Editing Theodore Sturgeon

{{Short description|American speculative fiction writer (1918–1985)}}
{{Use mdy dates|date=January 2024}}
{{use American English|date=January 2024}}

{{Infobox writer <!-- For more information see [[:Template:Infobox Writer/doc]]. --> 
| name          = Theodore Sturgeon
| image         = Theodore Sturgeon.jpg
| imagesize     = 
| alt           = 
| caption       =
| pseudonym     = E. Waldo Hunter
| birth_name    = Edward Hamilton Waldo
| birth_date    = {{Birth date|1918|02|26}}
| birth_place   = [[New York City]], U.S.
| death_date    = {{Death date and age|1985|5|8|1918|02|26}}
| death_place   = [[Eugene, Oregon]], U.S.
| resting_place = 
| relatives = [[Peter A. Sturgeon]] (brother)
| module = {{Infobox writer 
| embed = yes
| occupation    = {{hlist|Fiction writer|critic}}
| language      = 
| citizenship   = 
| education     = 
| alma_mater    = 
| period        = 1938–1985
| genre         = {{hlist|[[Science fiction]]|[[Fantasy fiction|fantasy]]|[[Horror fiction|horror]]|[[Mystery fiction|mystery]]|  [[Western fiction|western]]|[[literary criticism]]}}
| subject       = Science fiction (as critic)
| movement      = 
| notableworks  = {{ubl|
* ''[[More Than Human]]''
* "[[Microcosmic God]]"
* ''[[I, Libertine]]''
* "Slow Sculpture"
}}
| spouse        = 
| partner       = 
| children      = 
| relatives     = 
| awards        = {{hlist|[[Hugo Award|Hugo]]|[[Nebula Award|Nebula]]}}
| signature     = 
| signature_alt = 
| website       = 
| portaldisp    = 
}}
}}

[[File:Weird Tales November 1948.jpg|thumb|right|Sturgeon's "The Perfect Host" was the cover story in the November 1948 ''Weird Tales'']]
[[File:Fantastic adventures 195002.jpg|thumb|right|An early version of Sturgeon's first novel, ''The Dreaming Jewels'', was the cover story in the February 1950 issue of ''Fantastic Adventures'']]
[[File:Planet stories 195109.jpg|thumb|right|Sturgeon's novella ''The Incubi of Parallel X'' was the cover story in the September 1951 ''Planet Stories'']]
[[File:Galaxy 195405.jpg|thumb|right|Sturgeon's novella ''Granny Won't Knit'' took the cover of the May 1954 ''[[Galaxy Science Fiction]]'', illustrated by [[Ed Emshwiller]]]]

'''Theodore Sturgeon''' ({{IPAc-en|ˈ|s|t|ɜr|dʒ|ən}}; born '''Edward Hamilton Waldo''', February 26, 1918 – May 8, 1985) was an American author of primarily [[fantasy fiction|fantasy]], [[science fiction]], and [[Horror fiction|horror]], as well as a critic. He wrote approximately 400 reviews and more than 120 short stories, 11 novels, and several scripts for ''[[Star Trek: The Original Series]]''.<ref name=isfdb/>

Sturgeon's science fiction novel ''[[More Than Human]]'' (1953) won the 1954 [[International Fantasy Award]] (for SF and fantasy) as the year's best novel, and the [[Science Fiction Writers of America]] ranked "[[Baby Is Three]]" number five among the "[[The Science Fiction Hall of Fame, Volume Two|Greatest Science Fiction Novellas of All Time]]" to 1964. Ranked by votes for all of their pre-1965 novellas, Sturgeon was [[The Science Fiction Hall of Fame, Volume Two#Authors|second among authors]], behind [[Robert Heinlein]].<!-- source is our linked book article -->

The [[Science Fiction and Fantasy Hall of Fame]] inducted Sturgeon in 2000, its fifth class of two dead and two living writers.<ref name="sfhof-old" />

==Biography==
===Youth and education===
Sturgeon was born Edward Hamilton Waldo in [[Staten Island, New York]], in 1918. His name was legally changed to Theodore Sturgeon at age eleven after his mother's divorce and subsequent marriage to William Dicky ("Argyll") Sturgeon.<ref>Williams, Paul (1976). [http://www.physics.emory.edu/~weeks/sturgeon/williams.html "Theodore Sturgeon, Storyteller"] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20030913021248/http://www.physics.emory.edu/~weeks/sturgeon/williams.html |date=2003-09-13 }}. First published 1997, online. Retrieved 2013-03-26.<br /> Quote: "Sturgeon because that was the stepfather's name—he was a professor of modern languages at Drexel Institute in Philadelphia—and Theodore because Edward was the boy's father's name and the mother was still bitter and anyway young Edward had always been known as Teddy."<br /> Quote: "To this day, libraries all over the world list 'Theodore Sturgeon' as a pseudonym for 'E. H. Waldo', which is incorrect."</ref>
Theodore's birth father, Edward Waldo, was a color and dye manufacturer of middling success.  With his second wife, Anne, he had one daughter, Joan. Theodore's mother, Christine Hamilton Dicker (Waldo) Sturgeon, was a well-educated writer, watercolorist, and poet who published journalism, poetry, and fiction under the name Felix Sturgeon. His stepfather, William Dickie Sturgeon (sometimes known as Argyll), was a mathematics teacher at a prep school and then Romance Languages Professor at Drexel Institute (later [[Drexel Institute of Technology]]) in Philadelphia. Sturgeon's account of his stepfather is included in a posthumous memoir.<ref name="Argyll">Sturgeon, Theodore (1993). ''Argyll; A Memoir'', Entwhistle Books. {{ISBN|978-0934558167}}</ref> Sturgeon's sibling, [[Peter A. Sturgeon|Peter Sturgeon]], wrote technical material for the pharmaceutical industry and the [[World Health Organization|WHO]], and founded the American branch of [[Mensa International|Mensa]].

Upon graduating from high school in 1935, Sturgeon pleaded to be allowed to attend college, but his step-father refused to support him, citing his frivolity.{{sfnp|Moskowitz|1974|p=234}}

===Great Depression and the war years===
The young Sturgeon held a wide variety of jobs. As an adolescent, he wanted to be a circus [[acrobatics|acrobat]]; an episode of [[rheumatic fever]] prevented him from pursuing this. From 1935 (aged 17) to 1938, he was a sailor in the [[merchant marine]], and elements of that experience found their way into several stories. He sold [[refrigerator]]s door to door. He managed a hotel in [[Jamaica]] around 1940–1941, worked in several construction and infrastructure jobs (driving a bulldozer in [[Puerto Rico]], operating a [[filling station]] and truck lubrication center, work at a [[drydock]]) for the US Army in the early war years, and by 1944 was an advertising copywriter. In addition to freelance fiction and television writing, in New York City he opened his own literary agency<ref name="Agency">{{Cite book |title=Bright Segment |last=Sturgeon |first=Theodore |publisher=North Atlantic Books |year=2002 |isbn=1556433980 |editor-last=Williams |editor-first=Paul |pages=xiii |chapter=Foreword by William Tenn}}</ref> (which was eventually transferred to [[Scott Meredith]]), worked for ''[[Fortune (magazine)|Fortune]]'' magazine and other Time Inc. properties on circulation, and edited various publications. 

Sturgeon initially had a somewhat irregular output, frequently suffering from [[writer's block]]. He sold his first story, "Heavy Insurance", in 1938 to the [[McClure Syndicate]], which bought much of his early work. It appeared in the ''Milwaukee Journal'' on July 16th. At first he wrote mainly short stories, primarily for genre magazines such as ''[[Astounding]]'' and ''[[Unknown magazine|Unknown]]'', but also for general-interest publications such as ''[[Argosy Magazine]]''. He used the [[pen name]] "E. Waldo Hunter" when two of his stories ran in the same issue of ''Astounding''. A few of his early stories were signed "Theodore H. Sturgeon".

===1950s: The boom years===
Although the bulk of Sturgeon's short story work dated from the 1940s and '50s, his original novels were all published between 1950 and 1961. Disliking arguments with [[John W. Campbell]] over editorial decisions, Sturgeon only published one story in ''Astounding'' after 1950.<ref name="latham2009">{{Cite book |title=The Routledge Companion to Science Fiction |last=Latham |first=Rob |publisher=Routledge |year=2009 |isbn=9781135228361 |editor-last=Bould |editor-first=Mark |pages=80–89 |chapter=Fiction, 1950-1963 |editor-last2=Butler |editor-first2=Andrew M. |editor-last3=Roberts |editor-first3=Adam |editor-last4=Vint |editor-first4=Sherryl |chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=y7CNAgAAQBAJ&pg=PA80 |access-date=2020-10-20 |archive-date=2024-01-05 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20240105045255/https://books.google.com/books?id=y7CNAgAAQBAJ&pg=PA80#v=onepage&q&f=false |url-status=live }}</ref> He did, however, take very seriously Campbell's enthusiasms for [[psionics]] and for [[L. Ron Hubbard]]'s [[Dianetics]] (even before it became the [[Church of Scientology]] in 1953). Sturgeon was [[Auditing (Scientology)|"audited"]] by Campbell himself, and according to [[Alec Nevala-Lee]], he became more devoted to it than any other science fiction writer other than [[A.E. van Vogt]].<ref>[[Alec Nevala-Lee|Nevala-Lee, Alec]] (2018), ''Astounding: John W. Campbell, Isaac Asimov, Robert A. Heinlein, L. Ron Hubbard, and the Golden Age of Science Fiction'', New York: Dey Street Books/HarperCollins, p. 280. "Apart from van Vogt, the writer who took dianetics the most seriously was Sturgeon..."</ref> He became a trained auditor and defended the Church for decades.

Sturgeon published the "first stories in science fiction which dealt with homosexuality, '[[The World Well Lost]]' [June 1953] and 'Affair with a Green Monkey' [May 1957]",<ref>Duncan, David D. (1979). [http://www.physics.emory.edu/faculty/weeks//misc/duncan.html "The Push from Within: The Extrapolative Ability of Theodore Sturgeon"] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20191019010650/http://www.physics.emory.edu/faculty/weeks//misc/duncan.html |date=10-19-19}}. First published 1979, print. Retrieved 2020-03-20.<br /> Quote: "first stories in science fiction which dealt with homosexuality, 'The World Well Lost' and 'Affair With a Green Monkey{{'"}}</ref> and sometimes put gay [[subtext]] in his work, such as the back-rub scene in "[[Shore Leave (Star Trek: The Original Series)|Shore Leave]]",<ref>{{cite journal|last1=Hageman|first1=Andrew|title=A generic correspondence: Sturgeon–Roddenberry letters on sf, sex, sales and ''Star Trek''|journal=Science Fiction Film & Television|date=2016|volume=9|issue=3|pages=473–478|doi=10.3828/sfftv.2016.9.15|s2cid=193714832 |doi-access=}}</ref> or in his Western story, "Scars".<ref name="UW pg. 203">{{cite book|first1=Eric|last1=Garber|first2=Lyn|last2=Paleo|title=Uranian Worlds: A Guide to Alternative Sexuality in Science Fiction, Fantasy, and Horror|edition=2nd|page=[https://archive.org/details/uranianworldsgui0000garb/page/203/mode/2up?q=Scars 203]|url=https://archive.org/details/uranianworldsgui0000garb|url-access=registration|location=Boston|publisher=G K HallA|year=1990|isbn=0-8161-1832-9<!-- printed without leading 0-->}}</ref> 

[[Carl Sagan]] later described "To Here and the Easel" (1954) as "a stunning portrait of personality disassociation as perceived from the inside", and further said that many of Sturgeon's works were among the "rare few science‐fiction novels [that] combine a standard science‐fiction theme with a deep human sensitivity".<ref name="sagan19780528">{{Cite news |url=https://www.nytimes.com/1978/05/28/archives/growing-up-with.html |title=Growing up with Science Fiction |last=Sagan |first=Carl |date=1978-05-28 |work=The New York Times |access-date=2018-12-12 |page=SM7 |language=en-US |issn=0362-4331 |archive-date=2018-12-11 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20181211180058/https://www.nytimes.com/1978/05/28/archives/growing-up-with.html |url-status=live }}</ref>
According to science fiction writer [[Samuel R. Delany]], a friend of Sturgeon's,<ref name="Noël">{{cite interview |last=Sturgeon|first=Noël |title=Interview with Noël Sturgeon |url=https://middletownpubliclib.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/12/Discussion-about-Theodore-Sturgeon.pdf |date=November 2019}}</ref> Sturgeon was bisexual.<ref name="Delany">{{cite interview |last=Delany |first=Samuel |subject-link=Samuel R. Delany |interviewer=Alex Wermer-Colan |title=Stonewall, Before and After |url=https://lareviewofbooks.org/article/stonewall-before-and-after-an-interview-with-samuel-r-delany/ |magazine=Los Angeles Review of Books |date=July 6, 2019}}</ref>

Though not as well known to the general public as contemporaries like [[Isaac Asimov]] or [[Ray Bradbury]], Sturgeon became well known among readers of mid-20th-century science fiction anthologies. At the height of his popularity in the 1950s he was the most anthologized English-language author alive.<ref name="Engel_1994">
{{cite book
  | last = Engel
  | first = Joel
  | title = Gene Roddenberry: The Myth and the Man Behind Star Trek
  | publisher = Hyperion
  | page = [https://archive.org/details/generoddenberrym00enge/page/92 92]
  | isbn = 0786860049
  | date = June 1, 1994
  | quote = Theodore Sturgeon, the most anthologized writer in the English language but one who'd never written for television before ''Star Trek'', received several long letters and memos from Roddenberry.
  | url = https://archive.org/details/generoddenberrym00enge/page/92
  }}</ref><ref name="Meehan_1998">
{{cite book
  | last = Meehan
  | first = Paul
  | title = Saucer Movies: A UFOlogical History of the Cinema
  | publisher = Scarecrow Press
  | page = 166
  | isbn = 0810835738
  | date = November 1, 1998
  | quote = Veteran science fiction writer Theodore Sturgeon, reportedly the most anthologized science fiction writer of all time, wrote the teleplay adaptation of his own short story for the ABC-TV movie ''Killdozer'' (1974).
}}</ref> 

Three Sturgeon stories were adapted for the 1950s NBC radio anthology ''[[X Minus One]]'': "[[A Saucer of Loneliness]]" (broadcast twice), "The Stars Are the Styx" and "Mr. Costello, Hero". 

Sturgeon was a member of the all-male literary banqueting club the [[Trap Door Spiders]], which served as the basis of [[Isaac Asimov]]'s fictional group of mystery solvers the [[Black Widowers]].  In 1959, Sturgeon moved to [[Truro, Massachusetts]] where he met and became friendly with a then unknown [[Kurt Vonnegut, Jr]]. (Sturgeon was the inspiration for the recurrent character of [[Kilgore Trout]] in Vonnegut's novels.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.flf.com/mnight/aol_qa.htm |title=Interview with Vonnegut |access-date=2013-04-04 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/19980115150204/http://www.flf.com/mnight/aol_qa.htm |archive-date=January 15, 1998 }} "I think it's funny when someone is named after a fish"</ref>)

In 1959, he began to write book reviews for [[National Review]], and continued until 1973.

===1960s and '70s: Ellery Queen and TV scripts===
Sturgeon [[ghost-writer|ghost-wrote]] one [[Ellery Queen]] [[Mystery (fiction)|mystery]] novel, ''The Player on the Other Side'' (Random House, 1963).  This novel was praised by critic [[H. R. F. Keating]]: "[I] had almost finished writing ''Crime and Mystery: The 100 Best Books'', in which I had included ''The Player on the Other Side''&nbsp;... placing the book squarely in the Queen canon"<ref name="KEAT">Keating, H. R. F. (1989). ''The Bedside Companion to Crime''. New York: Mysterious Press.</ref> when he learned that it had been written by Sturgeon. Similarly, William DeAndrea, author and winner of [[Mystery Writers of America]] awards, selecting his ten favorite mystery novels for the magazine ''Armchair Detective'', picked ''The Player on the Other Side'' as one of them.  He said: "This book changed my life&nbsp;... and made a raving mystery fan (and therefore ultimately a mystery writer) out of me.&nbsp;... The book must be 'one of the most skillful pastiches in the history of literature. An amazing piece of work, whomever did it'."<ref name="KEAT" />

Sturgeon wrote the screenplays for the ''[[Star Trek: The Original Series]]'' episodes "[[Shore Leave (Star Trek)|Shore Leave]]" (1966) and "[[Amok Time]]" (1967, adapted as a [[Bantam Books]] "Star Trek Fotonovel" in 1978).<ref name=isfdb/> The latter featured the first appearance of [[pon farr]], the [[Vulcan (Star Trek)|Vulcan]] mating ritual, the sentence "Live long and prosper"{{sfnp|Nimoy|1995|p=67}} and the [[Vulcan salute|Vulcan hand symbol]]. Sturgeon also wrote several more ''[[Star Trek: The Original Series|Star Trek]]'' scripts that were never produced. One of these first introduced the [[Prime Directive]]. 

Sturgeon also wrote an episode of the Saturday morning show ''[[Land of the Lost (1974 TV series)|Land of the Lost]]'', "[[The Pylon Express]]", in 1975. His 1944 novella ''[[Killdozer! (story)|Killdozer!]]'' was the inspiration for the 1974 [[Killdozer (film)|made-for-TV movie]], [[Marvel comic]] book, and [[Killdozer (band)|alternative rock band]] of the same name, as well as becoming the colloquial name for [[Marvin Heemeyer]]'s 2004 bulldozer rage incident.

===Later years===
Though Sturgeon continued to write through 1983, his work rate dipped noticeably in the later years of his life; a 1971 story collection entitled ''Sturgeon Is Alive and Well...'' addressed Sturgeon's seeming withdrawal from the public eye in a tongue-in-cheek manner. Two of his stories were adapted for the 1980s revival of ''[[The Twilight Zone (1985 TV series)|The Twilight Zone]]''. One, "[[A Saucer of Loneliness]]", was broadcast in 1986 and was dedicated to his memory. Another short story, "Yesterday Was Monday", was the inspiration for ''The Twilight Zone'' episode "[[A Matter of Minutes]]". 

Sturgeon played guitar and wrote music which he sometimes performed at [[science fiction convention]]s. He lived for several years in [[Springfield, Oregon]].<ref name=Portal>{{cite news |url= https://news.google.com/newspapers?id=LPFVAAAAIBAJ&pg=2474,2425068&dq |title= Famed author, award-winner, dies in Eugene |last= Portal |first= Ann |date= May 10, 1985 |work= [[The Register-Guard]] |location= Eugene, Oregon |access-date= 2011-06-20 |archive-date= 2021-03-04 |archive-url= https://web.archive.org/web/20210304063357/https://news.google.com/newspapers?id=LPFVAAAAIBAJ&pg=2474,2425068&dq |url-status= live }}</ref> He died on May 8, 1985, of [[lung fibrosis]], at [[Sacred Heart Medical Center University District|Sacred Heart General Hospital]] in the neighboring city of [[Eugene, Oregon|Eugene]].<ref name=Portal/> He had been a lifelong [[smoking pipe (tobacco)|pipe]] smoker and his death from lung fibrosis may have been caused by exposure to [[asbestos]] during his Merchant Marine years.

[[John Clute]] wrote in ''[[The Encyclopedia of Science Fiction]]'': "His influence upon writers like [[Harlan Ellison]] and [[Samuel R. Delany]] was seminal, and in his life and work he was a powerful and generally liberating influence in post-WWII US sf". He won comparatively few genre awards; one was the [[World Fantasy Award for Life Achievement]] from the 1985 World Fantasy Convention.<ref name=SFAwards/>

==Sturgeon's Law==
{{Main|Sturgeon's law}}
In 1957, Sturgeon coined what is now known as ''[[Sturgeon's Law]]'':

{{quote|Ninety percent of [science fiction] is crud, but then, ninety percent of ''everything'' is crud.<ref>{{cite web | url=https://archive.org/details/Venture_v01n05_1957-09_Gorgon776/page/n49/mode/2up | title=Venture v01n05 (1957 09) (Gorgon776) | date=September 1957 }}</ref>}}

This was originally known as ''Sturgeon's Revelation''; Sturgeon has said that "Sturgeon's Law" was originally

{{quote|Nothing is always absolutely so.{{Cite quote|date=July 2024}}}}

However, the former statement is now widely referred to as Sturgeon's Law. He is also known for his dedication to a credo of critical thinking that challenged all normative assumptions: "Ask the next question."<ref>{{cite web|url=https://christopher-mckitterick.com/Sturgeon-Campbell/Sturgeon-Q.htm |title=Ask the Next Question - Theodore Sturgeon }} </ref> This was the subject of an essay published in [[Cavalier Magazine]] in June 1967. He represented this credo by the symbol of a Q with an arrow through it, an example of which he wore around his neck and used as part of his signature in the last 15&nbsp;years of his life.<ref>{{cite web |url=https://physics.emory.edu/faculty/weeks/misc/duncan.html |title=The Push from Within: The Extrapolative Ability of Theodore Sturgeon}}</ref>

==Personal life==
;Wives and partners
Sturgeon was married three times, had two long-term committed relationships outside of marriage, divorced once, and fathered a total of seven children. His first wife was Dorothe Fillingame (married 1940, divorced 1945) with whom he had two daughters.{{cn|date=July 2024}} He was married to singer Mary Mair from 1949 until an annulment in 1951.{{cn|date=July 2024}} In 1953, he wed Marion McGahan with whom he had two sons and two daughters.<ref name="sturgeon196104">{{Cite magazine |last=Sturgeon |first=Theodore |date=April 1961 |title=Tandy's Story |url=https://archive.org/stream/Galaxy_v19n04_1961-04#page/n85/mode/1up |magazine=Galaxy Science Fiction |pages=170–194}}</ref> In 1969, he began living with Wina Golden, a journalist, with whom he had a son.{{sfnp|Sturgeon|1978|p=12}}

Finally, his last long-term committed relationship was with writer and educator Jayne Englehart Tannehill, with whom he remained until the time of his death. She joined Sturgeon at book signings for his collection ''Maturity'', and signed as "Jayne Sturgeon". Englehart had her own biological son prior to her partnership with Sturgeon, to whom Sturgeon became like a stepfather.{{cn|date=July 2024}}

;Relationship with Kurt Vonnegut
In 1965, [[Kurt Vonnegut]] devised the name of his fictional science-fiction writer [[Kilgore Trout]] as an obscure reference to Sturgeon's name.<ref>{{cite book | last1=Link | first1=Eric Carl | last2=Canavan | first2=Gerry | title=The Cambridge companion to American science fiction | publication-place=New York, NY | date=2015 | isbn=978-1-107-28060-1 | oclc=902771331 | doi = 10.1017/CCO9781107280601}}</ref> The two writers had become friends when Sturgeon moved to [[Truro, Massachusetts]] in 1957. Vonnegut described Trout as a notably unsuccessful writer, prolifically publishing hackwork only in pulp and pornographic magazines. Since the characterization was unflattering, it was not until after Sturgeon's death that Vonnegut explicitly acknowledged the connection; he stated in a 1987 interview that "Yeah, it said so in his obituary in ''[[The New York Times]]''. I was delighted that it said in the middle of it that he was the inspiration for the Kurt Vonnegut character of Kilgore Trout."<ref>[https://web.archive.org/web/20110716210548/http://www.vonnegutweb.com/vonnegutia/trout Kilgore Trout webpage]</ref> In 2000, Vonnegut wrote an admiring introduction to Volume VII of ''The Complete Stories of Theodore Sturgeon''.<ref> Sturgeon, Theodore (2000), ''A Saucer of Loneliness: Volume VII: The Complete Stories of Theodore Sturgeon''; Paul Williams (Editor), Kurt Vonnegut Jr. (Foreword); North Atlantic Books.</ref>

==Works==
===Novels===
* ''[[The Dreaming Jewels]]'' (1950) <small> Also published as ''The Synthetic Man'' </small>
* ''[[More Than Human]]'' (1953) <small>[[Fix-up]] of three linked novellas, the first and third written around ''[[Baby Is Three]]'' (Galaxy Science Fiction, October 1952)</small>
* ''[[The Cosmic Rape]]'' (1958) <small>A shorter version was published as ''To Marry Medusa''</small>
* ''[[Venus Plus X]]'' (1960)
* ''[[Some of Your Blood]]'' (1961)
* ''[[Godbody]]'' (1986) <small>Published posthumously</small>

====Novelizations====
Sturgeon, under his own name, was hired to write novelizations of the following movies based on their scripts (links go to articles about the movies):
* ''[[The King and Four Queens]]'' (1956)
* ''[[Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea]]'' (1961)  The book is described in ''[[Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea (novel)]]''.
* ''[[The Rare Breed]]'' (1966)

====Pseudonymous novels====
* ''[[I, Libertine]]'' (1956): Historical novel created as a for-hire hoax.  Credited to "Frederick R. Ewing", written from a premise by [[Jean Shepherd]].
* ''The Player on The Other Side'' (1963): Mystery novel credited to [[Ellery Queen]] and [[ghost-writer|ghost-written]] with Queen's assistance and supervision.

===Short stories===

Sturgeon published numerous short story collections during his lifetime, many drawing on his most prolific writing years of the 1940s and 1950s.

Note that some reprints of these titles (especially paperback editions) may cut one or two stories from the line-up.  Statistics herein refer to the original editions only.

====Collections published during Sturgeon's lifetime====

The following table includes sixteen volumes (one of them collecting [[Western (genre)|western]] stories).  These are considered "original" collections of Sturgeon material, in that they compiled previously uncollected stories.  However, some volumes did contain a few reprinted stories: this list includes books that collected only previously uncollected material, as well as those volumes that collected ''mostly'' new material, but also contained up to three stories (representing no more than half the book) that were previously published in a Sturgeon collection.

{| class="wikitable"
|-
! rowspan="2"| Title
! rowspan="2"| Year
! rowspan="2"| <small>Number <br /> of stories</small>
! rowspan="2"| <small>previously <br /> collected</small>
! colspan="2"| <small>Originally published</small>
|- style="font-size:smaller"
! Earliest story 
! Latest story
|-
|''[[Without Sorcery]]''
!1948
!13
|
|1939
|1947
|-
|''[[E Pluribus Unicorn]]''
!1953
!13
|
|1947
|1953
|-
|''A Way Home''
!1955
!11
|
|1946
|1955
|-
|''Caviar''
!1955
!7
| align=center | 1
|1941
|1955
|-
|''A Touch of Strange''
!1958
!11
|
|1953
|1958
|-
|''Aliens 4''
!1959
!4
|
|1944
|1958
|-
|''Beyond''
!1960
!6
|
|1941
|1960
|-
|''Sturgeon In Orbit''
!1964
!5
|
|1951
|1955
|-
|''Starshine''
!1966
!6
| align=center | 3
|1940
|1961
|-
|''Sturgeon Is Alive and Well ...''
!1971
!11
|
|1954
|1971
|-
|''The Worlds of Theodore Sturgeon''
!1972
!10
| align=center | 3
|1941
|1962
|-
| ''Sturgeon's West'' ([[Western (genre)|westerns]])
!1973
!7
|
| 1949 || 1973
|-
|''Case and the Dreamer''
!1974
! 3
|
|1962
|1973
|-
|''Visions and Venturers''
!1978
!8
| align=center | 1
|1942
|1965
|-
|''The Stars Are The Styx''
!1979
!10
| align=center | 1
| 1951 || 1971
|-
| ''The Golden Helix''
!1979
!10
| align=center | 3
| 1941 || 1973
|}

The following six collections consisted entirely of reprints of previously collected material:

{| class="wikitable"
|-
! rowspan="2"| Title
! rowspan="2"| Year
! colspan="3"| Stories
! rowspan="2"| Notes
|- style="font-size:smaller"
! Number
! Earliest
! Latest
|-
|''Thunder and Roses''
!1957
!8
| 1946
| 1955
| selected from 11 in 1955's "A Way Home"
|-
|''Not Without Sorcery''
!1961
!8
| 1939
| 1941
| selected from 13 in 1948's [[Without Sorcery]]
|-
|''The Joyous Invasions''
!1965
!3
| 1955
| 1958
| selected from 4 in 1959's "Aliens 4"
|-
|''To Here and the Easel''
!1973
!6
| 1941 || 1958
|-
|''Maturity''
!1979
!3
| 1947 || 1958
|-
|''Alien Cargo''
!1984
!14
| 1940 || 1956
|}

====Complete short stories====
[[North Atlantic Books]] released the chronologically assembled ''The Complete Short Stories of Theodore Sturgeon'', edited by [[Paul Williams (Crawdaddy! creator)|Paul Williams]]. The series consisted of 13 volumes published between 1994 and 2010. Introductions were provided by [[Harlan Ellison]], [[Samuel R. Delany]], [[Kurt Vonnegut]], [[Gene Wolfe]], [[Connie Willis]], [[Jonathan Lethem]], and others. Extensive story notes were provided by [[Paul Williams (Crawdaddy! creator)|Paul Williams]] and, in the last two volumes, Sturgeon's daughter Noël.

* Volume I – ''The Ultimate Egoist'' (1937 to 1940)
* Volume II – ''Microcosmic God'' (1940 to 1941)
* Volume III – ''Killdozer'' (1941 to 1946)
* Volume IV – ''Thunder and Roses'' (1946 to 1948)
* Volume V – ''The Perfect Host'' (1948 to 1950)
* Volume VI – ''Baby is Three'' (1950 to 1952)
* Volume VII – ''A Saucer of Loneliness'' (1953)
* Volume VIII – ''Bright Segment'' (1953 to 1955, as well as two "lost" stories from 1946)
* Volume IX – ''And Now the News...'' (1955 to 1957)
* Volume X – ''The Man Who Lost the Sea'' (1957 to 1960)
* Volume XI – ''The Nail and the Oracle'' (1961 to 1969)
* Volume XII – ''Slow Sculpture'' (1970 to 1972, plus one 1954 novella and one unpublished story)
* Volume XIII – ''Case and The Dreamer'' (1972 to 1983, plus one 1960 story and three unpublished stories)

===Representative short stories===
Sturgeon was best known for his short stories and novellas. The best-known include:
* "Ether Breather" (September 1939, his first published science-fiction story)
* "Derm Fool" (March 1940)
* "[[It! (story)|It]]" (August 1940)
* "[[Shottle Bop]]" (February 1941)
* "[[Microcosmic God]]" (April 1941)
* "Yesterday Was Monday" (1941)
* "[[Killdozer! (story)|Killdozer!]]" (November, 1944)
* "Maturity" (February, 1947)
* "Bianca's Hands" (May, 1947)
* "Thunder and Roses" (November 1947)
* "The Perfect Host" (November 1948)
* "It Wasn't Syzygy" (January 1948)
* "Minority Report" (June 1949, no connection to the [[Minority Report (film)|2002 movie]], which was based on a later story by [[Philip K. Dick]])
* "One Foot and the Grave" (September 1949)
* "[[Baby Is Three]]" (October 1952)
* "[[A Saucer of Loneliness]]" (February 1953)
* "[[The World Well Lost]]" (June 1953)
* "Mr. Costello, Hero" (December 1953)
* "The [Widget], The [Wadget], and Boff" (1955)
* "The Skills of Xanadu" (July 1956)
* "The Other Man" (September 1956)
* "And Now The News" (December 1956)
* "The Girl Had Guts" (January 1957)
* "[[The Man Who Lost the Sea]]" (October 1959)
* "Need" (1960)
* "How to Forget Baseball" (''[[Sports Illustrated]]'', December 1964)
* "The Nail and the Oracle" (''[[Playboy]]'', October 1964)
* "[[If All Men Were Brothers, Would You Let One Marry Your Sister?]]" (1967, ''[[Dangerous Visions]]'' anthology edited by [[Harlan Ellison]])—[[Nebula Award]] 1967 Nominee Novella
* "The Man Who Learned Loving"—[[Nebula Award]] 1969 Nominee Short Story
* "[[Slow Sculpture]]" (''[[Galaxy (magazine)|Galaxy]]'', February 1970) — winner of a [[Hugo Award]] and a [[Nebula Award]]
* "Occam's Scalpel" (August, 1971, with an introduction by [[Terry Carr]])
* "Vengeance Is." (1980, ''Dark Forces'' anthology edited by Kirby McCauley)

===Autobiography===
* ''Argyll: A Memoir'' (pamphlet, Sturgeon Project, 1993), an autobiographical sketch about Sturgeon's relationship with his stepfather. Introduction by his editor Paul Williams. Afterword by [[Samuel R. Delany]]. Cover art by [[Paul Williams (Crawdaddy! creator)#Family|Donna Nassar]]. The memoir, written for his psychotherapist, has many suggestions about his life, starting from his family's move from Staten Island to Philadelphia when his stepfather got a job at Drexel University and Sturgeon and his brother were still in the local public school to their attempts to catch poison ivy to delay the move—"Then we moved to Philadelphia, a little apartment on 34 Street with a sort of sun room, which was Argyll's study and had a single couch which was his and Mother's bed, and a kind of living room with a kitchenette built into one wall, where we slept on the floor on mattresses."— and his father's treatment of a puppy he couldn't discipline—"... he used to whip her with a wire after rubbing her nose in it—so he got rid of her" (p. 14). These go on to include Sturgeon's first gay experiences in his 14th year—"So [20-year-old] Bert blew me practically continuously from Friday evening until dinner time Sunday; we kept score and I came 14 times. Sweet are the uses of respectability. My God! It never occurred to me until this minute that Dr. Taft was probably the one—the only one, as sole mentor, who could possibly have insured Argyll's total ignorance!" (p.&nbsp;52); and in his long letter to his mother and Argyll, included in the same volume, Sturgeon harshly critiques his first novel, ''[[The Dreaming Jewels]]'': "My use of one detested Argyll would have been fine, but one wasn't enough; there had to be two, and as a result the balance of the work was destroyed and its literary worth was lost in vengeful polemic" (p. 62).

==See also==
{{Portal |Speculative fiction }}
* [[Theodore Sturgeon Award]]
* [[Golden Age of Science Fiction]]

== References ==
=== Citations ===
{{Reflist |refs=
<ref name=isfdb>
{{isfdb name |56}} (ISFDB). Retrieved 2013-04-18.</ref>

<!-- some awards refs -->
<ref name=SFAwards>
[http://www.locusmag.com/SFAwards/Db/NomLit133.html#5050 "Sturgeon, Theodore"] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20121016200141/http://locusmag.com/SFAwards/Db/NomLit133.html |date=2012-10-16 }}. ''The Locus Index of SF Awards: Index to Literary Nominees''. [[Locus Publications]]. Retrieved 2013-03-26.</ref>
<ref name=sfhof-old>[http://www.midamericon.org/halloffame/ "Science Fiction and Fantasy Hall of Fame"] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130521070009/http://www.midamericon.org/halloffame/ |date=2013-05-21 }}. Mid American Science Fiction and Fantasy Conventions, Inc. Retrieved 2013-03-26. This was the official website of the hall of fame to 2004.</ref>
}}

=== Cited sources ===
{{refbegin}}
*{{cite book |last=Moskowitz |first=Samuel |chapter=Theodore Sturgeon |title=Seekers of Tomorrow: Masters of Modern Science Fiction |place=Westport, Connecticut |publisher=Hyperion Press |year=1974 |orig-year=1965 |pages=229–248 |isbn=978-0-88355-129-5 |chapter-url=https://archive.org/details/seekersoftomorro00mosk/page/228}} An overview of Sturgeon's work to 1965.
*{{cite book| first=Leonard| last=Nimoy| title=I Am Spock| publisher=Hyperion| location=New York| year=1995| isbn=978-0-7868-6182-8| url=https://archive.org/details/iamspock00nimo |url-access=registration}}
*{{cite book | first=Theodore| last=Sturgeon | title=Sturgeon Is Alive and Well... |publisher=[[Pocket Books]] |location=New York |year=1978 | isbn= 0-671-81415-X}}
{{refend}}

== Further reading ==
{{refbegin}}
*{{cite book | first=Theodore| last=Sturgeon | title=Slow Sculpture: Volume XII: The Complete Stories of Theodore Sturgeon| location=Berkeley, CA| year=2009 | isbn= 978-1-55643-834-9 |ref=none}}
{{refend}}

==External links==
{{Wikiquote}}
* [http://www.physics.emory.edu/~weeks/misc/sturgeon.html The Theodore Sturgeon Page] - an informative and comprehensive fan site
* [http://www.theodoresturgeontrust.com The Theodore Sturgeon Literary Trust] – owners of Sturgeon copyrights, information on Sturgeon publications
* Theodore Sturgeon Papers ([http://hdl.handle.net/10407/6860068304 MS 303] and [http://hdl.handle.net/10407/3174061459 MS 254]) housed at the [http://spencer.lib.ku.edu/ Kenneth Spencer Research Library], University of Kansas
* {{sfhof |957 | Theodore Sturgeon}}
* {{isfdb name |56}}
* {{IBList|type=author|id=843|name=Theodore Sturgeon}}
* {{IMDb name|0836318}}
* {{Gutenberg author | id=55048 | name=Theodore Sturgeon}}
{{Memoryalpha}}
* [https://www.freesfonline.net/authors/Theodore_Sturgeon.html Theodore Sturgeon's online fiction] at Free Speculative Fiction Online
* [http://www.sfsite.com/gary/stur01.htm Gary Westfahl's Biographical Encyclopedia of Science Fiction Film]
* [http://efanzines.com/SFC/SteamEngineTime/SET13.pdf The Work of Theodore Sturgeon] – lengthy biographical and critical study of Sturgeon

{{Theodore Sturgeon}}
{{Hugo Award Best Novella}}
{{Hugo Award Best Short Story 1961–1980}}
{{Inkpot Award 1970s}}
{{Nebula Award Best Novelette}}
{{World Fantasy Award Life Achievement}}

{{Authority control}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:Sturgeon, Theodore}}
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