#warhoon

Encounters on Mars: "Green and Red Warriors Battle on Barsoom," "Red Warrior on Domestic Thoat," "Warhoon," and "Banth vs Calot." (Greg Bell, Warriors of Mars: The Warfare of Barsoom in Miniature, by Gary Gygax and Brian Blume, TSR, 1974)

Warhoon #28 was published in 1978 by Richard Bergeron. At 668 pages it had to be hardbound. Why so many pages? Bergeron had dedicated his 28th issue to be a fanthology reprinting the fanwriting of Walt Willis.

Walt Willis, along with James White, started Irish Fandom in 1947, and went on to produce many fanzines and write articles for other fanzines. Forties and Fifties science fiction fandom was in a state of flux. While many fans had a decent sense of humor which could be found in their zines, the typical Forties fanzine was “sercon” or serious and constructive. Articles about why Asimov understood robots better than Williamson, or vice versa. But soon the sillier fanzines would take on a larger role, to the point that a Fifties fanzine might make little or no mention of science fiction, but in talking about Jazz music, Mad magazine, and Walt Kelly’s Pogo comic strip, you could tell you were reading a sci-fi fanzine. Some of this is documented in A Wealth of Fable by Harry Warner, Jr.

In Warhoon #28 you can see the transition in Willis himself. Some of the early articles are rather dry, and typically sercon. But then Willis soon finds his sense of humor and the fanwriting gets funnier and funnier. One of the better pieces is The Enchanted Duplicator, a piece Willis wrote with Bob Shaw. It’s an allegory for fandom, fanzines, and fanwriting in the style of a Pilgrim’s Progress. But two of my favorite pieces are the trip reports Willis wrote about his first visit to the United States. The first report was written while Shelby Vick was raising funds for his first visit, and by necessity it is entirely fabricated. Every fannish myth and exaggeration Willis had read in US fanzines was enlarged and further exaggerated. But even better, once he had made his first visit he wrote a lengthy report that is no less funny for being an account of his actual visit.

Below are some pages from Warhoon #28.

pictured (clockwise) Walt Willis, Lee Hoffman, Max Keasler, and Shelby Vick.

title page

a convention report

diagram of Oblique House, the Willis abode as remembered by Bob Shaw