While Campbell is best known for certain settings and kinds of characters--both somewhat autobiographical--his novels and hundreds of short stories show a range that belies that simple reputation. His protagonists are generally everyday people, but may be male or female, of all ages from children to the elderly; they do tend to be working or middle class, but that is not universal.
Campbell is a presence at many science-fiction and horror conventions, frequent presenter of public readings and lectures, and president of the British Fantasy Society and the Society of Fantastic Films. Winter described Campbell in 1985: "He has the appearance of a displaced child, with a wide, smiling, boyish face" and "perennially twinkling" eyes. If he had not become a writer of horror fiction, Campbell told Winter, he might have become a stand-up comedian; and even his most grim fiction includes puns and other wordplay.
Yet, if one were to invent a stereotyped childhood for an author of horror fiction, one could hardly outdo Campbell's, as described in "At the Back of My Mind: A Guided Tour," his introduction to the 1983 Scream/ Press edition of The Face That Must Die.
This is a free page. This page contains 146 words. This
biography contains 5,405 words (approx. 18 pages at 300
words per page).
Read the rest of this Biography with our (John) Ramsey Campbell Access Pass.
