OF TIME AND STARS ARTHUR C. CLARKE CONTENTS: Introduction Foreword The Nine Billion Names of God An Ape About the House Green Fingers Trouble with the Natives Into the Comet No Morning After 'If I Forget Thee, Oh Earth…' Who's There? All the Time in the World Hide and Seek Robin Hood, F.R.S. The Fires Within The Forgotten Enemy The Reluctant Orchid Encounter at Dawn Security Check Feathered Friend The Sentinel Arthur C. Clarke was born in Somerset in 1917 and is a graduate of King's College, London. During the Second World War, as an RAF officer, he was in charge of the first Radar talk-down equipment during experimental trials. In 1945 he published the first technical paper laying down the principles of satellite communication. The author of over forty books and many articles, he won the 1961 Kalinga Prize, the 1965 Aviation-Space Writer's Prize, the 1969 Westinghouse Science Writing Prize, the Science Writers of America NEBULA (1972,1974,1979), a HUGO (1947) and the John W. Campbell Award (1974); he also shared an 'Oscar' nomination with Stanley Kubrick for the screenplay of 2001: A Space Odyssey. For many years now Clarke has lived in Sri Lanka and been involved in underwater exploration along that coast and along the Great Barrier Reef. He has been Chancellor of Moratuwa University, Sri Lanka, since 1979. Together with two other commentators he covered the lunar flights of Apollo 11, 12 and 15 for American CBS television. Exploring New Realms in Science Fiction/Fantasy Adventure Titles already published or in preparation: Echoes of the Fourth Magic by R. A. Salvatore When a U.S. submarine set out from Miami and was drawn off-course by the murderous magic of the Devil's Triangle, Officer Jeff DelGiudice survived the terrifying plunge through the realms. But his good fortune had a shocking consequence. He found himself stranded in a strange world awaiting its redeemer. Here four survivors ruled the corner of the once-great Earth with the ways of white magic… until one of them tasted the ecstasy of evil. Thalasi, Warlock of Darkness, had amassed an army to let loose death and chaos, and only the hero promised in the guardians' legends can defeat such power. Now Jeff must face his destiny - in a dangerous, wondrous quest to lead humankind's children back to the realms of Light. The Earthsea Trilogy by Ursula Le Guin Wizard of Earthsea The Tombs of Atuan The Farthest Shore As long ago as forever and as far away as Selidor, there lived the dragonlord and Archmage, Sparrowhawk, the greatest of the great wizards—he who, when still a youth, met with the evil shadow-beast; he who later brought back the Ring of Erreth-Akbe from the Tombs of Atuan; and he who, as an old man, rode the mighty dragon Kalessin back from the land of the dead. And then, the legends say, Sparrowhawk entered his boat, Look/or, turned his back on land, and without wind or sail or oar moved westward over sea and out of sight. THE WORLDS OF ARTHUR C. CLARKE OF TIME AND STARS WITH AN INTRODUCTION BY J. B. PRIESTLEY ROC Published by the Penguin Group Penguin Books Ltd, 27 Wrights Lane, London W8 5TZ, England Penguin Books USA Inc., 375 Hudson Street, New York, New York 10014, USA Penguin Books Australia Ltd, Ringwood, Victoria, Australia Penguin Books Canada Ltd, 10 Alcom Avenue, Toronto, Ontario, Canada M4V 3B Penguin Books (NZ) Ltd, 182-190 Waüau Road, Auckland 10, New Zealand Penguin Books Ltd, Registered Offices: Harmondswonh, Middlesex, England First published by Victor Gollincz 1972 Published in Puffin Books 1974 Reprinted in Penguin Books Copyright © Arthur C Clarke, 1972 Introduction copyright O J. B. Priestley, 1972 All rights reserved The Nine Billion Names of God' copyright 1953 by Ballantine Books, Inc.; 'An Ape about the House' copyright 1962 by Mystery Publishing Co., Inc.; 'Green Fingers' copyright 1956,1957 by Fantasy House, Inc.; 'Trouble with the Natives' copyright 1951 by Marvel Science Fiction; 'Into the Comet' copyright 1960 by Mercury Press, Inc.; 'No Morning After' copyright 1954 by August Derleth; 'If I Forget Thee, Oh Earth…' copyright 1951 by Columbia Publications Inc.; 'Who's There?' copyright 1958 by United Newspapers Magazine Corporation (originally published as 'The Haunted Spacesuit'; 'All the Time in the World' copyright 1952 by Better Publications, Inc.; 'Hide and Seek' copyright 1949 by Street at Smith Publications, Inc.; 'Robin Hood, F. R. S.' copyright 1956,1957 by Fantasy House, Inc.; 'The Fires Within' copyright 1949 by Standard Magazines Inc.; 'The Forgotten Enemy' copyright 1953 by Avon Publications, Inc.; 'The Reluctant Orchid' copyright 1956 by Renown Publishing Co., Inc.; 'Encounter at Dawn' copyright 1953 by Ziff-Davis Publishing Company (as 'Encounter in the Dawn'); 'Security Check' copyright 1957 by Fantasy House Inc.; 'Feathered Friend' copyright 1957 by Royal Publications, Inc.; 'The Sentinel' copyright 1951 by Avon Periodicals, Inc. Roc is a trademark of Penguin Books Ltd Printed in England by Clays Ltd, St Ives plc. Except in the United States of America, this book is sold subject to the condition that it shall not, by way of trade or otherwise, be lent, re-sold, hired out, or otherwise circulated without the publisher's prior consent in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition including this condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser. Introduction My claim to write an Introduction to a volume of science-fiction tales is very slight. Though I have written so much in a long writing life, I have produced only one science-fiction tale. But - and now for a brief exhibition of what my children used to call'the braggies' - this solitary story, Mr Strenberry's Tale, was not entirely without any importance. I don't say this because it was frequently reprinted, to appear in various anthologies. What gives it a little importance is that I wrote it over forty years ago, so that I feel it must be the first story in which a man, from the distant future, threatened with some dreadful calamity, makes a desperate attempt to take refuge in our time. This is unlikely, I agree, but it isn't so wildly improbable, in my opinion, as most science-fiction stories bouncing around in different eras. This is because I believe that the past is still solidly there, in its place along the fourth dimension. But what about that far distant future? A good question, but I don't propose to answer it here and now. A good deal of science-fiction is disappointing. There are two kinds that never interest me. One is the sort of tale that merely shifts cops and robbers, cowboys and Indians, out of their familiar territory and has them chasing or fighting one another on mysterious remote planets, pretending to use atomic guns instead of Lugers or Colts. There is no suggestion of strangeness in these routine tales. Nor is there any in the other kind, often satirical. What the authors do in these stories is simply to enlarge and exaggerate what we see around us and what is already happening in our time. So they give us giant computers, astonishingly efficient robots, bigger space vehicles, monster rockets, and cities of fifty million people. There is nothing surprising in the futures they create. Incidentally, one of the most unexpected and astonishing stories of the future I have ever read is A Crystal Age, the work many years ago of W. H. Hudson. Get hold of it some time! But I am here to recommend Mr Arthur C. Clarke, and this is a pleasure, not a task. He is very different indeed from the two types of science-fiction writers I have just been grumbling about. And there are two very good reasons why he has been so successful. To begin with, he has a solid grounding - and with it some definite achievements - in the science and technology that should play an important part in his sort of fiction. He may have to do a bit of bluffing now and again, for dramatic purposes, but where most of us would be wildly guessing almost all the time he can largely depend on what he knows. From the first he seems to have fallen in love with space, and as soon as I met him I was aware of his genuine tremendous enthusiasm. (He is also a great gadget man, and if a robot had served lunch I would hardly have been surprised.) It must be this enthusiasm that gives him such an astonishing air of youth, suggesting a man in his thirties and not already in his middle fifties. However, while scientific and technological knowledge are important for a writer of science-fiction, there is something he must have, to be really worth reading, that is far more important. He must have imagination. And this must not be confused with mere fanciful invention, offering the reader a planet full of flesh-eating vegetables or monsters with eight legs and six eyes. A genuinely imaginative writer takes us deeply into the scene, however strange it may be, and into the thoughts and feelings of the man or men who are in that scene. And indeed, Mr Clarke in some of these short stories makes us share the thoughts and feelings of beings belonging to far-distant planets. It is because he is genuinely imaginative that he can make the fantastic seem entirely convincing. He can also be splendidly audacious in his inventions. It is years since I first read two of his most ambitious long stories, The City and the Stars and Childhood's End, but I can recall episodes from them just as if they were extraordinary things that had actually happened to me. And to me this is always impressive, proof of the unusual quality of any writer of fiction. We must all know by this time what a notable part Mr Clarke played in the creation of that remarkable and hugely successful film, 2001: A Space Odyssey. I have seen it twice already...
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