J.T. McIntosh – A Neglected Talent

In 2016, whilst undertaking voluntary work in the National Library of Scotland, I was introduced to the works of J.T. McIntosh, a Scottish science fiction writer who achieved notable success during the fifties and sixties in both Europe and the USA. He is the only science fiction author whose literary papers are held in the Library, this archive filling some twenty boxes stored on a bank of shelves, several floors below street level. My first reaction was one of embarrassment for I had never heard of J.T. McIntosh. So, I asked around and found, with the exception of the person who purchased the archive in 2010, that no-one else at the Library had heard of him either.

Needless to say, this intrigued me and, having spent two years working on the archive, I have come to the conclusion that J.T. McIntosh was a Scottish science fiction writer of unique talent whose story deserves to be told.

McIntosh was born James Murdoch MacGregor in Paisley on February 15th 1925 and moved to Aberdeen shortly afterwards. He decided from an early age that he wanted to be a writer, his youthful ambitions are evident from the start. The earliest work on file is The Diamond, a magazine created from a school exercise book in 1938. Other works from this period include Swing Time for Shakespeare (1941), a light-hearted time travel story, None so Blind (1944), a war story of 214 pages and Time to Recapture (1946), a story of 240 pages. What makes these early works memorable is the dedication shown in their execution; they are all written entirely in longhand with a fountain pen.

McIntosh’s break came in 1950 when the pioneering American SF magazine Astounding Science Fiction published his short story ‘The Curfew Tolls’, its title a quote from the poem Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard (1750) by Thomas Gray. This was a motif of McIntosh and we see quotes from various poets used as titles of other early works: Some Demon’s Mistress (1950) from Keats; The Happier Eden (1950) -from Milton; Where the Apple Reddens (1950) from Browning; A Man’s a Man (1952) from Burns; and By Any Other Name (1952) from Shakespeare.

In June 1953 Doubleday agreed to publish a novel by the title of ‘X’. They liked it so much that they paid McIntosh a healthy advance but insisted on changing the title to World Out of Mind. This was followed by Born Leader and then what was probably J.T. McIntosh’s most celebrated work, One in Three Hundred, a story centred on a dying Earth and the individuals who are chosen to colonise a new planet. The book was reprinted in several countries and was a huge success. A flurry of short stories and novels followed quickly afterwards.

However, just as success was coming into bloom, illness struck. McIntosh entered hospital in December 1953 and remained there until July 1954. The hospital to which McIntosh was admitted specialized in the treatment of non-pulmonary tuberculosis and the duration of his stay also tallies with the treatment of such an illness at that time. But what could easily have become a time of creative stagnation instead became a period of unmatched creativity; during his stay in the hospital he produced more science fiction stories as well as dramas, crime stories, radio plays, a comedy co-written with Talbot Rothwell (a screenwriter who worked on the Carry-On films) an unfinished operetta and two volumes of an epic novel (unpublished) set during the Second World War. He also began a detailed correspondence with E.J. Carnell, editor of Science Fantasy, on the subject of censorship.

Censorship in the 1950s was a serious problem for publishers of science fiction magazines in both the UK and America, with editors often afraid to publish for fear of ending up in court. McIntosh had at least two stories declined for this very reason. The Big Hop was initially turned down by Carnell for fear of upsetting ‘the purity league’ (it was finally published in 1955). There is also a letter from American literary agent Willis Kingsley Wing explaining to McIntosh that one of his works has been rejected by publishers on the grounds that ‘nineteen pages of the story is devoted to unmitigated sadism’.

Around this time McIntosh began an ongoing correspondence and friendship with Robert Heinlein. Heinlein, considered one of the ‘Big Three’ of Science fiction alongside Isaac Asimov and Arthur C. Clarke, was often outspoken about censorship and shared an interest with McIntosh in glamour/nude photography. McIntosh wrote a book on the subject, Glamour in Your Lens, published in 1958. We know from McIntosh’s correspondence that Heinlein travelled to Glasgow with his wife in September 1955 specifically to meet him.

Also in 1955 McIntosh struck up a friendship with Edgar Pangborn, winner of that year’s IFA (International Fantasy Award) for his novel, A Mirror for Observers (McIntosh tied in third place with Isaac Asimov). The two remained friends and the archive includes a letter from Pangborn in 1957 in which the subjects discussed include Johnny Walker Whisky, the town of Kilmarnock, and the works of Robert Burns as well as Pangborn’s next move in an ongoing correspondence chess match.

There is also an amusing letter from Willis Kingsley Wing in America at this time asking if there is a problem with the glue on British stamps. This is because all of McIntosh’s manuscripts were arriving in America stamped ‘Postage Outstanding’. Wing asks him to look into the matter ‘as these costs mount up’.

McIntosh’s star continued to rise during this decade. One in a Thousand, a requested sequel to One in Three Hundred, was another big success. McIntosh is also credited with the creation of what is now a universal science fiction term, ‘Empath’. This appeared in a story of the same name in 1956 but the archive contains an unpublished, earlier version titled Three Hours that predates this by almost a year. However, not everything was going smoothly; a contract to publish McIntosh’s work in South America was destroyed when the publisher’s proprietor (Juan Peron’s former Foreign Minister) was physically dragged from his office and ‘most probably shot’ (according to a letter from Willis Kingsley Wing). An anthology of his work was planned for the UK market but didn’t make it to publication.

The fifties were probably the high point of McIntosh’s literary career; his subsequent work began to receive criticism. He was accused of lacking discipline and the archive contains letters from his publishers regretting the apparent rehashing of themes and plots from previous works. His new work increasingly featured beautiful and nubile young women who invariably lost their clothing before ending up in the arms of the male protagonist. There is a letter from Scottish writer and poet, Nan Shepherd, in her capacity of editor of the Aberdeen University Review, in which she congratulates McIntosh on the success of his latest novel (When the Ship Sank) but criticises his ‘overt focus’ on six beautiful women.

During this time McIntosh appears to have grown weary of science fiction; he returned to writing crime stories, radio plays, war stories, television plays and comedy. His crime stories were invariably set in Scotland in the countryside of the Highlands or the Borders. He also moved beyond the world of fiction entirely and wrote books on wine making and cooking. As far as I am aware, none of these works were ever published. Frustration appears to have overtaken McIntosh in his later years and he destroyed many of his own manuscripts and correspondence.

It is difficult to place J.T. McIntosh in the canon of Scottish science fiction writers. As far as genre was concerned, he tended to favour the style of the space opera, with interplanetary wars being a mainstay in many of his works. He also engaged in Time Travel stories, Parallel Worlds, Post-Apocalyptic Fiction, and Robot Fiction. Canadian science fiction critic John Clute wrote of McIntosh that he: ‘never lost the vivid narrative skills that made him an interesting figure of 1950s SF, but his failure to challenge himself or his readers in his later career led to results that verged on mediocrity. His early work warrants revival.’

Whilst agreeing with this conclusion, I would emphasise the final five words. Whether McIntosh is to be regarded as a Scottish science fiction writer of distinction is a matter of opinion, but whether he is to be regarded as a Scottish science fiction writer of importance is a matter of fact.

McIntosh’s skill and imagination resulted in some very interesting, original and pioneering work in the world of science fiction in the 1950s and 1960s. His work deserves to be read.

J.T. McIntosh died in Aberdeen in 2008.

Tony Quinn moved to Edinburgh in his twenties. He worked as a cinema manger for eleven years, including five years at the Edinburgh International Film Festival. Then he worked as an engineer; it was during this time that Tony began a degree in Literatures in English. After the degree he moved on to a Masters and then a PhD on Shakespeare’s Juliet (they wouldn’t let him do one on Blade Runner). He currently works as an educator and tutor.