The Rediscovery of man
This is the 1999 British edition from Gollancz that includes 12 of the most famous short stories from Cordwainer Smith's "Instrumentality of Mankind" universe. His complete stories are collected in the 1993 NESFA edition called "The Rediscovery of Man: The Complete Short Science Fiction of Cordwainer Smith". The stories feature governing 'Lords of the Instrumentality' that are immortal with drug 'stroon' from planet Norstrilia. Underpeople are humanoid slaves genetically modified from animals. Starships are replaced by instantaneous planoforming. A unique and strange future history unlike any other. Scanners Live in Vain (1950) The Lady Who Sailed the Soul (1960) The Game of Rat and Dragon (1955) The Burning of the Brain (1958) Golden the Ship Was---Oh! Oh! Oh! (1959) The Crime and the Glory of Commander Suzdal (1964) The Dead Lady of Clown Town (1964) Under Old Earth (1966) Mother Hitton's Littul Kittons (1961) Alpha Ralpha Boulevard (1961) The Ballad of Lost C'mell (1962) A Planet Named Shayol (1961)
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What Hacker News says
- One of the greatest of the Golden Age writers with Ted Sturgeon, unlike the insipid and grossly overrated Heinlein.
NESFA Press has excellent omnibus reissues of The Rediscovery of Man and Norstrilia. I just wish they had eBook versions as well like they recently did for Fredric Brown.
I myself first read his work in French translation when I was 12 or so (unlike the US, classics like Cordwainer Smith or Fredric Brown never went out of print in France, thanks to Denoël's excellent Présence du Futur imprint).
- Looking at the "Best Sellers Rank" of some famous website in order to figure out if some of my ideas are actually forgotten or not... This helped discarding some books (like "Roadside Picnic" or "Memoirs Found in a Bathtub"). While not absolutely unknown, I would still suggest: "The Rediscovery of Man" by Cordwainer Smith.
- "The Rediscovery of Man" by Cordwainer Smith
There's no other science fiction like this, he had a unique style. It's a collection with most of the SF he wrote, excepting the novel "Norstrilia".
