Henry Kuttner

Background

Ethnicity: His relatives were of different ethnicity: the parents of his father had come from Leszno in Prussia, the parents of his mother were from Great Britain.

Henry Kuttner was born on April 7, 1915 in Los Angeles, California, United States. He was the son of Henry Kuttner, the bookseller, and Annie Levy. His grandparents on the father's side - Naphtaly Kuttner and Amelia Bush - lived in San Francisco since 1859; the parents of the mother's side were from Great Britain. Henry Kuttner's great-grandfather was the scholar Josua Heschel Kuttner. Kuttner grew up in relative poverty after the death of his father.

Education

Kuttner attended the University of Southern California in 1950.

Career

When Kuttner was young man, he worked in his free time for his uncle's literary agency, Laurence D'Orsay in Los Angeles before selling his first story, "The Graveyard Rats", to Weird Tales in early 1936. It was while working for the d'Orsay agency that Kuttner picked Leigh Brackett's early manuscripts of the slush pile.

Kuttner was best known for his literary prose and worked in close collaboration with his wife, C. L. Moore. Their work together spanned the 1940s and 1950s. In the mid-1940s Kuttner contributed a big amount of scripts to the Green Lantern comic book.

Among Kuttner's most popular work were the Gallegher stories, which were published under the Padgett name.

A number of his novels were published posthumously after his death.

Achievements

• In 2007, New Line Cinema released a feature film based on the Lewis Padgett short story "Mimsy Were the Borogoves" under the title The Last Mimzy.
  
  Marion Zimmer Bradley is among many authors who have cited Kuttner as an influence. Bradley's novel The Bloody Sun is dedicated to him.
  
  

Works

More photos

• book

  • Robots Have No Tails (Planet Stories)

    (Hounded by creditors and heckled by an uncooperative robo...)

  • The Best of C.L. Moore & Henry Kuttner eBook: C.L. Moore, Henry Kuttner: Books

    (Two legendary masters of science fiction and fantasy come...)

  • Mutant

    (The Big Blow-up left huge radioactive sores (the graves o...)

    1963
  • The Best of Henry Kuttner

    (Stories by a recognized master of Science Fiction, Fantas...)

  • The Michael Gray Novels (Omnibus Edition) - Kindle edition by Henry Kuttner. Mystery, Thriller & Suspense Kindle eBooks @ Amazon.com.

    ("[A] pomegranate writer: popping with seeds—full of ideas...)

  • The Last Mimzy: Stories
  • The Watcher at the Door: The Early Kuttner, Volume Two

Personality

Quotes from others about the person

• "Mort Weisinger introduced me to the informal luncheon gatherings of the working science fiction authors of the late thirties. I met Henry Kuttner. [He was] "medium-sized", "very quiet and courteous, and entirely without outstanding features." - Alfred Bester

Connections

Kuttner met with his wife, C. L. Moore through their association with the "Lovecraft Circle", a group of writers and fans who corresponded with H. P. Lovecraft.

Father:

Henry Kuttner

Mother:

Annie Levy Kuttner

Wife:

Catherine L. Moore

She was an American science fiction and fantasy writer.

Great-grandfather:

Naphtaly Kuttner

(1829 - 1903)

Great-grandmother:

Amelia Bush

(1834 - 1911)

Friend:

Richard Matheson

He was an American author and screenwriter, primarily in the fantasy, horror, and science fiction genres. He is best known as the author of I Am Legend, a 1954 science fiction horror vampire novel that has been adapted for the screen four times. Richard Matheson dedicated his 1954 novel I Am Legend to Kuttner.