Robert Bloch

At 77 years old, Robert Bloch physical status not available right now. We will update Robert Bloch's height, weight, eye color, hair color, build, and measurements.

Robert Albert Bloch (April 5, 1917 – September 23, 1994) was an American fiction writer, primarily of crime, horror, science fiction, and science fiction, born in Milwaukee, Wisconsin.

He is best known as the author of Psycho (1959), the basis for Alfred Hitchcock's film of the same name.

His fondness for a pun is evident in the titles of his story collections, such as Tales in a Jugular Vein, Screams Are Made Of and Out of Mouths of Graves. Bloch wrote hundreds of short stories and over 30 novels.

He was one of the youngest members of the Lovecraft Circle and began writing professionally right after graduating, aged 17.

He was a protégé of H. P. Lovecraft, the first to seriously promote his talent.

However, while Bloch began his career by immulating Lovecraft and his brand of "cosmic horror," he later concentrated on crime and horror stories with a more psychological outlook. Bloch began contributing to pulp magazines like Weird Tales early in his career, and he was also a prolific screenwriter and a key contributor to science fiction fanzines and fandom in general. He received the Hugo Award (for his book "That Hell-Bound Train"), the Bram Stoker Award, and the World Fantasy Award.

He served as president of the Mystery Writers of America (1970) and was a member of the Society of Science Fiction Writers of America, the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, and the Count Dracula Society.

Bloch's essay "The Shambles of Ed Gein" (1962) was selected for inclusion in the Library of America's two-century retrospective of American true crime.

His work has been heavily adapted to films, television series, comedies, and audiobooks.

Early life and education

Bloch was born in Chicago and the son of Raphael "Ray" Bloch (1884–1952), a bank cashier, and his partner Stella Loeb (1880-1944), both of German Jewish descent, was born in Chicago. When Bloch was five, his family moved to Maywood, a Chicago suburb,; he lived there until he was ten. Despite his parents' Jewish roots and attending Emerson Grammar School, he attended the Methodist Church there. He attended (alone at night) a screening of Lon Chaney, Sr.'s film The Phantom of the Opera (1925), aged eight years old, in Maywood, England. The scene of Chaney removing his mask terrified the young Bloch ("it scared the living hell out of me and I ran all the way home to experience the first of about two years of recurrent nightmares." It also ignited his fear of terror. Bloch was a precocious boy and found himself in fourth grade when he was eight years old. He also obtained a pass to the adult section of the public library, where he read omnivorously. Bloch thought he was a budding artist and worked in pencil sketching and watercolors, but myopia in adolescence seemed to effectively ban art as a career. He had a passion for lead toy soldiers made in Germany and silent cinema.

Bloch's father Ray Bloch lost his bank job and the family moved to Milwaukee, where Stella worked at the Milwaukee Jewish Settlement settlement house. Robert graduated from Washington, then Lincoln High School, where he met lifelong friend Harold Gauer. Gauer, the literary magazine in Lincoln, was published in The Quill, Lincoln, and Bloch's first published short story titled "The Thing" was accepted by Bloch's first published short story, a horror story about "The Thing" (the "thing" in the title). Both Bloch and Gauer graduated from Lincoln in 1934 during the Great Depression. Bloch was a student at Lincoln's Drama Department and performed and appeared in school vaudeville skits.

Personal life

Bloch married Marion Ruth Holcombe on October 2, 1940; it was reportedly a marriage of convenience designed to discourage Bloch from serving in the army. She had (initiously undiagnosed) tuberculosis of the bone during her marriage, which impaired her ability to walk.

Bloch, a Milwaukee, Grafton, was born in 1953 and relocated to Weyauwega, Marion's home town, so she could be close to friends and family. Although she was eventually free of tuberculosis, Bloch and Bloch divorced in 1963. Sally Bloch's daughter (born 1943) stayed with him.

Bloch married Eleanor ("Elly") Alexander (née Zalisko), who had lost her first husband, writer/producer John Alexander, to a heart attack three months earlier, and married her in a civil ceremony on October 16, 1964. Elly, a fashion model and cosmetician, was a fashion model and cosmetician. They honeymooned in Tahiti and then moved to London in 1965, then British Columbia. They were happily married until Bloch's death. Elly remained in the Los Angeles area for many years after hawking their Laurel Canyon Home to Bloch fans, later moving to Canada to be closer to her own family. She died on March 7, 2007, at the Betel Home in Selkirk, Manitoba, Canada. Her ashes were displayed in a similar book-shaped urn at Pierce Brothers in Westwood, California, next to Bloch's.

Bloch died on September 23, 1994, after a long fight with cancer at the age of 77. Frank Belknap Long, another member of the original "Lovecraft Circle", died within seven months.

In the Room of Prayer columbarium at Westwood Village Memorial Park Cemetery in Los Angeles, Bloch was cremated and his ashes laid in. Elly, his wife, is also interred there.

At the annual Necronomicon convention, the Robert Bloch Award is given. S.T., editor and scholar, was the recipient of the 2013 award. Joshi is a young guy from the United States. In H. P. Lovecraft's "The Haunter of the Dark" story, the award is named after the Shining Trapezohedron.

Source

Career

Bloch, a avid reader of Weird Tales, a pulp magazine that he began at the age of ten in 1927, was a prolific reader of the pulp magazine. His aunt, along with his parents and aunt Lil, had offered him any magazine he wanted, but she refused to buy Weird Tales (Aug 1927 issue) off the newsstand after her shocked protest. With the first instalment of Otis Adelbert Kline's "The Bride of Osiris," he began his readings of the magazine, which dealt with a mystery Egyptian city named Karneter, which was located underneath Bloch's birth city of Chicago. The 1930s were the worst depression to date. In accepting the Lifetime Achievement Award at the First World Fantasy Convention (1975), he recalled how "times were very difficult." In a day when most pulp magazines cost no more than twenty dollars, Weird Tales cost twenty-five cents per page. I'll never forget that meant a lot to me." He went on to explain how he would get up early on the last day of the month with twenty-five cents saved from his monthly allowance of one dollar, and that the latest Weird Tales issue would be published under his jacket, often taking it home under his jacket. Hugh Doak Rankin's sexy covers for the magazine attracted his parents, and when the Bloch family moved to Milwaukee in 1928, they gradually lost interest. However, by the time he had started high school, he was back to reading Weird Tales during flu season.

H. P. Lovecraft, a frequent contributor to Weird Tales, is one of his favorite writers. In Weird Tales for October 1927, Lovecraft's first of Lovecraft's stories he had read was "Pickman's Model." "I was coerced to squirm my way into the lives of Oliver Wendell Holmes, James Lowell, and Henry Wadsworth Longfellow." The ghouls ate all three of them in 'Pickman's Model'. Now that was poetic justice, I thought." Bloch wrote a fan letter to Lovecraft (1933), asking where he could find copies of earlier Lovecraft's stories that Bloch had missed as a child. Lovecraft lent them to him. Lovecraft gave Bloch advise on his early fiction writing attempts, asking if Bloch had written any weird stuff and if so, where he might have seen samples of it. In late April 1933, Bloch accepted Lovecraft's offer, giving him two short items, "The Gallows," and another work whose name is uncertain.

Bloch wrote to other members of the Lovecraft Circle, including August Derleth, R. H. Barlow, Clark Ashton Smith, Donald Wandton Smith, Donald Wandel, E. Whitehead, Henry S. Whitehead, Bernard Austin Dwyer, and J. Vernon Shea. "Le Laughter of a Young Ghoul" and "The Black Lotus" were two of Bloch's first published stories. These were sent by Bloch to Weird Tales, but editor Farnsworth Wright summarily rejected them all. In addition, Bloch successfully placed "Lilies" in the semi-professional magazine Marvel Tales (Winter 1934) and "Black Lotus" in Unusual Stories (1935). "I thought I'd better do something different or I'd end up as a florist," Bloch later said.

Bloch graduated from high school in June 1934. He wrote a tale that was sold to Weird Tales just six weeks later. A letter from Bloch's first appearance in Weird Tales was a letter criticizing Robert E. Howard's Conan stories. The short stories "The Feast in the Abbey" and "The Secret in the Tomb" were his first professional sales, aged 17 (July 1934). In the January 1935 issue, "Feast..." appeared first, but "The Secret in the Tomb" appeared in the May 1935 Weird Tales;

Bloch's friendship with Derleth culminated in a trip to Derleth's home in Sauk City, Wisconsin (the Arkham House's headquarters). Bloch was impressed by Derleth's "fulfilling my hopes as a writer" by wearing this purple velvet smoking jacket. That made me even more impressed because Derleth's first name didn't even smoke." Bloch went to Chicago and spoke with Farnsworth Wright, the then editor of Weird Tales, as a result of all this and continued correspondence with Lovecraft. Otto Binder, the first Weird Tales writer outside of Derleth, whom he had never met before.

Lovecraft had a major influence on Bloch's early stories. Well, a number of his stories were set in and extended the Cthulhu Mythos world. "The Dark Demon" (written after Lovecraft's style) and "The Unspeakable Betrothal" (vaguely attached to the Cthulhu Mythos) are among these. For example, Bloch invented the oft-cited Mythos texts De Vermis Mysteriis and Cultes des Goules. Several other Lovecraft stories were also included in Bloch's collection Mysteries of the Worm (now in its third, expanded version). Bloch wrote the story "Satan's Servants," on which Lovecraft gave some advice, but no of the prose appeared in print until 1949, in Something About Cats and Other Pieces.

In Lovecraft's story "The Haunter of the Dark" (1936), the teenage Bloch appears, thinly disguised as the character Robert Blake. Bloch is dedicated to Bloch. Bloch was the only one to whom Lovecraft ever dedicated a story. Lovecraft kills Robert Blake, the Bloch-based character, for "courtesy" Bloch's 1935 tale "The Shambler from the Stars," in which the Lovecraft-inspired figure dies; the story goes even further than using Bloch's then-current address (620 East Knapp Street) in Milwaukee. (Bloch even had a signed certificate from Lovecraft [and some of his creations] allowing Bloch permission to murder Lovecraft off in a tale.) "I don't know who else I'd rather be killed by," Bloch later remembered. Bloch wrote a new story "The Shadow from the Steeple," picking up where "The Haunter of the Dark" had begun (Weird Tales, September 1950).

Lovecraft's death in 1937 deeply affected Bloch, who was then only 20 years old. "Parts of me died with him," the singer said, not because he was not a god, but because he had so little fame in his own lifetime." No novels or collections had been published, and there was no such thing as a great discovery of what was lost even here in Providence. "The news of his destiny came to me as a shattering blow," Elsewhere wrote, and the world at large ignored his death. Only my parents and a few journalists seemed to understand my indignation and my suspicion that a piece of me had died with him."

Bloch began writing for Weird Tales in 1937, where he became one of the nation's most popular writers. In addition, he began contributing to other pulps, such as the science fiction magazine Amazing Stories. Bloch's imagination widened the scope of his story. Voodoo ("Mother of Serpents"), the conte cruel ("The Mandarin's Canaries"), demonic possession ("Fiddler's Fee"), and black magic ("Return to the Sabbat") were among his horror themes. In 1937, Bloch visited Henry Kuttner in California. "The Secret of the Observatory," Bloch's first science fiction tale, was published in Amazing Stories (August 1938).

Stanley Weinbaum, Ralph Milne Farley, and Raymond A. Palmer all attended The Milwaukee Fictioneers' group in 1935, 1936-1978 Bloch. Gustav Marx, a fellow of the company, sold Bloch's copy to his media company while still allowing Bloch to write stories in his spare time in the office. Bloch was close friends with C. L. Moore and her partner Henry Kuttner, who visited him in Milwaukee.

Bloch appeared in dramatic performances, both writing and performing in his own scripts, during the years of depression. He sold some gags to radio comedians Stoopnagle and Budd, and Roy Atwell around 1936. Heard Tales' "The Grinning Ghoul" appeared in Weird Tales (June) in 1936; "The Opener of the Way" appeared in Weird Tales (Oct); "Mother of Serpents" appeared in the December issue. Lovecraft's "The Haunter of the Dark," a young author "Robert Blake," was also included in the December issue.

"The Mannikin" appeared in Weird Tales in 1937, following Lovecraft's death. In July 1938, Weird Tales published "Return to the Sabbath." "The Secret of the Observatory," Bloch's first science fiction tale, appeared in Amazing Stories (Aug 1938). Bloch described himself as "tall, dark, and unhandsome" with "all the charm and personality of a swamp adder" in a blog accompanying this tale. He wrote, "I hate everything," but reserved a particular dislike for "bean soup, red nail polish, house-cleaning, and optimists."

Bloch was first contacted by James Doolittle, who was directing the campaign for Mayor of Milwaukee, who was also representing a little-known assistant city attorney named Carl Zeidler in 1939. In collaboration with his longtime friend Harold Gauer, he was offered to assist Zeidler's speechwriting, promotion, and photo shooting. They produced elaborate campaign shows; in Bloch's 1993 autobiography, Once Around the Bloch, he gives an inside look at the campaign and the changes he and Gauer introduced, for example, the first releasing-balloons-from-the-ceiling ruse. He explains vehemently how people were dismissed and not even paid their promised salaries after Zeidler's victory. He brings the tale to a snarkily philosophical conclusion: he has come to an end.

Both "The Strange Flight of Richard Clayton" (Amazing Stories, August) and "The Cloak" were published in 1939. Many of Bloch's stories were published in Strange Stories in 1939 as a result of 'Tarleton Fiske''s fantasy/horror hybrids of the contes cruels form.

In October 1941, the story "A Good Knight's Job" in Unknown Worlds first appeared. Lefty Feep, a Damon Runyon-esque comedic series character, appeared in the story "Time Wounds All Heels" Fantastic Adventures (April 1942). The bulk of Bloch's over 100 stories were published in the first decade of his career, as well as Weird Tales. He began working at the Gustav Marx Advertising Agency as an advertising copywriter, a position he held until 1953. In the tense days, Marx encouraged Bloch to write stories in the office. Bloch's first collection of 23 Lefty Feep stories in Fantastic Adventures was published in 1950, but the majority were published during World War II. Feep's character name had actually been invented by Bloch's friend/collaborator Harold Gauer for their unpublished book In the Land of Sky-Blue Ointments, Bloch's collaborator/collaborator Harold Gauer spent time in local vaudeville and tried to venture into writing for nationally known actors.

Bloch gradually evolved from Lovecraftian imitatements to a modern, original design. "Yours Truly, Jack the Ripper," one of the first strictly "Blochian" stories (Weird Tales, July 1943). Bloch's take on the Jack the Ripper legend was filled with more accurate factual information of the case than many other fictional treatments. It depicted the Ripper as an immortal being who must make human sacrifices in order to extend his immortality. It was both radio (in Stay Tuned for Terror) and television (as an episode of Thriller adapted by Barré Lyndon in 1961). Bloch continued to this tale with the following quotes: "Iron Mask," 1944), the Marquis de Sade ("The Skull of the Marquis de Sade") and Lizzie Borden ("Lizzie Borden Took an Axe") -- 1946).

"You Truly Jack the Ripper," by Laird Cregar in 1944, was broadcast on a coast-to-coast radio network.

Bloch was asked to write 39 15-minute episodes of his own radio horror show Stay Tuned for Terror, near the end of World War II in 1945. Many of the programs were based on his own pulp stories. (All episodes were broadcast, but recordings were believed to be missing.) However, two episodes, "The Bogeyman Will Get You" and "Lizzie Borden Took an Axe," were rediscovered in 2020 amongst an old-time radio enthusiast's archives. (These episodes have also been released on YouTube and the Internet Archive)[2] ][1]][2]] "The Skull of the Marquis de Sade" was published in the same year as last year (Weird Tales, Sept.). The Opener of the Way, August Derleth's publisher, published Bloch's first collection of short stories, The Opener of the Way, in a limited edition of 2,000 copies, with jacket art by Ronald Clyne. "Yours Truly, Jack the Ripper," his best-known early story, gained a lot of attention thanks to dramatization on radio and reprinting in anthologies. This tale, which involves a Ripper who has found literal immortality in his crimes, has been heavily imitated (or plagiarized); Bloch himself will return to the theme (see below). "Enoch" was among the stories published in 1946 (Weird Tales, Sept.) and Lizzie Borden Took an Axe (Weird Tales, Nov.)

Bloch's first book was published in hardcover – The Scarf (The Dial Press, 1947; the Fawcett Gold medal paperback of 1966 features a new text). It tells the tale of a writer named Daniel Morley, who uses real women as models for his characters. However, when he's finished writing the story, he's immediately compelled to murder them, and in the same way: with the maroon scarf he has worn since childhood. The tale begins in Minneapolis and follows him and his corpses to Chicago, New York City, and finally Hollywood, where his hit novel will be turned into a film and where his self-control may have surpassed its limits.

Bloch was the Guest of Honor at Torcon I, the World Science Fiction Convention in Toronto, Canada, in 1948. "Lucy Comes to Stay" was published in 1952 (Weird Tales, Jan. During the 1950s, Bloch introduced the "Auction Bloch" at science fiction conventions, a trend in which fans bid on professionals, buying an hour of their time. Bloch will auction an hour of a well-known writer's time at a convention to raise money for a worthy cause. (The winner had an hour of personal interaction with the writer at the convention.)

[3]

Bloch published three books in 1954, including Spiderweb, The Kidnapper, and The Will to Kill, as he continued to help his family. He appeared on the television quiz show It's a Draw each year. Shooting Star (1958), a mainstream book, was released in a double volume with Bloch's collection Terror in the Night. This Crowded Earth (1958) was science fiction.

Bloch continued to have his fiction published in Amazing, Wonderful, Science Fiction, and Fantastic Universe, with the demise of Weird Tales; he was a frequent contributor to Imagination and Imaginative Tales. His thriller output soared and he began to appear in The Saint, Ellery Queen, and other mystery journals, as well as other suspense and horror-fiction magazine projects as Shock.

Bloch's Jack the Ripper theme was revisited. His contribution to Harlan Ellison's 1967 science fiction anthology "A Toy for Juliette" was a tale that brought together both Jack the Ripper and the Marquis de Sade in a time travel tale. Ellison's sequel to it, "The Prowler in the City at the Edge of the World," was included in the same anthology. In Bloch's contribution to the original Star Trek series episode "Wolf in the Fold," his earlier conception of the Ripper as an immortal being resurfaced. Inspector Frederick Abberline's probe into the assassination of the Ripper takes place during Queen Victoria's reign, including Sir Arthur Conan Doyle.

Bloch received the Hugo Award for Best Short Story for his "That Hellbound Train" in 1959, the same year that his sixth book, Psycho, was released. Bloch had written "The Real Bad Friend," a short story about dissociative identity disorder that appeared in the Mike Shayne Mystery Magazine in February 2005, which foreshadowed the 1959 book Psycho. Psychologically, on the other hand, has thematic connections to the story "Lucy Comes to Stay." Bloch delivered a lecture titled "Imagination and Modern Social Criticism" at the University of Chicago in 1959; it was reprinted in the critical volume The Science Fiction Novel (Advent Publishers). In May, his story "The Hungry Eye" appeared in Fantastic (May). Despite having graduated from painting watercolours to oils, he gave up completely painting this year.

Norman Bates, the main character in Psycho, was based on two people. Ed Gein, the true-life serial killers, was the first victim of whom Bloch later wrote "The Shambles of Ed Gein," a fictionalized account. (The tale can be found in Crimes and Punishments: The Lost Bloch, Volume 3.) Second, several people, including Noel Carter (wife of Lin Carter) and Chris Steinbrunner, as well as Bloch himself, have confirmed that Norman Bates was partially based on Calvin Beck, the publisher of Castle of Frankenstein. In the film Ed Gein: The Ghoul of Plainfield, Bloch's baseding of Norman Bates on Ed Gein is discussed. Disc 2 of the DVD release of the remake of The Texas Chainsaw Massacre (2003) discusses Bloch's character on Ed Gein. Bloch, on the other hand, said it was the situation itself – a mass murderer living in a typical small town in middle America – rather than Gein's tale. "Thoroughly, the real-life murderer was not the role model for my character Norman Bates," he says. Ed Gein didn't own or run a motel. Ed Gein didn't kill anyone in the shower. Ed Gein wasn't into taxidermy. Ed Gein did not shampoon his mother, held her body in the house, dress in a drag outfit, or adopt a different image. Norman Bates' functions and characteristics were listed above, but Norman Bates' Norman Bates didn't exist until I made him up. I'm sure the reason so many people want to take showers with me is out of my own imagination, rather than out of my own.

Despite that Bloch was unaware of the film adaptation of Joseph Stefano's novel, he was to become the country's most popular author. In 1961, Bloch was given a special Mystery Writers of America scroll for his book.

The book is one of the first examples of Bloch's complete horror relying on the horrors of interior psychology rather than the supernatural. In an interview with Douglas E. Winter, Bloch explained that "I had really mined the vein of ordinary supernatural themes before it had become varicose." "I knew, as a result of what went on during World War II and of reading the more widely disseminated psychology research, that the true horror lies in our own skulls, not in the shadows." Although Bloch was not the first horror writer to use a psychological approach (it appears in the works of Edgar Allan Poe), Bloch's modern times psychoanalysis was remarkably different.

Harry Altshuler, Bloch's agent, received a "blind bid" for the book, though the buyer's name was not revealed – the price for the book was $7,500. Bloch accepted the bid, which was eventually worth $9,500. Bloch had never sold a book to Hollywood before. Simon & Schuster's deal included no compensation for a film purchase. According to his employment, the publisher received 15 percent, while the agent took his 10%; Bloch took home $6,750 before taxes. Bloch received no further financial compensation despite the huge profits made by Hitchcock's film.

Only Hitchcock's film was based on Bloch's book. The later films in Bloch's Psycho series have no connection to either of Bloch's sequel books. Actually, Bloch's script for the film Psycho II was rejected by the studio (as were many other submissions), and it was here that he later adapted for his own sequel book.

Alfred Hitchcock's film adaptation of Psycho (2010) tells the tale. Although Bloch and his book are discussed in the film, Bloch is not a fictional character in the story.

Bloch had multiple television jobs since moving to Hollywood around 1960. However, he was not allowed to write for five months during the Writers Guild's strike. He became a regular script writer for television and film projects in the mystery, suspense, and horror genres after the strike ended. He started with the Macdonald Carey car, Lock-Up, (penning five episodes), as well as one for Whispering Smith. An episode of Bus Stop ("I Kiss Your Shadow"), ten episodes of Thriller (1960–62, many based on his own tales, were among Alfred Hitchcock Presents' (1960–62). Nightmares is a short story collection published by Arkham House in 1960.

Bloch wrote the screenplay for The Cabinet of Caligari (1962), which is only vaguely related to the 1920 German silent film, and it was an uncomfortable one. Bloch wrote the story and teleplay "The Sorcerer's Apprentice" for Alfred Hitchcock Presents in the same year. The episode was shelved when the NBC Television Network and Sponsor Revlon announced the cancellation of Revlon as "too gruesome" (by 1960s standards) for airing. Bloch was ecstatic when the episode was included in the program's syndication service to affiliate stations, where no single complaint was submitted. Due to public domain status, the episode is now available in many home media packages, as well as on demand.

Bloch's fictional output was not slowed by his television work. Harlan Ellison, then an editor at Regency Books, contributed to the first 1,200 words in the early 1960s. Several works in 1962 were published in book form. The Couch (1962) by Bloch (the basis for the screenplay of his first film, which was shot the same year) was published. Several Bloch short story collections, Atoms and Evil, More Nightmares, and Yours – Jack the Ripper was released in this year, as well as another book, Terror (whose working titles included Amok and Kill for Kali). Editor Earl Kemp assembled a collection of Bloch's most popular fan magazines as The Eight Stage of Fandom: Selections From 25 Years of Fan Fiction (Advent Publishers). "What Bloch did with books like The Deadbeat, The Scarf, Firebug, Psychos, and The Couch was to re-discover the suspense novel and reimagine the antihero, as first discovered by James Cain."

Bloch's first two collections of short stories, Bogey men, and Horror-7 were published in 1963. Bloch married Eleanor Alexander in 1964 and wrote original screenplays for two films produced and directed by William Castle, Strait-Jacket (1964) and The Night Walker (1965), as well as The Skull (1965). The second film was based on his short story "The Skull of the Marquis de Sade."

Bloch's later TV writing in this period included The Alfred Hitchcock Hour (7 episodes, 1962–1965), I Spy (1 episode, 1966), Run for Your Life (1 episode, 1966), and The Girl from U.N.C.L.E. 1967 (one episode): A.K.A. "What Are Little Girls Made Of?" He wrote three scripts for the original Star Trek series, which were broadcast in 1966 and 1967: "What Are Little Girls Made Of?" "Wolf in the Fold" (another Jack the Ripper version) and "Catspaw" were among the "Catspaw" characters in "Wolf in the Fold" (another Jack the Ripper version).

Bloch, who appeared in 1968, appeared in London for two episodes of the English Hammer Films series Journey to the Unknown for Twentieth Century Fox, which was directed by the author. In the American TV film Journey to Midnight (1968), one of the episodes, "The Indian Spirit Guide," was included. The other episode was titled "Girl of My Dreams," co-scripted with Michael J. Bird and based on Richard Matheson's eponymous tale.

He wrote the screenplays for five feature films produced by Amicus Productions (1967), The Skull (1965), and Asylum (1972), based on a Bloch story but scripted by Milton Subotsky (1965). Bloch's last two films were based on stories that were published in anthologies he wrote in the 1940s and early 1950s.

Bloch produced two TV films for director Curtis Harrington (1973) and The Dead Don't Die. Bloch's Cat Creature was an unhappy manufacturing experience. Doug Cramer, a filmmaker, wanted to do an update on Cat People (1942), the Val Lewton-produced film. "Instead, I suggested a mash-up of elements from many well-remembered films and came up with a story line involving Egyptian cat-goddess (Bast), reincarnation, and the first bypass operation on an artichoke heart," Bloch explained. In Bloch's autobiography, a comprehensive account of the film's turbulent production is given.

Bloch (1972), The Manhunter (1974), and Gemini Man (1976) penned single episodes for Night Gallery (1971), Interspersed Between his screenplays for Amicus Productions and other ventures.

In 1965, two more collections of short stories appeared, The Skull of the Marquis de Sade and Tales in a Jugular Vein. Bloch won the Ann Radcliffe Award for Television and Publisher yet another series of shorts - Chamber of Horrors. Bloch returned to 620 East Knapp St. Milwaukee (the address used by Lovecraft for Robert Blake's character "The Haunter of the Dark") only to discover the neighborhood was razed and the entire neighborhood was leveled and rebuilt by expressway approaches.

The Living Demons, another Bloch collection, was released in 1967. In Harlan Ellison's Dangerous Visions anthology, he also published another classic tale about Jack the Ripper, "A Toy for Juliette." As Ladies' Day and This Crowded Earth, he produced a pair of long sf novellas in 1968. In hardcover (Mirage Press), his book The Star Stalker was published, and Dragons and Nightmares (the first collection of Lefty Feep stories) appeared.

The Bloch and Bradbury (a collaboration with Ray Bradbury) and the hardcover book The Todd Dossier were released in 1969, first as Collier Young. In 1969, Bloch received his second Ann Radcliffe Award, this time for Literature. Bloch and other science fiction writers from the United States, United Kingdom, and Europe were invited to Rio de Janeiro, March 23-31, the same year.

Bloch was president of the Mystery Writers of America in 1971, while also publishing the book Sneak Preview, Fear Today, Gone Tomorrow, and the short story It's All in Your Mind. Night-World, Richard Campbell's 1972 novel, became his second book. Bloch, the Guest of Honor at Torcon II, a World Science Fiction Convention in Toronto, 1973. The publication of his novel American Gothic in 1974 was inspired by serial killer H.H.'s true life story. Holmes.

Bloch received the Lifetime Achievement Award at the First World Fantasy Convention in Providence, Rhode Island, in 1975. H. P. Lovecraft's bust was deemed worthy. This was the first time Bloch had visited Providence, Rhode Island, at the time of this festival. During that 1975 convention, Robert Bloch's audio recording was made available online.

[4]

Alternate World recordings' "Gracefully, Robert Bloch!" – two Bloch recordings of his tales were released in 1976.

and "Blood!

The Life and Times of Jack the Ripper!

Harlan Ellison appears on the show (with Harlan Ellison). Lester del Rey, a 1977-born scholar, wrote The Best of Robert Bloch for Del Rey books. Cold Chills and The King of Terrors were two new short story collections published.

During this time, Bloch continued to publish short story collections. His Selected Stories (reprinted in paperback with the incorrect name The Complete Stories) appeared in three volumes shortly before his death, but several previously uncollected stories have appeared in volumes published since 1997 (see below). In addition to Tales of the Witch World, Bloch wrote "Heir Apparent," set in Andre Norton's Witch World. 1) Tor, 1987, NY: Tor, 1987.

Bloch's book There is a Serpent in Eden (also reissued as The Cunning) and two more short story collections, Out of the Mouths of graves and Such Stuff as Screams Are Made From), were published in 1979.

Bloch's numerous books from science fiction (1971) to horror books such as the loving Lovecraftian tribute Strange Eons (Whispers Press, 1978) and the non-supernatural mystery There is a Serpent in Eden (1979).

Bloch's screenplay-writing career continued to flourish into the 1980s, with teleplays for Tales of the Unexpected ("one episode, 1980), and "Everybody Wants a Little Love") and Monsters (three episodes, 1988–1989: "The Legacy," "Mannikins of Horror," and "Reaper" (two episodes, 1988). In the five years leading up to his death, no further screen work has been released, but a version of Edgar Allan Poe's "collaboration," "The Lighthouse," was shot as an episode of The Hunger in 1998.

Three Authors Reminiscences Of Bloch, T.E.D.'s First World Fantasy Convention (Necronomicon Press, 1980), a reminiscence of that historic event. Fritz Leiber and Klein. Zebra Books published the first edition of the Mysteries of the Worm, a Cthulhu Mythos-themed book. This item was reprinted in a Chaosium-edition some years ago.

Bloch's sequel to the original Psychological, Psycho II, was published in 1982, and in 1983 he published Twilight Zone: The Movie. Night of the Ripper (1984) was Bloch's second return to one of Bloch's favorite subjects, the Jack the Ripper murders of 1888.

Scream Press published the hardcover omnibus Unholy Trinity in 1986, amassing three of the Scarf, The Dead Beat, and The Couch, three of which are now rare Bloch books. Out of My Head, NESFA Press' second retrospective collection of Bloch's nonfiction was published as Out of My Head.

Bloch's 70th birthday was celebrated in 1987. The Selected Stories of Robert Bloch (individual volumes titled Final Reckonings, Bitter Ends, and Last Rites) was published by Underwood-Miller. When Citadel Press reissued this in paperback, they incorrectly named it The Collected Stories of Robert Bloch. A collection, Midnight Pleasures, appeared from Doubleday, and Lost in Time and Space with Lefty Feep (Creatures at Large Press), a collection of the Lefty Feep novels published in 2013. The former was the first of a planned series of three volumes, but no further volumes were ever published. Tor Books reissued Bloch's little second book, The Kidnapper, in 1988.

Many works were released in 1989: Fear and Trembling, the crime novel based on a single graphic novel), and another omnibus of long-out-of-print early books, Screams (including The Will to Kill, Firebug, and The Star Stalker). Randall D. Larson released The Robert Bloch Companion (1986-1986) (Starmont House), an extensive review of Bloch's work (Fandom Unlimited Enterprises), and The Complete Robert Bloch Companion: An Illustrated, Comprehensive Bibliography (Fandom Unlimited Enterprises). Borgo Press published Larson's three books hardcover and distributed them.

Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, Bloch's book (1990), was a joint effort with Andre Norton and a sequel to Robert Louis Stevenson's Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. With Psycho House, the third Psycho book, Norman Bates' "mythos" returned to the Norman Bates "mythos" in the same year. It has no connection to the film titled Psycho III as the second book in the series. It would be his last published book.

He was named Master of Ceremonies at the first World Horror Convention in Nashville, Tennessee, in February 1991. In Spring, Weird Tales published a special Robert Bloch issue, as well as his screenplay for the televised version of his story "Beetles" (see also "Beetles"). "Yours Truly, Jack the Ripper" by Pulphouse was published in both hardcover and paperback by Pulphouse, and Bloch co-edited with Martin H. Greenberg the original anthology Psycho-Paths. (Tor). J. Vernon Shea's Introduction to In Search of Lovecraft appeared in 1991 Bloch's In Search of Lovecraft.

Bloch's 75th birthday was celebrated with a bash at a Los Angeles mystery/horror bookstore attended by a number of sf/horror celebrities in 1992. He released his "unauthorized autobiography," Once Around the Bloch (Tor) and edited the original anthology Monsters in Our Midst in 1993.

Fedogan and Bremer began publishing The Early Fears, a collection of 39 of his stories in early 1994. Bloch's Psychos, Robert Bloch's Psychos, was initially a new original anthology but was unable to complete it before his death; Martin H. Greenberg died after the book appeared several years later (1997).

Source

Awards

• 1959: "That Hell-Bound Train" Hugo Award for Best Short Story
• 1959: E. Everett Evans Memorial Award for Fantasy and Science Fiction Work
• 1960: Ann Radcliffe Award for Literature (Count Dracula Society) The Count Dracula Society was founded by Dr Donald A. Reed, who also founded the Academy of Science Fiction, Fantasy and Horror Films.
• 1960: Edgar Allan Poe Award (Special Scroll) (for Psycho) Mystery Writers of America
• 1960: Screenwriter's Annual Award nominated by Screenwriter's Guild (for Psycho)
• 1964: Inkpot Award for Science Fiction
• 1965: Third Trieste Film Festival Award (for The Skull)
• 1966: Ann Radcliffe Award for Television (Count Dracula Society)
• 1973: First prize, La 2de Convention Du Cinema Fantastique De Paris (for Asylum)
• 1974: Award for Service to the Field of Science Fantasy Los Angeles Science Fiction Society
• 1975: World Fantasy Award, Life Achievement
• 1978: Fritz Leiber Fantasy Award
• 1979: Reims Festival Award
• 1984: Hugo Special Award for 50 years as a science fiction professional