Need science fiction quote

Somebody back in the 1940s - probably John W. Campbell, but possibly Robert Heinlein - said that he wanted stories that read as if they were mainstream stories from a magazine of the year 2000.

It’s a relatively famous quote but all the search terms are too common for me to find it without first remembering the exact wording of the quote. Can anybody help me stop beating my head against the wall?

Here’s an allusion to the quote The History of the Science-fiction Magazine - Michael Ashley, Mike Ashley - Google Books in a book about science fiction.

Sounds familiar. Perhaps in Expanded Universe or Grumbles From the Grave ?

(I don’t have either in front of me right now)

Yeah, this sounds closer than what I posted. Though it may be in the books I posted as a quote from Campbell. What’s nagging at my brain is the thought it’s in the preface to the story about a bathroom of her own.

We’re not helping you get any closer, are we? :wink:

That’s almost certainly the quote I’m thinking of, so it’s definitely Campbell.

But now I’m wondering if more people remember the paraphrase than the quote itself. With those keywords I found this:

That’s too dull to be a lasting quote. Maybe Campbell himself edited it to a better soundbite.

I love that quote and the notion behind it. It’s what’s made reading Hannu Rajaniemi and Iain M. Banks so freaking awesome.

Wasn’t that the guiding gist of the “prophesied” issue (ASF, 11/49)? That JWC wanted to publish a mainstream magazine from 100 years in the future, or some such?

Not that I know of. In the November 1948 reader’s column he printed a letter from Richard A. Hoen mock-reviewing the stories in the November 1949 issue. Then he had the authors write stories with those titles and themes, if any were mentioned. I don’t think they were set in any particular time.