Wold Newton

Tropes and genres
Synonym(s)	Wold Newton Family, Wold Newton Universe
Related tropes/genres	Crossover Universe
See also	crossover, Shared universe
Related articles on Fanlore.

Wold Newton refers to a literary crossover fiction concept created by Philip José Farmer around 1972 and expanded by Win Scott Eckert in 1997, with them claiming that several well-known heroic (and a few villainous) characters are related because a meteorite fall.

Origin Concepts

On December 13, 1795 a meteorite fell near Wold Newton, Yorkshire, England; being thus titled Wold Cottage meteorite. Based on this real event, Philip José Farmer wrote two fictional biographies, "Tarzan Alive: A Definitive Biography of Lord Greystoke" (1972) and "Doc Savage: His Apocalyptic Life" (1973), addressing the possible consequences of this event:

• The meteorite caused genetic mutations in the occupants of two passing coaches due to ionization;
• Their descendants were thus endowed with extremely high intelligence and strength, as well as an exceptional capacity and drive to perform good or, as the case may be, evil deeds;
• The progeny of these travellers are purported to have been the real-life originals of fictionalised characters, both heroic and villainous, over the last few hundred years.

The families and their descendants that Farmer originally included in his work are the characters Tarzan and Doc Savage, both Lord Peter Wimsey and Sherlock Holmes. This list later grew, with Farmer's inclusion of:

• Professor Moriarty, Sherlock Holmes's nemesis
• Patricia Savage (Doc Savage's cousin) and Monk Mayfair (one of his five assistants)
• Solomon Kane
• Captain Blood
• The Scarlet Pimpernel
• Phileas Fogg
• The Time Traveller (main character of The Time Machine by H. G. Wells)
• Allan Quatermain
• A. J. Raffles
• Professor Challenger
• Richard Hannay
• Bulldog Drummond
• Fu Manchu and Sir Denis Nayland Smith (his adversary)
• G-8
• The Shadow
• Sam Spade
• The Spider
• Nero Wolfe
• Mr. Moto
• The Avenger
• Philip Marlowe
• James Bond
• Lew Archer
• Travis McGee
• Monsieur Lecoq
• Arsène Lupin

Expansion Concepts

In 1997, Win Scott Eckert coined the term World Newton Universe or WNU, which you introduced on your website "An Expansion of Philip José Farmer's Wold Newton Universe", to detonate an expansion concept of the fictional crossover of the World Newton family by Philip José Farmer.

The expanded concept has been embraced by other authors, expanded list of related families, with proposals supported by informative context and persuasive arguments; coming to write fiction authorized by the Farmer and Farmer's Estate, being then its new characters recognized and added to the original universe.

This characters incorporated into the WNU are not necessarily blood relatives, descendants, or ancestors of the coach travelers present at the 1795 Wold Cottage meteor strike, but these characters all exist in the same shared fictional universe, and not all characters in Farmer's Wold Newton fiction are core members of the Wold Newton Family, but all are linked into the larger WNU via connections with Farmer's primary Wold Newton Family works.

Some of the characters added with the universe expansion are:

• The Lone Ranger
• The Green Hornet
• Spock, through his human mother Amanda Grayson (see more in Sherlock Holmes and Star Trek)
• Ernst Stavro Blofeld, Bond's nemesis

List of Works

Original and Expanded WNU

• Tarzan Alive: A Definitive Biography of Lord Greystoke (1972)
• Doc Savage: His Apocalyptic Life (1973)
• The Other Log of Phileas Fogg (1973)
• Time's Last Gift (1972)
• Hadon of Ancient Opar (1974)
• Flight to Opar (1976)
• Myths for the Modern Age: Philip José Farmer's Wold Newton Universe (edited by Win Scott Eckert, 2005)
• Crossovers: A Secret Chronology of the World Parts 1 and 2 (2010)
• Tales of the Wold Newton Universe (edited by Win Scott Eckert and Christopher Paul Carey, 2013)
• Farmerphile: The Magazine of Philip José Farmer

Inspired by WNU

• Anno Dracula series by Author Kim (partially inspired by the Wold Newton family)
• Tales of the Shadowmen anthology series edited by Jean-Marc Lofficier
• The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen comic book and its sequels by Alan Moore (Wold Newton is a seminal influence)

WNU's Fanworks

It was mentioned in five works in the AO3: World Newton search

• Taste of Nectar by clutzycricket - GoT/ASoIaF
• Carry Lies, Win Power by AtomMudman - various fandoms

External links

• The Wold Newton Universe from Philip Jose Farmer's Official Site
• Secret History of the Wold Newton Universe, by Dennis Power now a defunct url