Hmm, as I recall I began with Norton and the Heinlein juveniles. I qickly lost all interest in the latter as Heinlein seemed to focus on his USian central characters. Since I wasn't interested in boring Yanks, I can always turn on the tv if I wanted those, but the exotic universe I eventually gave Heinlein the boot. Norton's work on the other hand I love to this day. Not every book of course, and not every part of every book, but when she is on form, as in The Zero Stone and about 90% of Dread Companion I am not of this earth.
Curiously I seem to have covered much the same ground as you did, reading much of Burroughs and Howard, as well as Lord Of the Rings. However my experience is slightly different to yours in that while I read ERB's Barsoom series and his Venus series and one or two others I never liked them enough to want to reread, not back then and not now. Many of Howard's stories on the other hand I reread a great many times though I'm not sure I could repeat the feat now.
At much the same time I was still reading Norton and had added the likes of Eric Frank Russell, Jack Vance, Harry Harrison, Poul Anderson, Clifford Simak etc. They all seemed to be writing about the same galactic empire, at least that's the nebulous vision of endless worlds and endless starports to reach them that I formed. I don't know if it's possible for anybody discovering sf today to reach this particular galactic empire since so much of the relevant fiction doesn't appear to be easily available.
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Curiously I seem to have covered much the same ground as you did, reading much of Burroughs and Howard, as well as Lord Of the Rings. However my experience is slightly different to yours in that while I read ERB's Barsoom series and his Venus series and one or two others I never liked them enough to want to reread, not back then and not now. Many of Howard's stories on the other hand I reread a great many times though I'm not sure I could repeat the feat now.
At much the same time I was still reading Norton and had added the likes of Eric Frank Russell, Jack Vance, Harry Harrison, Poul Anderson, Clifford Simak etc. They all seemed to be writing about the same galactic empire, at least that's the nebulous vision of endless worlds and endless starports to reach them that I formed. I don't know if it's possible for anybody discovering sf today to reach this particular galactic empire since so much of the relevant fiction doesn't appear to be easily available.