Educated at the University of Wisconsin, Weinbaum received a degree in chemical engineering in 1923. Always interested in writing, he began to contribute short stories to magazines during the late 1920's. During the 1930's, most of his work appeared in the science fiction magazines Astounding and Wonder Stories. His first novel, The Lady Dances, was published in 1930 under the pseudonym Marge Stanley. In 1934, he published A Martian Odyssey a ground-breaking story which introduced a sympathetic non-human alien, Tweel. Only fifteen months later his career was cut short by his death from throat cancer. Most of Weinbaum's work was published posthumously and included Valley of Dreams (1934), The Dawn of Flame (1934), Parasite Planet (1935), The Lotus Eaters (1935), The Mad Moon (1935), Shifting Seas (1937), The New Adam (1939) and The Black Flame (1948). Today he is regarded as one of the great science fiction authors and a crater on Mars is named after him. |