Emil Petaja - Later Life and Work

Later Life and Work

In the late 1940s, Petaja moved to San Francisco, where he turned his interest in photography into a profession. He traveled the state as a school photographer, and at times maintained studios in Sausalito and San Francisco, California. He was the house photographer for local theater groups, and wrote articles for magazines such as Popular Photography.

Having largely given up writing by the early 1950s, Petaja resumed literary work in the early 1960s. His first published novels were Alpha Yes, Terra No! (Ace Books, 1965) and The Caves of Mars (Ace Books, 1965). These works, like a number of Petaja's subsequent novels, were published as part of the paperback series of Ace doubles. As such, Petaja was published alongside emerging writers like Samuel R. Delany, Michael Moorcock, Brian Stableford, and Dean Koontz.

Of Finnish descent, Petaja's best known works make up a series based on the Kalevala, the Finnish verse epic. In each of the books which comprise the "Otava Series" – Saga of Lost Earth's (Ace Books, 1966), Star Mill (Ace Books, 1966), The Stolen Sun (Ace Books, 1967), and Tramontane (Ace Books, 1967), an Earth descendant of one of the four main heroes of the Kalevala is reborn into an avatar's role in order to re-enact adventures on Otava, the planet of origin of the Kalevala pantheon. The series brought Petaja readers from around the world; while his mythological approach to science fiction – an early example within the genre – was discussed in scholarly papers presented at academic conferences. In 1979, two omnibus editions of the "Otava Series" were published by DAW Books. A fifth novel in the cycle, Return to Otava (1970), remains unpublished. Another novel unconnected with the series but related to the Kalevala is The Time Twister (Dell, 1968).

The Green Planet books – Lord of the Green Planet (Ace Books, 1967) and Doom of the Green Planet (Ace Books, 1968) – recounts similar adventures befalling its Irish protagonist, who finds himself role-playing Celtic deities for the benefit of a madman armed with instruments of coercion.

Other novels dating from the late 1960s and early 1970s include The Prism (Ace Books, 1968), The Nets of Space (Berkley, 1969), The Path Beyond the Stars (Dell, 1969), and Seed of the Dreamers (Ace Books, 1970). Four other novels remain unpublished, Glory Stone (1970), Little Gods (1972), Spin the Star Wheel (1975), and Zodiac World (1980). This latter work concerns a planet whose population is ruled by astrological beliefs.

As chairman of the Golden Gate Futurians – an informal club for writers and fans – Petaja hosted meetings for friends and colleagues at his home in the Castro neighborhood of San Francisco. Among the regular attendees were local noted authors like Fritz Leiber, Avram Davidson and E. Hoffmann Price. Writers and editors who might be visiting from out of town – such as Donald Wollheim or Harlan Ellison – would also attend and there, have a chance to meet local figures like the Satanist Anton LeVay or the film maker Kenneth Anger. Petaja enjoyed the company of other writers and artists, and was acquainted with a number of individuals who lived in the San Francisco Bay Area, such as Warren Hinkle (his upstairs neighbor), Anthony Boucher, Frank M. Robinson, Poul Anderson, Philip K. Dick and Robert A. Heinlein.

To date, Petaja's fiction have been translated and published in England, The Netherlands, Italy, Spain, Sweden, France, and Finland. In 1995, in recognition of a lifetime of significant achievement, Petaja was named an "Author Emeritus" by the Science Fiction Writers of America. The award was created "as a way to recognize and appreciate senior writers in the genres of science fiction and fantasy who have made significant contributions to our field but who are no longer active or whose excellent work may no longer be as widely known as it once was." As Author Emeritus, Petaja was invited to speak at the annual Nebula Awards banquet.

Petaja died of heart failure on August 17, 2000. He had suffered complications brought on from the treatment of a blood clot. After his death, obituaries appeared in newspapers and magazines around the world.