Editing Pulp magazine (section)

==History==
===Origins===
Before pulp magazines, [[Newgate novel]]s (1840s-1860s) fictionalized the exploits of real-life criminals. Later, British [[sensation novel]]s gained peak popularity in the 1860s-1870s. Sensation novels focused on shocking stories that reflected modern-day anxieties, and were the direct precursors of pulp fiction.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Hoglund |first=Johan |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=XBrACwAAQBAJ&dq=%22Sensation+novel%22+vs+%22pulp+fiction%22&pg=PA42 |title=The American Imperial Gothic: Popular Culture, Empire, Violence |date=2016-03-16 |publisher=Routledge |isbn=978-1-317-04519-9 |language=en}}</ref><ref>{{Cite book |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=_o3fI-b5WGAC&dq=%22Sensation+novel%22+vs+%22pulp+fiction%22&pg=PA146 |title=Acting with the Voice: The Art of Recording Books |date=2004 |publisher=Hal Leonard Corporation |isbn=978-0-87910-301-9 |language=en}}</ref>

The first "pulp" was [[Frank Munsey]]'s revamped ''[[Argosy (magazine)|Argosy]]'' magazine of 1896, with about 135,000 words (192 pages) per issue, on pulp paper with untrimmed edges, and no illustrations, even on the cover. The steam-powered printing press had been in widespread use for some time, enabling the boom in dime novels; prior to Munsey, however, no one had combined cheap printing, cheap paper and cheap authors in a package that provided affordable entertainment to young working-class people. In six years, ''Argosy'' went from a few thousand copies per month to over half a million.<ref name="ahgttp">"A Two-Minute History of the Pulps", in ''The Adventure House Guide to the Pulps'', edited by [[Doug Ellis (editor)|Doug Ellis]], [[John Locke (editor)|John Locke]], and [[John Gunnison]]. Silver Spring, MD, Adventure House, 2000. (p. ii–iv).</ref>

[[Street & Smith]], a [[dime novel]] and boys' weekly publisher, was next on the market. Seeing ''Argosy''{{'}}s success, they launched ''[[The Popular Magazine]]'' in 1903, which they billed as the "biggest magazine in the world" by virtue of its being two pages (the interior sides of the front and back cover) longer than ''Argosy''. Due to differences in [[page layout]] however, the magazine had substantially less text than ''Argosy''. ''The Popular Magazine'' did introduce color covers to pulp publishing, and the magazine began to take off when in 1905 the publishers acquired the rights to serialize ''[[Ayesha (novel)|Ayesha]]'' (1905), by [[H. Rider Haggard]], a sequel to his popular novel ''[[She: A History of Adventure|She]]'' (1887). Haggard's [[Lost world|Lost World]] genre influenced several key pulp writers, including [[Edgar Rice Burroughs]], [[Robert E. Howard]], [[Talbot Mundy]] and [[A. Merritt|Abraham Merritt]].<ref>See Lee Server, ''Encyclopedia of Pulp Fiction Writers'' (2002), pg.131.</ref> In 1907, the cover price rose to 15 cents and 30 pages were added to each issue; along with establishing a stable of authors for each magazine, this change proved successful and circulation began to approach that of ''Argosy''. Street and Smith's next innovation was the introduction of specialized genre pulps, with each magazine focusing on a particular genre, such as detective stories, romance, etc.<ref>Reynolds, Quentin. ''The Fiction Factory; Or, From Pulp Row to Quality Street: The Story of 100 Years of Publishing at Street & Smith''. Random House, 1955. (Covers: Street & Smith, [[Nick Carter (literary character)|Nick Carter]], Max Brand, Buffalo Bill, Frank Merriwell, Gerald Smith, Richard Duffy, Frederick Faust, dime novel, Horatio Alger, Henry Ralston, Ned Buntline, Ormond Smith, Beadle's, Edward Stratemeyer, detective fiction, Laura Jean Libbey, ''Astounding Science Fiction'', Edith Evans)</ref>
[[File:Spicy Detective Stories April 1935.jpg|thumb|right|180px|Cover of the pulp magazine ''Spicy Detective Stories'' vol. 2, #6 (April 1935) featuring "Bullet from Nowhere" by [[Robert Leslie Bellem]]]]

===Peak of popularity===
At their peak of popularity in the 1920s–1940s,<ref name="illustrationhistory.org">{{Cite web|url=https://www.illustrationhistory.org/genres/pulp-illustration-pulp-magazines|title=Pulp Illustration: Pulp Magazines – Illustration History|website=illustrationhistory.org|access-date=2020-01-22|archive-date=February 14, 2022|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220214193300/https://www.illustrationhistory.org/genres/pulp-illustration-pulp-magazines|url-status=live}}</ref> the most successful pulps sold up to one million copies per issue. In 1934, [[Frank Gruber]] said there were some 150 pulp titles. The most successful pulp magazines were ''[[Argosy (magazine)|Argosy]]'', ''[[Adventure (magazine)|Adventure]]'', ''[[Blue Book (magazine)|Blue Book]]'' and ''[[Short Stories (magazine)|Short Stories]]'', collectively described by some pulp historians as "The Big Four".<ref>{{cite book|last =Hulse|first = Ed|date =2009|chapter =The Big Four (Plus One)|title = The Blood 'n' Thunder Guide to Collecting Pulps|publisher = Murania Press|isbn = 978-0-9795955-0-9|pages = 19–47}}</ref> Among the best-known other titles of this period were ''[[Amazing Stories]]'', ''[[Black Mask (magazine)|Black Mask]]'', ''Dime Detective'', ''[[Flying Aces (magazine)|Flying Aces]]'', ''[[Horror Stories (magazine)|Horror Stories]]'', ''[[Love Story Magazine]]'', ''[[Marvel Tales and Unusual Stories|Marvel Tales]]'',<ref name="ls">{{cite book |first=Lee |last=Server |author-link=Lee Server |title=Danger Is My Business: an illustrated history of the Fabulous Pulp Magazines |location=San Francisco |publisher=Chronicle Books |year=1993 |isbn=978-0-8118-0112-6 |pages=62–65 }}</ref> ''[[Oriental Stories]]'', ''[[Planet Stories]]'', ''Spicy Detective'', ''[[Startling Stories]]'', ''[[Wonder Stories|Thrilling Wonder Stories]]'', ''[[Unknown (magazine)|Unknown]]'', ''[[Weird Tales]]'' and ''[[Western Story Magazine]]''.<ref name="ls" />

During the economic hardships of the [[Great Depression]], pulps provided affordable content to the masses, and were one of the primary forms of entertainment, along with [[Classical Hollywood cinema|film]] and [[Golden Age of Radio|radio]].<ref name="illustrationhistory.org"/>

Although pulp magazines were primarily an American phenomenon, there were also a number of British pulp magazines published between the [[Edwardian era]] and [[World War II]]. Notable UK pulps included ''[[The Pall Mall Magazine]]'', ''The Novel Magazine'', ''[[Cassell's Magazine]]'', ''[[The Story-Teller]]'', ''The Sovereign Magazine'', ''Hutchinson's Adventure-Story'' and ''Hutchinson's Mystery-Story''.<ref name="age">Ashley, Michael (2006). ''The Age of the Storytellers: British Popular Fiction Magazines, 1880–1950''. British Library. {{ISBN|1-58456-170-X}}</ref> The German fantasy magazine ''[[Der Orchideengarten]]'' had a similar format to American pulp magazines, in that it was printed on rough pulp paper and heavily illustrated.<ref>"Orchideengarten, Der". in: M.B. Tymn and Mike Ashley, ''Science Fiction, Fantasy, and Weird Fiction Magazines''. Westport: Greenwood, 1985. pp. 866. {{ISBN|0-313-21221-X}}</ref>

===World War II and market decline===
{{multiple image
| align             = left
| direction         = vertical
| width             = 100
| footer            = <small>Pulp magazines began to decline during the 1940s, giving way to paperbacks, comics and digest-sized novels</small>
| image1            = DetectiveBookMagazine002.jpg
| image2            = Two complete science adventure books 1952sum n6.jpg
| image3            = Tops in Science Fiction Fall 1953.jpg
}}

During the [[Second World War]], paper shortages had a serious impact on pulp production, starting a steady rise in costs and the decline of the pulps. Following the model of ''[[Ellery Queen's Mystery Magazine]]'' in 1941, some magazines began to switch to [[digest size]]: smaller, sometimes thicker magazines. In 1949, Street & Smith closed most of their pulp magazines in order to move upmarket and produce [[Slick (magazine format)|slicks]].<ref>Ashley, Michael. ''Transformations: The Story of the Science Fiction Magazines from 1950 to 1970'', Volume 2 (2005), pg. 3 {{ISBN|978-0-85323-779-2}}</ref>

Competition from [[Comic book|comic-books]] and [[Paperback|paperback novels]] further eroded the pulps' market share, but it has been suggested the widespread expansion of [[television]] also drew away the readership of the pulps.<ref name="illustrationhistory.org"/> In a more affluent post-war America, the price gap compared to slick magazines was far less significant. In the 1950s, [[men's adventure]] magazines also began to draw some former pulp readers.

The 1957 liquidation of the [[American News Company]], then the primary distributor of pulp magazines, has sometimes been taken as marking the end of the "pulp era"; by that date, many of the famous pulps of the previous generation, including ''Black Mask,'' ''[[The Shadow (magazine)|The Shadow]],'' ''[[Doc Savage (magazine)|Doc Savage]],'' and ''[[Weird Tales]],'' were defunct (though some of those titles have been revived in various formats in the decades since).<ref name="ahgttp" /> Almost all of the few remaining former pulp magazines are science fiction or [[mystery fiction|mystery]] magazines, now in formats similar to "[[digest size]]", such as ''[[Analog Science Fiction and Fact]]'', though the most durable revival of ''Weird Tales'' began in pulp format, though published on good-quality paper. The old format is still in use for some lengthy serials, like the German science fiction weekly ''[[Perry Rhodan]]'' (over 3,000 issues as of 2019).

Over the course of their evolution, there were a huge number of pulp magazine titles; [[Harry Steeger]] of [[Popular Publications]] claimed that his company alone had published over 300, and at their peak they were publishing 42 titles per month.<ref name = "Haining02">{{cite book | last=Haining |first=Peter |title=The Fantastic Pulps | year=1975 |publisher=Vintage Books, a division of Random House |isbn=0-394-72109-8}}</ref> Many titles of course survived only briefly. While the most popular titles were monthly, many were bimonthly and some were quarterly.

The collapse of the pulp industry changed the landscape of publishing because pulps were the single largest sales outlet for short stories. Combined with the decrease in slick magazine fiction markets, writers trying to support themselves by creating fiction switched to novels and book-length anthologies of shorter pieces. Some ex-pulp writers like [[Hugh B. Cave]] and [[Robert Leslie Bellem]] had moved on to writing for television by the 1950s.

The last pulp to cease publication was ''[[Ranch Romances]]'' in 1971.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Nevins |first=Jess |author-link=Jess Nevins |url= |title=The Oxford Handbook of Science Fiction |date=2014 |publisher=Oxford University Press |isbn=978-0-19-983884-4 |editor-last=Latham |editor-first=Rob |editor-link=Rob Latham |pages=93 |language=en |chapter=Pulp Science Fiction |chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=D44dBAAAQBAJ&pg=PA93}}</ref>