In July 1938 Astounding magazine under the editorship of John W. Campbell published a story for the first by future Grand master Clifford D. Simak. This story Rule-18 was not a classic, nor was it considered one of the great SF writer's better stories. OK, so why the hell are we covering it on this series devoted to classic SF stories classics of the 30s? The impact of this story is an interesting case. When the issue ran the story was dismissed in the letter column by a young fan from Brooklyn named Issac Asimov. Wanting to understand his issues with the story the elder Simak wrote Asimov and thus began a friendship. Re-reading the story to answer the letter, Asimov found the story worked; this experience is one he considered crucial to his development as a  writer.

So I invited Alec Nevala-Lee the author of Astounding (A history of the golden age SF) and Seth Heasley host of The Hugos There podcast to join me for this episode. None of us had read the story before.  Rule-18 is about a 24th-century football game between Mars and Earth.  In this discussion we talk about the story, the issue of Astounding it appeared in, John W. Campbell's relationship to the writers, the influence on Asimov, and we debate if this story should be canon.

 Read the story for free here:

https://archive.org/details/Astounding_v21n05_1938-07/page/n3/mode/2up

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