Nightfall And Other Stories

Начало книги

 The writing of "Nightfall" was a watershed in my professional career. When I wrote it, I had just turned twenty-one. I had been writing professionally (in the sense that I was submitting my stories to magazines and occasionally selling them) for two and a half years, but had created no tidal wave. I had published about a dozen stories and had failed to sell a dozen others.

 Then John W. Campbell, Jr., the editor of Astounding Science Fiction, showed me the Emerson quotation that starts "Nightfall." We discussed it; then I went home and, over the course of the next few weeks, wrote the story.

 Now let's get something straight. I didn't write that story any differently from the way I had written my earlier stories-or, for that matter, from the way I wrote my later stories. As far as writing is concerned, I am a complete and utter primitive. I have no formal training at all and to this very day I don't know How To Write.

Читать дальше →