Arnold, Frank Edward
Entry updated 30 September 2024. Tagged: Author, Editor, Fan.
Working name of UK author Francis Joseph Eric Edward Arnold (1914-1987), active in World War Two; in the 1930s he was an early member of UK Fandom, publishing in Fanzines – including the first two issues of this incarnation of New Worlds – as Frank E Arnold or Francis Arnold. His first professional sale was "City of Machines" in Tales of Wonder for Summer 1939; three further Pulp magazine stories followed in 1941-1954. The first (under his preferred title "The Mad Machines") was assembled with three others, one original to the collection, in Wings Across Time (coll 1946), published in the short-lived Pendulum "Popular" Spacetime Series of which he was editor. They are strong on action; themes include runaway Automation, problematic Supermen and Time Travel. He published no further fiction.
In Fandom, Arnold attended and maintained a visitors' book for the London "first Thursday" pub gatherings from their early days in the 1940s until his death. A posthumous selection of his nonfiction, for the most part not previously published, appeared as The Frank Arnold Papers (2017 ebook; exp 2024) edited by Rob Hansen; the expanded edition adds further published and unpublished reviews plus an essay on early sf Cinema, "Out of This World" (June 1963 Films and Filming). [JC/DRL]
Francis Joseph Eric Edward Arnold
born London: 3 January 1914
died London: 14 November 1987
works
- Wings Across Time (London: Pendulum Publications, 1946) [coll: pb/Bob Wilkin]
nonfiction
- The Frank Arnold Papers (Reading, Berkshire: Ansible Editions, 2017) [nonfiction: coll: ebook: edited by Rob Hansen: na/photographic]
- The Frank Arnold Papers (Reading, Berkshire: Ansible Editions, 2024) [nonfiction: coll: exp of the above by roughly one-third: edited by Rob Hansen: pb/photographic]
links
previous versions of this entry