Science Fact/Fiction

by Edmund J. Farrell (editor), Ray Bradbury (introduction)

These stories delight in ideas, holding machine kaleidoscopes up to the sun to see the many shapes of time, man, and destiny. This book is insidious. It is secretly subversive of all that you have believed in the past. It is revolutionary in that it may well make you want to go out and invent better empathy-machines, which repeat truths and amiably shape dreams, such as those strange robots, the motion-picture projector or the record player.

Contents:

Science Fiction: Before Christ and After 2001 • essay by Ray Bradbury
The Gun Without a Bang (1958) / short story by Robert Sheckley [as by Finn O'Donnevan]
Crabs Take Over the Island (1969) / short story by Anatoly Dnieprov (trans. of  Крабы идут по островуƒ 1958)
All Watched Over by Machines of Loving Grace (1968) • poem by Richard Brautigan
EPICAC (1950) / short story by Kurt Vonnegut Jr.
R. U. R. (1969) / short fiction by Karel ÄŒapek (trans. of R. U. R. 1920)
The Human Factor (1963) / short story by David Ely
The Thinking Machine (1967) • essay by Isaac Asimov
Misbegotten Missionary (1950) / short story by Isaac Asimov (variant of Green Patches)
Elegy (1953) / short story by Charles Beaumont
Aesthetics of the Moon • poem by Jack Anderson (1935-)
Constant Reader (1953) / short story by Robert Bloch
Who's There? (1958) / short story by Arthur C. Clarke
We'll Never Conquer Space (1962) • essay by Arthur C. Clarke
The Sack (1950) / short story by William Morrison
Mariana (1960) / short story by Fritz Leiber
I Always Do What Teddy Says (1965) / short story by Harry Harrison
The Man Who Could Work Miracles (1898) / short story by H. G. Wells
Echoes of the Mind (1972) • essay by Arthur Koestler
The Reluctant Orchid [Tales from the White Hart] (1956) / short story by Arthur C. Clarke
Founding Father (1965) / short story by Isaac Asimov
The Wound (1970) / short story by Howard Fast
The Sound Machine (1949) / short story by Roald Dahl
Love Among the Cabbages (abridged) (1972) • essay by Peter Tompkins and Christopher Bird
Puppet Show (1962) / short story by Fredric Brown
Random Sample (1953) / short story by T. P. Caravan
On the Wheel (1972) / short story by Damon Knight
Orbiter 5 Shows How Earth Looks from the Moon (1969) • poem by May Swenson
The King of the Beasts (1964) / short story by Philip Jose Farmer
UFO Detective Solves 'em All - Well Almost (1973) • essay by Philip J. Hilts
The Good Provider (1952) / short story by Marion Gross
A Sound of Thunder (1952) / short story by Ray Bradbury
Who's Cribbing? (1953) / short story by Jack Lewis
The Third Level (1950) / short story by Jack Finney
Speed (1960) • poem by Josephine Miles
The Inn Outside the World (1945) / short story by Edmond Hamilton
On the Relativity of Time (1949) • essay by Wolfgang Pauli
Relativity Wins Again (1972) • essay by Anonymous
A Matter of Overtime (1969) • essay by Anonymous
There Will Come Soft Rains [The Martian Chronicles] (1950) / short story by Ray Bradbury
The Forgotten Enemy (1948) / short story by Arthur C. Clarke
Earthmen Bearing Gifts (1960) / short story by Fredric Brown
The IFTH of OOFTH (1957) / short story by Walter Tevis
Electronic Tape Found in a Bottle (1971) • poem by Olga Cabral
Brace Yourself for Another Ice Age (1973) • essay by Douglas Colligan
The Census Takers (1956) / short story by Frederik Pohl
Disappearing Act (1953) / short story by Alfred Bester
Bulletin (1954) / short story by Shirley Jackson
Autofac (1955) / novelette by Philip K. Dick
Toward the Space Age (1970) • poem by William Stafford
Biographies of Authors • essay by uncredited; Science-Fiction Awards • essay by uncredited; Spaceship Earth (1969) • essay by Buckminster Fuller; Pronunciation Key • essay by uncredited; Discussion Questions • essay by uncredited; Index of Authors and Titles • essay by uncredited.
.

Genres: Short Stories, Fiction, Science Fiction

419 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1974

Reviews

[Coyle · Rating 5 out of 5]

My high school English teacher used this book as a textbook, but it's still fantastic! This volume really needs to be brought back into print...

[Timothy · Rating 4 out of 5]

We read it in English class when I was a junior in high school. I own a copy. It was used widely as a textbook in the late 1970s, I think. It contains a good selection of stories. I never forgot Sheckley's "Gun Without a Bang," the Brautigan poem "All Watched Over by Machines of Loving Grace," Capek's great R.U.R., Fredric Brown's "Puppet Show," Bradbury's "Sound of Thunder," Jack Lewis's clever "Who's Cribbing?", and Anatoly Dnieprov's "Crabs Take Over the Island."

I have the book in my hand right now. I am checking to see if there were stories here that I never read....

[Clarence Day]

I read this anthology in high school and really enjoyed it. Picking it up again now was interesting, especially to see what these authors envisioned so long ago and I still enjoyed the few but I have grown away from the world that would assign this man-worship to young people to read. So I only read a few stories and moved on.

[Jon Blauvelt · Rating 4 out of 5]

A little hit or miss, but with an expansive collection like this it's expected. I appreciated that most were lighter in tone, and the length of story ranged so you can tailor the time you have to the length of story, from poems to ~15 page stories this volume has a lot of great stories from not so well known authors (at least for me).

[Alexis Neal · Rating 5 out of 5]

A fantastic collection of short stories. As with any collection, there are a few stinkers, but by and large the stories are excellent. Which is hardly a surprise with authors like Ray Bradbury, Arthur C. Clark, Isaac Asimov, Kurt Vonnegut, H.G. Wells, and Philip K. Dick contributing. (And Roald Dahl, though oddly enough his story is not one of the stronger entries in the collection. Science fiction writing is, perhaps, not his forte.)

Very easily digested, as well. Most of the stories are only a few pages long, so it's easy to work through this collection in small increments--great for the reader who only has a few minutes at a time.

The introduction ("Science Fiction: Before Christ and After 2001," by Ray Bradbury) is one of the best defenses I've seen for the legitimacy of the science fiction literature. (Not least because he echoes my own sentiments regarding the value of the genre.)

If you appreciate good science fiction and enjoy the short story format, you would do well to track down a copy of this book. It won't be easy--the thing's been out of print for a while--but it will be well worth the effort.

[Lars Wigren · Rating 4 out of 5]

This 1974 collection of science fiction themed stories and essays curated by Ray Bradbury seems to have been some sort of hailing to the establishment of science fiction as a real genre that was here to stay. The diverse selections of this compilation really underline that and thus make it so great to me. I could do without a few of the essays, but I did read almost all of them and sort of enjoyed them for what they were. It even features science fiction themed poetry, containing 'machines of loving grace' by Richard Brautigan and others.

Beyond the aim of this compilation to sort of claim science fiction as a 'real' thing that was here to stay, the selection of stories in this book is just great. I also love how everything is presented with silly, little minimalist illustrations. Must read stories include: The Gun Without a Bang by Robert Sheckley, Crabs Take Over the Island by Anatoly Dnieprov, The Sack by William Morrison, The Sound Machine by Roald Dahl, The Inn Outside the World by Edmond Hamilton, and many others.

[Deanna]

This collection of short stories was one of my favorites when I was in high school. I'd love to locate a copy and see what I think of it now!

[Erik Graff · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book was published with the intention of its being used as a text for literature courses about science fiction, Scott Foresman being primarily a schoolbook printer.

[Sergio · Rating 4 out of 5]

Nice collection of sci fi short stories. I was completely unaware of some of them and stories like EPICAC changed a lot the way I view science fiction.

[Dan · Rating 5 out of 5]

A fantastic introduction by Ray Bradbury.