Typewriter in The Sky - Genres

Genres

In the biographical entry on L. Ron Hubbard in The Houghton Mifflin Dictionary of Biography, Typewriter in the Sky and Slaves of Sleep are categorized among classics in science fiction. In his book The Witching Hour, author James Gunn placed Typewriter in the Sky among "classics" in science fiction published in Unknown. Francis Hamit of Daily News of Los Angeles characterized Typewriter in the Sky and Fear as "classics" in science fiction. Roland J. Green of the Chicago Sun-Times also described the work as a "classic". Daniel Cohen wrote in Masters of the Occult that works including Typewriter in the Sky, Fear, and Slaves of Sleep "moved Hubbard into the front rank of science fiction writers of the late 1940s." Writing in Dream makers: The Uncommon Men and Women Who Write Science Fiction, Charles Platt called the book, "one of Hubbard's most well-known and playful pieces". The St. James Encyclopedia of Popular Culture described Typewriter in the Sky and Fear as Hubbard's "most famous stories" in the genre of science fiction.

In the book Resnick at Large, authors Mike Resnick and Robert J. Sawyer cited Typewriter in the Sky as an example of the subgenre of science fiction – "Recursive Science Fiction", described as "science fiction about science fiction". In the work, The Greenwood Encyclopedia of Science Fiction and Fantasy: Themes, Works, and Wonders, Gary Westfahl commented, "Recursive fantasy fiction – that is, a fantasy about writing fantasy – is scarce. Luigi Pirandello's play Six Characters in a Search of an Author (1921) offered a non-genre model." Westfahl noted that Hubbard's book was "an early genre example, perhaps inspired by Pirandello".

Typewriter in the Sky is well regarded within the genre of fantasy; it is listed in Fantasy: The 100 Best Books, by James Cawthorn and Michael Moorcock. Robert E. Weinberg, Stefan R. Dziemianowicz, and Martin Harry Greenberg write in Rivals of Weird Tales: 30 Great Fantasy and Horror Stories from the Weird Fiction Pulps that Typewriter in the Sky is classed among stories published in Unknown which "still rank as some of the best fantasy produced in this century". Author David Wingrove noted in The Science Fiction Source Book, "His best work is outstanding within the pulp tradition: "Typewriter in the Sky" is a fine fantasy about a man who gets trapped within a story written by a pulp writer". Writing in A Short History of Fantasy, authors Farah Mendlesohn and Edward James characterized the book as "The best of Hubbard's stories" and noted that it "is better seen as a rationalized fantasy".