Some dates seem to acquire a literary life of their own, and 21 September has an unusually impressive collection of connections.
We begin in 1866, with the birth of H. G. Wells. Wells became one of the defining figures of early science fiction, imagining time travel, invisible men and, most famously, an invasion from Mars in The War of the Worlds. His Martian fighting machines have subsequently become one of science fiction’s most recognisable images: enormous tripods striding across the English landscape.
Jump forward 71 years to 21 September 1937, and another imaginary landscape was opening its doors. J. R. R. Tolkien’s The Hobbit was published by George Allen & Unwin. It introduced readers to Bilbo Baggins and brought Tolkien’s Middle-earth to a mass audience. The book was an immediate success, and its popularity eventually prompted the publisher to ask Tolkien for more stories about hobbits — setting him on the road towards The Lord of the Rings.
Then, exactly ten years later, on 21 September 1947, Stephen King was born in Portland, Maine. King would create yet another extraordinary collection of fictional places, characters and monsters, from Carrie and The Shining to Misery, It and The Stand. His official website confirms his birthday as 21 September 1947.
So we can move through three very different literary worlds on the same square of the calendar:
1866 — H. G. Wells born
1937 — The Hobbit published
1947 — Stephen King born
From Wells’s Martians, we MOVE to Tolkien’s Middle-earth and then into the much darker territory of King. ZOOM into the timeline and there is a particularly satisfying detail: The Hobbit and Stephen King are separated by precisely a decade. SNAP all three to 21 September, and more than a century of science fiction, fantasy and horror suddenly occupies a single date.
And there is one final piece of Link Salad irony. 21 September is also the International Day of Peace. So while Martian fighting machines stride across the countryside and something distinctly unpleasant appears to have happened inside Bag End, Stephen King can sit peacefully at his typewriter with an International Day of Peace mug.
From Martians to Middle-earth to Misery: not a bad literary journey for one day.