Presslie Robert David Redd (1 results)

Card wrappers. First edition (& 1st printing). Very neat 32-page booklet, a short bibliography (with colour reproductions of magazine covers) and appreciation of the UK sf writer Robert Presslie who wrote many stories for the sf magazines in the 1950s and early 1960's. Limited to a total printing of just 26 copies, this is one of 20 numbered copies (there were also six lettered copies signed by Redd). ''(1920-2000) English author who worked as a pharmacy manager in London; he is remembered for readable and occasionally memorable short fiction on conventional genre themes. His first sale was ''Trespassers Will Be Prosecuted'' in Authentic, June 1955. Presslie was notably prolific in the late 1950s, twice achieving the feat of simultaneous publication in three major UK magazines: Authentic, Nebula Science Fiction and Science Fantasy in October 1957, and Nebula Science Fiction, New Worlds and Science Fantasy in December 1958, the New Worlds piece being his most reprinted story ''Another Word for Man'', though the horror-tinged ''Dial O for Operator'' (February 1958 Science Fantasy), about a call for help made (tragically) from the future, is very strong. His prose and story-treatments were probably too English in style for American readers, although translations appeared in several European countries. His last story was ''The Night of the Seventh Finger'' (in New Writings in SF 7, anth 1966, ed John Carnell). Presslie is sometimes cited as the best representative of the many forgotten writers who helped create the typical genre-magazine ambience of that era; his competent stories assisted the gradual improvement in British magazine sf away from pulp adventures towards more thoughtful works amidst which writers such as Brian Aldiss and J G Ballard could develop. In this Presslie exemplified Kingsley Amis's description in New Maps of Hell (1960) of 'the sound minor writer whose example brings into existence the figure of real standing'. Unfortunately no full-length novels or collections are known'' (David Redd/Encyclopedia of SF, 3rd Edition). Fine (as new) copy.