which I am proud to be a member—acollection of moronic individuals, and the followers of your creed ofa "higher type of intellect." I just hate to disagree with you, but ifyou investigate the reason for the small number of such creatures, youwould probably find out that most asylums censor their inmate's mail.Unfortunately, lack of space and postal laws prohibit my expressing ofmy true opinion of both the (?-!—) and its readers. I challenge you toprint this."
It is easy to see that the writer of this card is "one of the generalpublic." Here we find the customary challenge to print it and the lackof signature, which must denote that the writer is either ashamed orafraid to append his name. Concerning asylums, however, we hadn't eventhought of soliciting the inmates. That's not a bad idea. We'll have totake that point up at the next Director's Meeting. Which one are youin?