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| MAGAZINE OF FANTASY & SCIENCE FICTION The Gunslinger" (October 1978) |
The Gunslinger:
For the last few months I've been hunting. Yep, I have. Wanting to round out my Dark Tower collection. Of course, that meant I had to buy WTTK. It came. . . only, Grant instead sent me The Dark Tower artist edition. They were nice about it.
The other thing I wanted (even more than Wind) was the original five magazines that the Gunslinger was published in. That means heading over to ebay.
MAGAZINE OF FANTASY & SCIENCE FICTION
"The Gunslinger" (October 1978)
"The Way Station" (April 1980)
"The Oracle and the Mountains" (February 1981)
"The Slow Mutants" (July 1981)
"The Gunslinger and the Dark Man" (November 1981)
I have the last three. Getting the Way Station was not too difficult. And then my long hunt for The Gunslinger intensified. I called the specialty bookstores -- and they also had the first four. But, that last one, not so easy to get! Checked specialty Science Fiction magazine sellers, and they would have every issue of that magazine, except October 1978.
Found and Lost
Then I found it! It was on ebay. I clicked watch, but did not bid. It was a solid week away. It was a long week, and I checked every day to see if anyone else was bidding. No takers! I was going to get this thing for a sweet $10.
I Reminded myself on a Monday morning to check ebay and bid! But, alas, I was working on a very interesting message on the doctrine of heaven and in particular the New Earth. Cool stuff, I promise. Giant city, a whole world to explore (universe), friendship with God himself, the physical and spiritual drawn together. . . I was caught up. And yes, after all those years of searching for that magazine, I forgot to bid on it! Fifteen minutes after the auction closed, I gasped. I looked up from my sermon draft -- could I have really missed my opportunity to buy the gunslinger? Certainly not. Not after all that searching, phone calls, hours of combing the internet. Certainly not! But I had. I had gotten so excited about what the Bible says about the new earth that I had lost track of time. I soothed my disappointment with self righteousness: At least I had my mind of heavenly thing. Now this is crazy. . . I could almost taste the loss! I had come so close.
My wife and I returned to the hunt. We even called used bookstores, asking if they had stacks of Fantasy and Science Fiction magazines. Some did. They did not have that issue. Sheesh! Finding the X-men comic book was easier than this. In fact, coming up with a first edition of the Shining was easier!
Now, what's fun about this magazine is that it shouldn't be real expensive. It's the first appearance of The Gunslinger, it's fairly old, and it really did not make a big splash in the world of Stephen King collectors at the time. That means that there's not billions of them out there. But they don't sell for that much! Remember, when The Gunslinger was first listed in King's list of published books, collectors didn't even know what it was or that it existed. So having it in an appearance before the Grant edition is cool.
Hope Again
ALAS! I found it the other day. Thank you, ebay! But I didn't find it. . . I found them. They had two auctions going for the October 1978 edition of Fantasy and Science Fiction. It has a shuttle like spaceship with what looks like Frogger riding it. Can't be Frogger! -- that little green guy wasn't gracing out Atari's in 1978 (had to wait until 1981). Maybe it's just a gooey version of Gumbie. See, I don't know what's up with the cover, because it's not in my hands yet.
I didn't miss the auction this time! In fact, I bought the magazine for $12.86 (and $4.00 shipping.) That completes my set of Magazine and Science Fiction Gunslinger's. I ought to check the text and see if there were major revisions made between the Grand first printing and the magazine printings.
Oh, the other magazine is still up for auction. Have about 4 hours as of the writing of this. It's selling, at the moment, for a ridiculously low $7.99. Pretty sweet, huh. Okay. . . 4 hours later, that magazine went for $36.00. I choose to sleep instead of participate in that bid war. I actually suspect that magazine is actually worth something like $30-40.
You got an orginal magazine edition of the Gunslinger for just twelve bucks? Well you must be one lucky son of a gun, Reverend.
ReplyDeleteI'm repeating myself here, but I've finally figured out why I prefer the original more or less to the revised current edition.
The revised Gunslinger strikes me as much too fanboy-ish in composition. There was too much willingness to cop out to Mid-World terms which made it sound too Star Wars or Star Trekker, whereas the original was content with mystery and a late sixties acid film aesthetic. In fact, as i said before, what I like best about the original Gunslinger is that's essentially one with all the late sixties acid westerns churned out during the latter part of that decade (with King it always seems to come back to the fifties and sixties in some way).
ChrisC
The difference in the original and the revised is that when King wrote the original he was just writing in the dark; he didn't know where he was going with the story. There were shadows of where he wanted to take the series, but the novel moves with almost purposeless motion. Stuff just happens.
ReplyDeleteI think the "mystery" you sense is what I see as King's own mystery of "what in the world am I doing here? I'm having fun. . . walking in the dark."
But, like the old Star Wars, it will always be there for those who like it.
As to what you say about the first book's purposelessness, well, maybe.
ReplyDeleteReading King's intro to the revised edition he sticks close to the stylistic creed of the American Naturalists, people like Twain and Jack London who's basic motto was keep it simple stupid. That's a writing creed King has adhered to more as the years have gone by and he's honed his own style.
I hear what you say about the original still being around, I know I got my 81 copy, even a hardback copy of the original 78 version of The Stand. Although I got to admit, these days I'm more of an Indiana Jones fan. Those movies even have the same themes as Star Wars and seem to do them better without having to resort to a lot of nonsense words. Plus, you don't have to explain the Indy villains, the knowledge comes ready to hand. All this, however, is another discussion.
What's sad is to think that some time, say seventy years hence, it will be hard for future generations to get hands on such copies, sad really.
ChrisC
stephen king GUNSLINGER 1981 magazine of fantasy and science fiction, if anyone wants to buy this paper back minature magazine email me and we can sell it over paypal. cuc73@aol.com
ReplyDeletethis books was selling for i guess 199.00 or more becaus thats what they wanted for it so it may be more $$$ then 199. i just want 45.00 and again, my email is cuc73@aol.com
ReplyDeleteStephen King "Dark Tower: The Gunslinger" dj/HC First Edition, First Printing, Fine/Fine ,this was on site of VERY FINE BOOKS AND SOLD FOR =Price: $1,295.00 Publisher: Donald M. Grant Publishers 1982 Binding: dj/HC
ReplyDeleteEdition: US First Edition/First Printing, SO YOU SEE THE HARD COVER IS VERY RARE, AGAIN IF YA INTERSTED IN MY
stephen king GUNSLINGER 1981 magazine of fantasy and science fiction,THEN EMAIL IS CUC73@AOL.COM
PUT THIS ON EBAY AND IT MAY POPUP PRICE AND LOOKS OF THE SMALL SCIENCE FICTION PAPERBACK BOOK ''stephen king GUNSLINGER 1981 magazine of fantasy and science fiction'' WANT JUST 45. FOR MINE AND ITS GOIN FOR 199. ON EBAY cuc73@aol.com
ReplyDelete