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<title>Beyond Fantasy Fiction</title>
<authors>Wikipedia</authors>
<publisher>wikipedia.org</publisher>
<publishedplace>network</publishedplace>
<publishedyear>2010</publishedyear>
<edition></edition>
<category>Featured articles</category>
<section id="40881" fatherid="0" title="" lv="" priority="-1" level="1">
Beyond Fantasy Fiction was a US fantasy fiction magazine edited by H. L. Gold, with only ten issues published from 1953 to 1955. The last two issues carried the cover title of Beyond Fiction, but the publication's name for copy purposes remained as before.See the individual issues, and also the index at 
Although not a commercial success, it included several significant short stories by distinguished authors, such as Isaac Asimov, Ray Bradbury and Philip K. Dick.Asimov's "Kid Stuff" and Dick's "The King of the Elves" appeared in the September 1953 issue:   Bradbury's "The Watchful Poker Chip" appeared in the March 1954 issue: .  These and more may be found via an online index:   The publication has been described by critics as a successor to the tradition of Unknown, a fantasy magazine that ceased publication in 1943. It was noted for printing fantasy with a rational basis such as werewolf stories that included scientific explanations. A selection of stories from Beyond was published in paperback form in 1963, also under the title Beyond.
James Gunn, a historian of science fiction, regarded the magazine as the best of the fantasy magazines launched in the early 1950s, and science fiction encyclopedist Donald H. Tuck contended it printed very good material.  Not every critic viewed Beyond as completely successful, however; P. Schuyler Miller, in a 1963 review, commented that the stories were most successful when they did not try to emulate Unknown.

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<section id="40882" fatherid="0" title="History and significance" lv="" priority="-2" level="1">
Beyond Fantasy Fiction was a fantasy-oriented companion to the more successful Galaxy Science Fiction, which launched in 1950; Beyond had been planned by editor H. L. Gold from the time Galaxy was launched, but it had to wait until Galaxy was firmly established.Michael  Ashley, Transformations, pp. 65–66.  Beyond's first issue, dated July 1953, included an editorial by Gold in which he laid out the magazine's scope, excluding (in his words) only "the probably possible" and "the unentertaining".H.L. Gold, "Beyond", in Beyond Fantasy Fiction, July 1953, p. 2. Gold recruited Sam Merwin, who had recently quit as editor of Fantastic Universe, to help in editing, though the masthead of both magazines listed Gold as editor.  A typical issue of Beyond included several stories that were long enough to be listed as novellas or novelettes, with the contents augmented with shorter works, usually for a total of at least seven stories.
The first issue featured Theodore Sturgeon, Damon Knight, Frank M. Robinson, and Richard Matheson.  Other writers who appeared in the magazine included Jerome Bixby, John Wyndham, James E. Gunn, Fredric Brown, Frederik Pohl (both under his own name and with Lester del Rey under the joint pseudonym "Charles Satterfield"), Philip José Farmer, Randall Garrett, Zenna Henderson, and Algis Budrys.
The magazine was not commercially successful: at that time circulation figures were not required to be published annually, as they were later,See for example the statement of circulation in "Statement Required by the Act of October 23, 1962", Analog Science Fiction/Science Fact vol. 76, no 4 (December 1965), p.161. so the actual circulation figures are not known. Lasting less than two years, its demise can be attributed in part to the decreasing popularity of fantasy and horror fiction.

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<section id="40883" fatherid="0" title="Reception" lv="" priority="-3" level="1">
Beyond's selection of stories has been described by science fiction historian Michael Ashley as "seeking to achieve … high quality fantasy fiction acceptable to all readers"; he adds that Beyond was more successful than Fantastic Science Fiction, a competitor in this niche, because Gold "had a clearer vision and was more determined … to achieve it. … despite sales problems, Gold persisted in publishing fiction that sought to stretch the boundaries of imagination."
Several significant or widely reprinted stories appeared during Beyond's short history:All but the Gunn and Dick stories are included by Tuck in his list of "Notable fiction" from Beyond. The Gunn story is mentioned as a classic by Ashley, in "Beyond Fantasy Fiction", p.110. Dick's story is included because of his current prominence; see Tuck "Beyond Fantasy Fiction".
Although no Hugo Awards were presented in 1954, the 2004 World Science Fiction Convention awarded "Retro Hugos" for that year.  Two Beyond stories appeared as runners-up: Sturgeon's "…And My Fear Is Great…" placed third in the novella category, and Cogswell's "The Wall Around the World" fifth in the novelette category.  In addition, Gold placed fifth in the editor category, though this recognized his work at Galaxy as well as at Beyond.

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<section id="40884" fatherid="0" title="Bibliographic details" lv="" priority="-4" level="1">
The publisher was Galaxy Publishing Corporation, New York.  The magazine was initially titled Beyond Fantasy Fiction, and this remained the title on the masthead throughout the ten-issue run.  However, issue 9 changed the title to simply Beyond Fiction on the cover, spine, and table of contents.  Issue 10 used the new, shorter title on the cover and spine, but reverted to Beyond Fantasy Fiction for the table of contents.  As a result, the magazine is often listed as having changed its name for the last two issues.See the individual issues, and also the index at  Tuck, "Beyond Fantasy Fiction", p.549.
The magazine began as a 160-page digest, priced at 35 cents.  The price stayed the same throughout the run, but the page count was cut to 128 for the eighth issue, September 1954.  The magazine was bimonthly, but issues 9 and 10 did not carry month and year dates, which has led different bibliographers to catalogue them in different ways.  However, the masthead for these issues indicates that the magazine remained bimonthly, and so they are now usually catalogued as November 1954 and January 1955, respectively; the copy dates on the last two issues correspond to these dates.  The volume numbering was completely regular; volume 1 had six numbers, and volume 2 ceased with its fourth number.  The stories were printed in the two-column format usual to digest magazines.Not described in the reference works; see the individual issues.
A British edition of the magazine ran for four issues on a bimonthly schedule starting in November 1953 and finishing in May 1954.  These copied the first four issues of the US version, with slightly cut contents. They were numbered 1 to 4 but were not dated.Ashley, Beyond Fantasy Fiction, p.110; Tuck, "Beyond Fantasy Fiction", p.549.  Ten years after the magazine folded, nine stories from Beyond were collected into the 160-page paperback Beyond, published in 1963 by Berkley Books (F712) and edited by Thomas Dardis (who was not credited on the book).Mike  Ashley, Beyond Fantasy Fiction, in John Clute and John Grant, eds, The Encyclopedia of Fantasy (New York: St. Martin's; ISBN 0312145942), 110.

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<section id="40885" fatherid="0" title="Notes" lv="" priority="-5" level="1">
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<section id="40886" fatherid="0" title="References" lv="" priority="-6" level="1">
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<section id="40887" fatherid="0" title="External links" lv="" priority="-7" level="1">
Category:Defunct science fiction magazines of the United States
Category:Fantasy fiction magazines
Category:Publications disestablished in 1955
Category:Publications established in 1953

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