It’s hard to understand the botching of “The Dweller in the Gulf,” except on the theory that Gernsback or one of the editors thought that the horror needed toning down. But I hadn’t understood that the horror element was objectionable: the only criticism they made of the tale in its original form was, that it “lacked scientific motivation.” I am utterly disgusted with that outfit. Gernsback’s present policy strikes me as being suicidal. Science fiction requires abundant descriptive matter to put it over at all—and most of the tales I have sent in recently have been objected to as containing a surplus of descriptive matter, adjectives, etc. Oh, hell.... And the bastards owe me about six hundred dollars anyway. They might at least have the decency to print my stuff straight.
7
Some of Gernsback’s motivation for altering the story might be inferred from remarks Lasser had made concerning what they regarded as Smith’s “over-reliance” on atmosphere. Lasser had sent Smith a letter dated August 11, 1932—about the time he was writing “Dweller”—that warned Smith that Wonder Stories was “not interested in weird tales” or any “bizarre scientific themes,” which of course was Smith’s forte; instead he should concentrate on “originality of plot, drama, conflict, situation, environment, character.”8 Lasser apologized to Smith on February 15, 1933 and insisted that the changes were made at Gernsback’s “special request,”9 but the damage was already done: “Gernsback must be loco [...] Lasser apologized profusely in reply to the verbal drubbing that I gave him—but that hardly mends matters. I judge that the idiotic alterations have cooked the story pretty well with readers who might otherwise have admired it.”10
Smith didn’t realize just how right he was. Forrest J. Ackerman wrote a letter to the fan magazine Fantasy Fan attacking the story. Ackerman stated that he “could not find one redeeming feature about the story” and called for the ink in Smith’s pen to “dry up.”11 He even went so far as to write Smith a personal letter asking that he not submit such stories to WS. (Ackerman would later approach Smith about publishing a collection of his science fiction stories, includung this tale, and would include “The Dweller in the Gulf” in an anthology that he published in Spain.12)
Smith was to have received fifty dollars for “The Dweller in the Gulf.” By the time of the “Boiling Point” controversy, Gernsback already owed Smith $741, which according to Mike Ashley was probably the most money he owed to any writer. Ashley observes that “though the payments would obviously have been beneficial, they were not critical.” 13. They soon became critical when Smith’s elderly mother scalded her foot in October 1933, throwing “another monkey wrench into my literary programme.”14
The domestic duties that his mother performed now fell to CAS, along with the task of providing nursing care, so he was no longer producing stories with the same regularity as before. It became imperative that Smith collect what he was due, so he hired a New York attorney, Ione Weber, to pursue collection of the debt. Smith was surprised when payments were forthcoming despite Gernsback’s having dissolved Wonder Stories’ old publisher, Stellar Publishing, which Ashley notes would have limited Smith’s claim.16 Miss Weber reported to Smith that “it is getting even more difficult to collect from Gernsback. However, you are the one getting paid. I have not had a check for any other author for months and months.”15 Since Smith was not submitting stories, Ashley concludes that Gernsback held him in high enough regard that he was attempting to lure him back. This might be the reason why Gernsback himself wrote to Smith the next year to invite him to serve as an “incorporator” and Honorary Member of the Science Fiction League that he was sponsoring; Smith was listed as a Director of the League in the May 1934 issue of Wonder Stories.
1. CAS, letter to DAW, September 1, 1932 (ms, MHS).
2. CAS, letter to AWD, September 1, 1932 (SL 190).
3. CAS, letter to AWD, November 24, 1932 (SL 197). See Appendix 4.
4. CAS, letter to AWD, February 9, 1933 (SL 201).
5. CAS, letter to DAW, November 10, 1932 (SL 196).
6. HPL, letter to CAS, April 4, 1932 (AHT 32.83).
7. CAS, letter to AWD, February 19, 1933 (ms, SHSW).
8. David Lasser, letter to CAS, August 11, 1932 (ms, JHL).
9. David Lasser, letter to CAS, February 15, 1933 (ms, JHL).
10. CAS, letter to AWD, March 1, 1933 (ms, SHSW).
11. Forrest J. Ackerman, letter to “The Boiling Point,” Fantasy Fan 1, no. 1(September 1933): 6; rpt. In The Boiling Point by Clark Ashton Smith et al (West Warwick, RI: Necronomicon Press, April 1985): [1].
12. See Ackerman’s letter to CAS, July 1, 1947 (ms, JHL); also Forrest J. Ackerman, ed., Los mejores historias de horror (Barcelona: Editorial Bruguera, 1969).
13. Mike Ashley, “The Perils of Wonder: Clark Ashton Smith’s Experiences with Wonder Stories.” Dark Eidolon no. 2 (June 1989): 7.
14. CAS, letter to RHB, October 25, 1933 (SL 234).
15. Mike Ashley and Robert A. W. Lowndes, The Gernsback Days: A study of the evolution of modern science fiction from 1911 to 1936 (Holicong, PA: Wildside Press, 2004): 243.
16. Ione Weber, letter to CAS, March 15, 1935 (ms, JHL).
The Maze of the Enchanter
After completing “The Dimension of Chance,” Smith apparently felt the need to cleanse his literary palate by writing something more to his liking. The result was originally entitled “The Maze of Mool Dweb,” which he described to August Derleth as “ultra-fantastic, full-hued and ingenious, with an extra twist or two in the tail for luck.”1 He did not think that it would find favor with Wright, and was proven correct when the manuscript was returned as “too poetic and finely phrased.” The rejections of “Mool Dweb” and “The Eidolon of the Blind,” in combination with a perceived decline in the quality of Weird Tales in recent issues, “make me feel that the chances for fine literature in that direction are growing decidedly slimmer.”2
Smith next submitted the story to Argosy, which had published interplanetary romances by Otis Adelbert Kline (1891-1946) that were perhaps in the same phylum but definitely not the same class, but without success. (Smith probably expected as much, since he wrote to Derleth not “if Argosy returns it,” but “when.”) He decided that a preferable title would be “The Enchanter’s Maze,” and also that “Maal Dweb—two syllables,—would be preferable, perhaps, for tone-color, etc. The few rare (?) words, with the exception of valence, termini, and possibly one or two others, can be replaced with less exotic terms without an actual sacrifice of meaning.” He added defiantly “But beyond this, I won’t touch the story for anyone, if I never sell it.”3 Lovecraft wrote at the time that the story “had much charm, & Satrap Pharnabazus [Wright] was certainly an ass (as usual) to reject it.”4
Smith revised and retyped the story at the beginning of October 1932. He presented the original version to a Bay Area science fiction fan named Lester Anderson, whose position at a bookstore allowed Smith to purchase a number of long-desired titles at bargain prices. This typescript was “so overcrawled with alterations that I had to make a clean copy to send out. But maybe the variant readings will interest you.” (This typescript is now part of the Bancroft Library’s collection.) He went on to explain that
Wright objected to the “unfamiliar” exotic diction of the tale, so I tried to eliminate almost everything that might bother a fifth-grade grammar student. My sole reason for using words not usually employed by “pulp” writers have been to achieve precision, variety and richness. The words are never plugged in for their own sake, but simply because they expressed a fine shade of meaning or gave the tone-color that I wanted. I am forced to infer, though, that all this is lost on the average reader. And yet the A. R., formally speaking, has probably received more education than I have had.