Another from FOREVER PEOPLE 3, July 1971:



 Quote:
Dear Editor,

Just to add a few words to the already awesome mound of praise (one might term it a "mountain of judgement", had one a way with clever nomenclature) surely deluging you, my compliments on the first issue of Jack Kirby's FOREVER PEOPLE. In recent memory, only Deadman, Enemy Ace and Bat Lash seem to match this strip for innovation and success. Which probably means -- if we are to use as yardstick the commercial failure of those three high-water marks of quality continuity -- FOREVER PEOPLE is too good for the average comic audience.

Its power and inventiveness display the Kirby charisma at its peak. Every panel is a stunner. Potentially, it appears to be the richest vein of story material National has unearthed in years. One hopes Kirby will be given total free reign, that he will be allowed to ride his dreams to wherever they take him, for the journey is a special one, and we get visionaries like Kirby once in a generation, if we're terribly lucky. To constrain him, to force him to fetter himself with the rules and regs of previous comics experience, would be to dull the edge of his imagination.

After many false starts of National efforts in the past five years, at last it seems you've struck the main route. That it should be Kirby -- at the top of his form -- that worked point-scout, is not surprising. He has long been a master of the form, and in FOREVER PEOPLE it seems he's found his métier.

Best wishes and prayers for a long, long life for the FOREVER PEOPLE. Till now, all the flack bushwah about this being the Golden Age of Comics have follen tinnily on us; but with Kirby in the saddle FOREVER PEOPLE casting its wondrous glow, you now have leave to bang the drums.
--Harlan Ellison, Sherman Oaks, California


(It cannot be denied that a great deal of hard work has gone into unearthing that "rich vein of story material" of which you write, Harlan. But no matter how highly we may rate the FOREVER PEOPLE, the real drum-banging has to come from the readership, who responded in unhesitant manner. )





I always enjoyed not only getting a letter published, but when it made enough impact on the editor that he/they felt compelled to write a response to it. Although needless to say, who isn't going to notice when Harlan Ellison sends them a letter?