Ballantine Adult Fantasy series


The Ballantine Adult Fantasy series was an imprint of American publisher Ballantine Books. Launched in 1969, the series reissued a number of works of fantasy literature which were out of print or dispersed in back issues of pulp magazines, in cheap paperback form—including works by authors such as James Branch Cabell, Lord Dunsany, Ernest Bramah, Hope Mirrlees, and William Morris. The series lasted until 1974.
Envisioned by the husband-and-wife team of Ian and Betty Ballantine, and edited by Lin Carter, it featured cover art by illustrators such as Gervasio Gallardo, Robert LoGrippo, David McCall Johnston, and Bob Pepper. The agreement signed between the Ballantines and Carter on November 22, 1968 launched the project. In addition to the reprints comprising the bulk of the series, some new fantasy works were published as well as a number of original collections and anthologies put together by Carter, and Imaginary Worlds, his general history of the modern fantasy genre.
The series was never considered a money-maker for Ballantine, although the re-issue of several of its titles both before and after the series' demise shows that a number of individual works were considered successful. The Ballantines supported the series as long as they remained the publishers of Ballantine Books, but with their sale of the company to Random House in 1973 support from the top was no longer forthcoming, and in 1974, with the end of the Ballantines' involvement in the company they had founded, the series was terminated.
After the termination of the Adult Fantasy series, Ballantine continued to publish fantasy but concentrated primarily on new titles, with the older works it continued to issue being those with proven track records. In 1977, both its fantasy and science fiction lines were relaunched under the Del Rey Books imprint, under the editorship of Lester and Judy-Lynn del Rey. Carter continued his promotion of the fantasy genre in a new line of annual anthologies from DAW Books, The Year's Best Fantasy Stories, also beginning in 1975. Meanwhile, the series' lapsed mission of restoring classic works of fantasy to print had been taken up on a more limited basis by the Newcastle Forgotten Fantasy Library, launched in 1973.

The series

All books in the "series proper" bore a distinctive Unicorn's Head colophon on the cover and included an introduction by Carter.

Precursors, August 1965 to April 1969

Ballantine published these fantasies and fantasy criticism before hiring Carter as consultant. Some were labeled "A Ballantine Adult Fantasy" on the first Ballantine cover. Later reprints of some bore the Unicorn's Head colophon.
  1. The Hobbit, J. R. R. Tolkien
  2. The Fellowship of the Ring, J. R. R. Tolkien
  3. The Two Towers, J. R. R. Tolkien
  4. The Return of the King, J. R. R. Tolkien
  5. The Tolkien Reader, J. R. R. Tolkien
  6. The Worm Ouroboros, E. R. Eddison
  7. Mistress of Mistresses, E. R. Eddison
  8. A Fish Dinner in Memison, E. R. Eddison
  9. The Road Goes Ever On, J. R. R. Tolkien and Donald Swann
  10. Titus Groan, Mervyn Peake
  11. Gormenghast, Mervyn Peake
  12. Titus Alone, Mervyn Peake
  13. A Voyage to Arcturus, David Lindsay
  14. The Last Unicorn, Peter S. Beagle
  15. A Fine and Private Place, Peter S. Beagle
  16. Smith of Wootton Major and Farmer Giles of Ham, J. R. R. Tolkien
  17. , Lin Carter
  18. The Mezentian Gate, E. R. Eddison

    The series proper, May 1969 to April 1974

Volumes published as part of the series, based on a listing by Lin Carter in Imaginary Worlds: the Art of Fantasy with the addition of books new to Ballantine published under the Unicorn's Head colophon thereafter.
  1. The Blue Star, Fletcher Pratt
  2. The King of Elfland's Daughter, Lord Dunsany
  3. The Wood Beyond the World, William Morris
  4. The Silver Stallion, James Branch Cabell
  5. Lilith, George MacDonald
  6. Dragons, Elves, and Heroes, Lin Carter, ed.
  7. The Young Magicians, Lin Carter, ed.
  8. Figures of Earth, James Branch Cabell
  9. The Sorcerer's Ship, Hannes Bok
  10. Land of Unreason, Fletcher Pratt and L. Sprague de Camp
  11. The High Place, James Branch Cabell
  12. Lud-in-the-Mist, Hope Mirrlees
  13. At the Edge of the World, Lord Dunsany
  14. Phantastes, George MacDonald
  15. The Dream-Quest of Unknown Kadath, H. P. Lovecraft
  16. Zothique, Clark Ashton Smith
  17. The Shaving of Shagpat, George Meredith
  18. The Island of the Mighty, Evangeline Walton
  19. Deryni Rising, Katherine Kurtz
  20. The Well at the World's End, Vol. 1, William Morris
  21. The Well at the World's End, Vol. 2, William Morris
  22. Golden Cities, Far, Lin Carter, ed.
  23. Beyond the Golden Stair, Hannes Bok
  24. The Broken Sword, Poul Anderson
  25. The Boats of the "Glen Carrig", William Hope Hodgson
  26. The Doom that Came to Sarnath and Other Stories, H. P. Lovecraft
  27. Something About Eve, James Branch Cabell
  28. Red Moon and Black Mountain, Joy Chant
  29. Hyperborea, Clark Ashton Smith
  30. ', Lord Dunsany
  31. Vathek, William Beckford
  32. The Man Who Was Thursday, G. K. Chesterton
  33. The Children of Llyr, Evangeline Walton
  34. The Cream of the Jest, James Branch Cabell
  35. New Worlds for Old, Lin Carter, ed.
  36. The Spawn of Cthulhu, Lin Carter, ed.
  37. Double Phoenix, Edmund Cooper and Roger Lancelyn Green
  38. The Water of the Wondrous Isles, William Morris
  39. ', F. Marion Crawford
  40. The World's Desire, H. Rider Haggard and Andrew Lang
  41. Xiccarph, Clark Ashton Smith
  42. ', C. J. Cutcliffe Hyne
  43. Discoveries in Fantasy, Lin Carter, ed.
  44. ', James Branch Cabell
  45. Kai Lung's Golden Hours, Ernest Bramah
  46. Deryni Checkmate, Katherine Kurtz
  47. Beyond the Fields We Know, Lord Dunsany
  48. The Three Impostors, Arthur Machen
  49. The Night Land, Vol. 1, William Hope Hodgson
  50. The Night Land, Vol. 2, William Hope Hodgson
  51. The Song of Rhiannon, Evangeline Walton
  52. Great Short Novels of Adult Fantasy I, Lin Carter, ed.
  53. Evenor, George MacDonald
  54. Orlando Furioso: The Ring of Angelica, Volume 1, Ludovico Ariosto, translated by Richard Hodgens
  55. The Charwoman's Shadow, Lord Dunsany
  56. Great Short Novels of Adult Fantasy Volume II, Lin Carter, ed.
  57. The Sundering Flood, William Morris
  58. Imaginary Worlds: the Art of Fantasy, Lin Carter
  59. Poseidonis, Clark Ashton Smith
  60. Excalibur, Sanders Anne Laubenthal
  61. High Deryni, Katherine Kurtz
  62. Hrolf Kraki's Saga, Poul Anderson
  63. The People of the Mist, H. Rider Haggard
  64. Kai Lung Unrolls His Mat, Ernest Bramah
  65. Over the Hills and Far Away, Lord Dunsany

    Leftovers, June to November 1974

Two volumes published after retirement of the Unicorn's Head colophon were evidently intended for the series. The first has a Carter introduction and the second completes a set of four begun under his editorship.
  1. Merlin's Ring, H. Warner Munn
  2. Prince of Annwn, Evangeline Walton

    Other works considered by Carter for inclusion in the series

Carter intended to reissue or compile these books for the series, according to statements in his introductions to other books in the series and lists discovered among his effects after his death or elsewhere. A few were later issued in the Newcastle Forgotten Fantasy Library, a fantasy revival series similar to the Ballantine Adult Fantasy series published between 1973 and 1980.
  1. The Elder Gods, John Campbell
  2. Short Stories, Donald Corley
  3. The Revolt of the Angels, Anatole France
  4. Thaïs, Anatole France
  5. The Twilight of the Gods and Other Tales, Richard Garnett
  6. One of Cleopatra's Nights, Théophile Gautier
  7. Short Stories, David H. Keller
  8. City of Sorcerers, Henry Kuttner. City of Sorcerers is an alternate title for the Kuttner novella "Lands of the Earthquake"
  9. Child Christopher and Goldilind the Fair, William Morris
  10. The Roots of the Mountains, William Morris
  11. A Tale of the House of the Wolfings and All the Kindreds of the Mark, William Morris
  12. The Story of the Glittering Plain, William Morris
  13. Arachne, Eden Phillpotts
  14. Circe's Island, Eden Phillpotts
  15. Evander, Eden Phillpotts
  16. Living Prophets, Eden Phillpotts
  17. Lycanthrope, Eden Phillpotts
  18. One Thing and Another, Eden Phillpotts
  19. Saurus, Eden Phillpotts
  20. The Thing at Their Heels, Eden Phillpotts
  21. The Treasure of Typhon, Eden Phillpotts
  22. Averoigne, Clark Ashton Smith
  23. Malneant, Clark Ashton Smith
  24. The Nightmare and Other Tales of Dark Fantasy, Francis Stevens
  25. Zadig, and Other Marvels, Voltaire
  26. The Nightmare Has Triplets, James Branch Cabell