Ballantine Adult Fantasy series

The Ballantine Adult Fantasy series was an imprint of Ballantine Books. Launched in 1969 (presumably in response to the growing popularity of Tolkien's works), the series reissued a number of works of fantasy literature, which were out of print or dispersed in back issues of pulp magazines (or otherwise not easily available in the United States), in cheap paperback form—including works by authors such as William Morris, Lord Dunsany, Ernest Bramah, Hope Mirrlees, and James Branch Cabell. The series lasted until 1974.

The series has been considered a high-water mark in fantasy publishing. Envisioned by the husband-and-wife team of Ian and Betty Ballantine, it was produced under the editorship of Lin Carter, who was extremely well-read and knowledgable in the genre. The agreement signed between them on November 22, 1968 launched the project. In addition to the reprints making up the bulk of the series, some new fantasy works were published, as well as a number of original collections and anthologies put together by Carter, and "Imaginary Worlds", his general history of the modern fantasy genre.

The series was never considered a money-maker for Ballantine, although the re-issue of several of its titles both before and after the series' demise shows that a number of individual works were considered successful. The Ballantines supported the series as long as they remained the publishers of Ballantine Books, but with their sale of the company to Random House in 1973 support from the top was no longer forthcoming, and in 1974, with the end of the Ballantines' involvement in the company they had founded, the series was terminated.

After the temination of the Adult Fantasy series, Ballantine continued to publish fantasy, but concentrated primarily on new titles, with the older works it continued to issue being those with proven track records. In 1977 both its fantasy and science fiction lines were relaunched under the Del Rey Books imprint, under the editorship of Lester and Judy-Lynn del Rey. Carter continued his promotion of the fantasy genre in a new line of annual anthologies from DAW Books, "The Year's Best Fantasy Stories", also beginning in 1975. Meanwhile, the series' lapsed mission of restoring classic works of fantasy to print had been taken up on a more limited basis by the "Newcastle Forgotten Fantasy Library", launched in 1973.

The Series

All books in the series proper bore a distinctive Unicorn's Head colophon on the cover and included an introduction by Carter.

eries precursors, August 1965-April, 1969

Ballantine's initial line of fantasies and fantasy criticism, published before hiring Carter as consultant. Later reprints of some bore the Unicorn's Head colophon.

# "The Hobbit", J. R. R. Tolkien (Aug. 1965)
# "The Fellowship of the Ring", J. R. R. Tolkien (Oct. 1965)
# "The Two Towers", J. R. R. Tolkien (Oct. 1965)
# "The Return of the King", J. R. R. Tolkien (Dec. 1965)
# "The Tolkien Reader", J. R. R. Tolkien (Sep. 1966)
# "The Worm Ouroboros", E. R. Eddison (Apr. 1967 - later reprinted with colophon)
# "Mistress of Mistresses", E. R. Eddison (Aug. 1967)
# "A Fish Dinner in Memison", E. R. Eddison (Feb. 1968)
# "The Road Goes Ever On", J. R. R. Tolkien and Donald Swann (Oct. 1968)
# "Titus Groan", Mervyn Peake (Oct. 1968 - later reprinted with colophon)
# "Gormenghast", Mervyn Peake (Oct. 1968 - later reprinted with colophon)
# "Titus Alone", Mervyn Peake (Oct. 1968 - later reprinted with colophon)
# "A Voyage to Arcturus", David Lindsay (Nov. 1968 - later reprinted with colophon)
# "The Last Unicorn", Peter S. Beagle (Feb. 1969 - later reprinted with colophon)
# "A Fine and Private Place", Peter S. Beagle (Feb. 1969 - later reprinted with "A Ballantine Adult Fantasy" on the cover)
# "Smith of Wootton Major and Farmer Giles of Ham", J. R. R. Tolkien (Mar. 1969)
# "", Lin Carter (Mar. 1969)
# "The Mezentian Gate", E. R. Eddison (Apr. 1969)

The series proper, May 1969-April 1974

Volumes published as part of the series, based on a listing by Lin Carter in ' with the addition of books new to Ballantine published under the Unicorn's Head colophon thereafter. Inexplicably, Carter's study ' (1972) is never listed in the series, though published by Ballantine.

# "The Blue Star", Fletcher Pratt (May 1969) (#01602)
# "The King of Elfland's Daughter", Lord Dunsany (Jun. 1969) (#01628)
# "The Wood Beyond the World", William Morris (Jul. 1969) (#01652)
# "The Silver Stallion", James Branch Cabell (Aug. 1969) (#01678)
# "Lilith", George MacDonald (Sep. 1969) (#01711)
# "Dragons, Elves, and Heroes", Lin Carter, ed. (Oct. 1969) (#01731)
# "The Young Magicians", Lin Carter, ed. (Oct. 1969) (#01730)
# "Figures of Earth", James Branch Cabell (Nov. 1969) (#01763)
# "The Sorcerer's Ship", Hannes Bok (Dec. 1969) (#01795)
# "Land of Unreason", Fletcher Pratt and L. Sprague de Camp (Jan. 1970) (#01814)
# "The High Place", James Branch Cabell (Feb. 1970) (#01855-9)
# "Lud-in-the-Mist", Hope Mirrlees (Mar. 1970) (#01880-X)
# "At the Edge of the World", Lord Dunsany (Mar. 1970) (#01879-6)
# "Phantastes", George MacDonald (Apr. 1970) (#01902-4)
# "The Dream-Quest of Unknown Kadath", H. P. Lovecraft (May 1970) (#01923-7)
# "Zothique", Clark Ashton Smith (Jun. 1970) (#01938-5)
# "The Shaving of Shagpat", George Meredith (Jul. 1970) (#01958-X)
# "The Island of the Mighty", Evangeline Walton (Jul. 1970) (#01959-8)
# "Deryni Rising", Katherine Kurtz (Aug. 1970) (#01981-4)
# "The Well at the World's End, Vol. 1", William Morris (Aug. 1970) (#01982-2)
# "The Well at the World's End, Vol. 2", William Morris (Sep. 1970) (#02015-4)
# "Golden Cities, Far", Lin Carter, ed. (Oct. 1970) (#02045-6)
# "Beyond the Golden Stair", Hannes Bok (Nov. 1970) (#02093-6)
# "The Broken Sword", Poul Anderson (Jan. 1971) (#02107-X)
# "The Boats of the "Glen Carrig"," William Hope Hodgson (Feb. 1971) (#02145-2)
# "The Doom that Came to Sarnath and Other Stories", H. P. Lovecraft (Feb. 1971) (#02146)
# "Something About Eve", James Branch Cabell (Mar. 1971) (#02067-7)
# "Red Moon and Black Mountain", Joy Chant (Mar. 1971) (#02178-9)
# "Hyperborea", Clark Ashton Smith (Apr. 1971) (#02206-8)
# "", Lord Dunsany (May 1971) (#02244-0)
# "Vathek", William Beckford (Jun. 1971) (#02279-3)
# "The Man Who Was Thursday", G. K. Chesterton (Jul. 1971) (#02305-6)
# "The Children of Llyr", Evangeline Walton (Aug. 1971) (#02332-3)
# "The Cream of the Jest", James Branch Cabell (Sep. 1971) (#02364-1)
# "New Worlds for Old", Lin Carter, ed. (Sep. 1971) (#02365-X)
# "The Spawn of Cthulhu", Lin Carter, ed. (Oct. 1971) (#02394-3)
# "Double Phoenix", Edmund Cooper and Roger Lancelyn Green (Nov. 1971) (#02420-6)
# "The Water of the Wondrous Isles", William Morris (Nov. 1971) (#02421-4)
# "", F. Marion Crawford (Dec. 1971) (#02446-X)
# "The World's Desire", H. Rider Haggard and Andrew Lang (Jan. 1972) (#02467-2)
# "Xiccarph", Clark Ashton Smith (Feb. 1972) (#02501-6)
# "", C. J. Cutcliffe Hyne (Feb. 1972) (#02502-4)
# "Discoveries in Fantasy", Lin Carter, ed. (Mar. 1972) (#02546-6)
# "Domnei", James Branch Cabell (Mar. 1972) (#02545-8)
# "Kai Lung's Golden Hours", Ernest Bramah (Apr. 1972) (#02574-1)
# "Deryni Checkmate", Katherine Kurtz (May 1972) (#02598-9)
# "Beyond the Fields We Know", Lord Dunsany (May 1972) (#02599-7)
# "The Three Imposters", Arthur Machen (Jun. 1972) (#02643-8)
# "The Night Land, Vol. 1", William Hope Hodgson (Jul. 1972) (#02669-1)
# "The Night Land, Vol. 2", William Hope Hodgson (Jul. 1972) (#02670-5)
# "The Song of Rhiannon", Evangeline Walton (Aug. 1972) (#02773-6)
# "Great Short Novels of Adult Fantasy I", Lin Carter, ed. (Sep. 1972) (#02789-2)
# "Evenor", George MacDonald (Nov. 1972) (#02874)
# "Orlando Furioso: The Ring of Angelica, Volume 1", Ludovico Ariosto, translated by Richard Hodgens (Jan. 1973) (#03057-5)
# "The Charwoman's Shadow", Lord Dunsany (Feb. 1973) (#03085-0)
# "Great Short Novels of Adult Fantasy Volume II", Lin Carter, ed. (Mar. 1973) (#03162-8)
# "The Sundering Flood", William Morris (May 1973) (#03261-6)
# "", Lin Carter (Jun. 1973) (#03309-4)
# "Poseidonis", Clark Ashton Smith (Jul. 1973) (#03353-1)
# "Excalibur", Sanders Anne Laubenthal (Aug. 1973) (#23416-2)
# "High Deryni", Katherine Kurtz (Sep. 1973) (#23485-5)
# "Hrolf Kraki's Saga", Poul Anderson (Oct. 1973) (#23562-2)
# "The People of the Mist", H. Rider Haggard (Dec. 1973) (#23660-2)
# "Kai Lung Unrolls His Mat", Ernest Bramah (Feb. 1974) (#023787-0)
# "Over the Hills and Far Away", Lord Dunsany (Apr. 1974) (#023886-9)

eries "left-overs," June-November 1974

Volumes evidently intended for issue in the series, though published after the Unicorn's Head colophon was retired. The first has a Carter introduction, and the second completes a set begun under his editorship.

#"Merlin's Ring", H. Warner Munn (Jun. 1974)
#"Prince of Annwn", Evangeline Walton (Nov. 1974)

External links

* [http://home.epix.net/~wallison/bafs.html The Haunted Bibliophile's page on the Ballantine Adult Fantasy series]