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Tuesday, April 02, 2019

#AtoZ Challenge - B Is For Robert Bloch

This year, my A to Z Challenge theme is SF and fantasy writers and their worlds. Today’s author is American horror writer Robert Bloch. Think you’ve never heard of his work? I bet you have! Read on...

Robert Bloch - from Wikipedia

Robert Bloch, American author of horror, mystery and fantasy, is one I discovered in my teens. I actually met him once, when he was guest of honour at Cinecon, a small convention in Melbourne many years ago. He was very pleasant and laid back, someone you could chat with in between panels. One night of the con, he was chatting with a group of us and when he got up to go, he turned and pointed at the quietest member of the group. “You talk too much!” he said with a straight face before walking out of the door.

I first encountered his work on the beach, where my friend Denise and I went in the summer, during our teens. Denise’s family owned a boarding house and their boarders tended to leave their books and magazines behind when they left. (That’s also how I discovered Robert Heinlein’s Stranger In A Strange Land). Denise brought them with her to the beach, and one of them happened to have a Bloch short story in it, about an old silent movie extra who has started seeing his departed girlfriend in movies where she never appeared, waving at him. Denise read that one aloud. Soon after, I read a story in which a girl who likes late night horror movies goes travelling and finds monsters from those movies wherever she goes. The last line was a delicious twist. I was hooked. 

Public Domain


Robert Bloch was born in Chicago in 1917. He was a huge fan of the horror magazine Weird Tales, which he used to save for every month as it was more expensive than the other pulp magazines. He made his first professional sale to that magazine when he was only seventeen, and after that, the rest was history.   

This was the golden age of SF and fantasy.  A lot of rubbish was published in the pulp magazines, but it also started the careers of some classic authors. As a teenager, he wrote a fan letter to horror writer H.P Lovecraft, who later became a friend. They wrote each other into their stories. He also became friends with some of the other big names of the era. 

You think you haven’t heard of him? I bet you’ve heard of Psycho, though. The Hitchcock movie was based on his book of the same name. Have you ever seen the original Star Trek series? He wrote three episodes of that. One was “What Are Little Girls Made Of?”, a very early episode of the series. “Catspaw” had Halloween characters and the Three Witches. “Wolf In The Fold” was based on his short story “Yours Truly, Jack The Ripper”. He did a lot of Jack the Ripper material, including one I read in Harlan Ellison’s Dangerous Visions anthology, “A Toy For Juliette”. I’ll let you discover this one for yourself rather than give you spoilers. But it’s a doozy! And while there has been a huge amount of Jack the Ripper material in fantasy and horror since then, his story “Yours Truly...”, published in 1943, might be where it all started. 

I admit I have only read his short fiction, but that is amazing stuff. In short fiction you can say everything in very few words and have clever twists. And some of his twists were very clever. I’d describe his short work as fun rather than scary, something I understood better after meeting that very funny man at Cinecon. 


You can still get his work quite easily in ebook and Dangerous Visions was still in print as of a few years ago, when I bought a copy. It’s a classic in its own right, so worth checking out. 

17 comments:

Melanie said...

I knew Bloch had a written psycho but I never realise he done so much more. I love short stories with a twist at the end. I’ve written a few myself! Sue, I have a feeling your A-Z challenge is going to be very bad for me-it keeps adding to my to read pile! 😂

Sue Bursztynski said...

Thanks, Melanie, I hope you find some enjoyable Bloch to read. The good thing about him is that so much of his fiction is short, so you don’t have to read it all at once. I know all about TBR piles! 😁

Brian Joseph said...

This is a great pick. I have also only read Bloch’s short fiction but he has always been on my radar. I am a lifelong Star Trek fan and his writing for that show has always been on my radar. What are Little Girls Made Of? had lots of Lovecraftian themes.

Sue Bursztynski said...

Hi Brian! I confess I have only read one or two Lovecraft stories, but it doesn’t surprise me, as Bloch’s fiction was influenced by Lovecraft.

Cathy Kennedy said...

Sue,

Not being much of the literary sort the name Bloch doesn't mean a lot to me, unfortunately. But, I am familiar with Hitchcock's thriller, "Psycho", but I always thought he wrote the script. So, it's neat to learn that the film was based on Bloch's work instead.

Thanks for joining me today for the second installment featuring the Bishop in my Little Mermaid Art Sketch series!

Happy A2Zing, my friend! ;)

Sue Bursztynski said...

Thanks for visiting, Cathy! Yes, he wrote the book on which it was based. At one time, that was about all he was known for by anyone outside SF fandom.

Sue Bursztynski said...

Hi, Stuart, thanks for visiting! Which author would that be? Zelazny, perhaps? Let me know and if it’s someone I have read I will add them to my post. I have two for tomorrow’s D post.

Roland Clarke said...

Robert Bloch seems to be someone that I've read back when I devoured SF and fantasy. (I was interested at the mention of Zelazny who happens to be one of my favourite writers. I have a number of his books that I read decades ago - Nine Princes in Amber; Donnerjack.)

Sue Bursztynski said...

Hi Roland! My sister was a huge Zelazny fan at one time. I have only read one of his novels, though quite a few of his short stories, and I love the intros he did to those almost as much as the stories themselves. I heard him speak at my very first SF convention, along with Brian Aldiss. A very pleasant, laid-back man!

Tasha Duncan-Drake said...

Ooh, Jack the Ripper - I do have a soft spot for JtR mashups. I'm a huge Trek fan so know all those eps, but have to admit I had no idea they were written by Robert Bloch - I shall add that to the back of my brain for those moments at dinner parties when I need to say something vaguely interesting ;)
Tasha
Tasha's Thinkings - Ghost Stories

Sue Bursztynski said...

Hi, Tasha! Yes, quite a few of those original series episodes were by classic SF and fantasy authors.

Joanna Maciejewska said...

I actually heard of him, but never got to read anything of his. (I haven't even watched Psycho!)
I loved your story about the convention - this kind of memories are always special, aren't they?

Sue Bursztynski said...

Stuart, I have just downloaded Lord Of Light. I’ve only read his novel Creatures Of Light And Darkness(Egyptian mythology)but quite a few of his short stories. I loved those introductions to them. Did you know he was inspired by Ernest Hemingway’s writing suggestions?

Joanna, yes, it’s very special when you get to meet your favourite authors and have a chat, though also nice even to hear them speak. I have quite a few such memories and treasure them.

AJ Blythe said...

You lost me at horror. I really can't do scary. But you are right, I have heard of Psycho =)

Sue Bursztynski said...

I’m not generally a horror fan, but his short film cation is more likely to make you go “Ouch!” Than “Aaargh!” They’re cheeky!

Debs Carey said...

Ah Sue, I'm a total novice in the area of SF and fantasy & without David's choices at our book group, would no doubt have stayed that way forever. But I'm slowly - very slowly - dipping my toe in the waters. But Bloch sounds a bit too far towards the horror end of the spectrum so may not make it onto the overloaded list.

Sorry for the delay in joining you. I lost my ability to post to Blogger blogs when G+ got withdrawn, but only discovered this fact last week. Initially, I thought I'd have to create a Blogger account simply to comment, but have found the workround (which was staring me in the face all along!) I finally get the frustrations you've suffered in reverse with WPress.

Sue Bursztynski said...

Hi Debs! What did you do? I’m curious. I assumed you can just create a Google account without having a blog. I’d like to know because when this is over I’m thinking of going back to Google accounts only, having been driven nuts by Anonymous commenters,