Remembering Cordwainer Smith: Full-Time Sci-Fi Author Part-Time Earthling - Ted Gioia

"One could spend many pages considering these sociological and political themes, but the main attraction of Cordwainer Smith is not the theoretical implications, but the extravagant and often disturbing plot elements that make his stories stand out from the pack. When Smith submitted his first sci-fi story "Scanners Live in Vain" to John Campbell, Jr., the mastermind behind the influential Astounding magazine, the seasoned editor turned it down because it was, in his words, "too extreme."" 3.5 out of 5 http://www.theatlantic.com/entertainment/archive/2013/03/remembering-cordwainer-smith-full-time-sci-fi-author-part-time-earthling/274344/

The Intricate World of Cordwainer Smith - Ross Hetherington

"Every one of Smith’s stories takes place within a single, projected future history spanning 14,000 years from the present (a history which has only ever been incompletely reconstructed – Linebarger lost his one notebook to a sailing trip). In them, after global collapse near to our present time, there is founded a single governing power – The Instrumentality of Mankind. Though the Instrumentality is willing to use any means at its disposal to preserve humanity, its dictatorship is neither that of abstract utilitarian computation, nor of pure bureaucracy. The Lords of the Instrumentality, when we meet them, are human, whatever methuselan age they have lived to, or whatever skills and technologies they employ. And, however vast and rigid the hierarchy sits under them, they retain their individuality and autonomy. Ultimately, that they will serve humanity above all other concerns is a matter of trust in the subtle wisdom of the system they serve." 3.5 out of 5 http://glasgowguardian.co.uk/culture/the-intricate-world-of-cordwainer-smith/

Earthport - Technovelgy

A massive spaceport that reared up from the surface of the earth to the edge of the atmosphere.

"...Earthport stood like an enormous wineglass, reaching from the magma to the high atmosphere. Earthport had been built during mankind's biggest mechanical splurge. Though men had had nuclear rockets since the beginning of consecutive history, they had used chemical rockets to load the interplanetary ion-drive and nuclear-drive vehicles or to assemble the photonic sail-ships for interstellar cruises. Impatient with the troubles of taking things bit by bit into the sky, they had worked out a billion-ton rocket, only to find that it ruined whatever countryside it touched in landing. The Daimoni-people of Earth extraction, who came back from somewhere beyond the stars-had helped men build [Earthport] of weatherproof, rustproof, timeproof, stressproof material."


4 out of 5

http://www.technovelgy.com/ct/Content.asp?Bnum=2066

Haberman - Technovelgy

"Haberman
Modified humans controlled by cybernetic implants.

A human that have been modified from most sensory reception, while their bodily functions are controlled by cybernetic implants. Habermans are needed to crew spacecraft, since unmodified humans would not be able to withstand the "pain of space". The Pain is a side effect of interstellar travel, which causes a desire for death in living beings."


3.5 out of 5

http://www.technovelgy.com/ct/content.asp?Bnum=1975

Cordwainer Smith: The Ballad of Lost Linebarger Part 2 - Frederik Pohl

"There was a problem. After a few more fine stories about the associates of Lord Jestecost and C’Mell the cat lady and all, I got a saddening letter from him. He wouldn’t be writing any more stories about the Instrumentality, he said, because he had totally run out of additional story ideas. He hadn’t thought that would happen, he told me, because for years he’d kept this little pocket notebook with him, filling it with ideas as they occurred to him, including a number for additional stories in the series. But, alas. he’d been in a small boat somewhere — maybe it was on some Italian lake or Mediterranean bay — and he had leaned incautiously over the side … and the notebook had fallen out of his breast pocket into the water … and he been able to watch it dropping through the crystal-clear water until at last it was out of sight, and was gone. Along with all those never-to-be-written stories"


5 out of 5

http://www.thewaythefutureblogs.com/2010/12/cordwainer-smith-the-ballad-of-lost-linebarger-part-2/

Underpeople

From Technovelgy

"An animal modified to be human in shape and intellect.


"...there had been the problem of the underpeople- people who were not human, but merely shaped from the stock of Earth animals. They could speak, sing, read, write, work, love, and die; but they were not covered by human law, which simply defined them as "homunculi" and gave them a legal status close to animals or robots...""


3.5 outof 5

http://www.technovelgy.com/ct/Content.asp?Bnum=1959

Planoforming

"A form of "faster than light" travel allows for interstellar travel.

"Planoforming was sort of funny. It felt like like— Like nothing much. Like the twinge of a mild electric shock. Like the ache of a sore tooth bitten on for the first time. Like a slightly painful flash of light against the eyes. Yet in that time, a forty-thousand-ton ship lifting free above Earth disappeared somehow or other into two dimensions and appeared half a light-year or fifty light-years off." "



3.5 out of 5

http://www.technovelgy.com/ct/content.asp?Bnum=1964

Cordwainer Smith: The Ballad of Lost Linebarger Part 1 - Frederik Pohl

"It was a story that had appeared in a semi-pro sf magazine from California called, if I remember aright, Fantasy Book. Its title was “Scanners Live in Vain.” It was about a bizarre kind of spaceflight, set in a bizarre future world, .and it was signed as by someone named Cordwainer Smith. So I included it in my lineup, and then had the problem of finding out who could sign a permission for the use of the story and accept the payment for it. “Cordwainer Smith” smelled very much like a pseudonym to me. But for whom? "


5 out of 5

http://www.thewaythefutureblogs.com/2010/12/cordwainer-smith-the-ballad-of-lost-linebarger-part-1/

Cordwainer Smith's Universe Timeline - J. J. Pierce

"Timeline From The Instrumentality of Mankind, Compiled by J.J. Pierce.

Note: With Smith's own notebooks lost, chronology is largely a matter of guesswork, based on internal evidence. But the order of stories and surounding events can be fairly well established."


4 out of 5

http://www.theweebsite.com/ragnar/smith_time.html

Planet Buyer and the Catmaster: A Critical Future for Transference

In: -

Empire Burlesque: The Fate of Critical Culture in Global America

Author(s): Daniel T. O'Hara
Published: 2003
Pages: 392
Series: New Americanists


Unseen. Small piece of at google books :- http://books.google.com.au/books?id=LEto7uIGCcQC&pg=PA301&lpg=PA301&dq=Planet+Buyer+and+the+Catmaster:+A+Critical+Future+for+Transference&source=bl&ots=FPRiKOxt3s&sig=UTndEyXf9zj7dTFYEkCIpTbTck8&hl=en&ei=k8u7TNSyEoSecObp7eoM&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=1&ved=0CBQQ6AEwAA#v=onepage&q=Planet%20Buyer%20and%20the%20Catmaster%3A%20A%20Critical%20Future%20for%20Transference&f=false

http://www.dukeupress.edu/Catalog/ViewProduct.php?productid=8340&viewby=series&categoryid=33&sort=title%C3%83%C3%9C

Cordwainer Smith and the Soushenji: Comparative Perspectives on the Boundaries of Humanity - Lisa Raphals

“Cordwainer Smith and the Soushenji: Comparative Perspectives on the Boundaries of ‘Humanity’” (in Dream Weavers: Globalization, Science Fiction, and the Cybernetic Revolution)

Unseen.

http://complitforlang.ucr.edu/people/faculty/bio.html?page=raphals.html

Tripping Cyborgs and Organ Farms: The Fictions of Cordwainer Smith - Steve Silberman

"Calling a magazine “off-trail” may not be the most felicitous way for an aspiring author to introduce himself, but it was understandable if the boyish professor at Johns Hopkins University — who coyly described his work for the Pentagon as being “a visitor to small wars” — felt defensive about his novelette. Three years earlier, the editor of Astounding Science Fiction, the most literary-minded of the pulps, had rejected Scanners, calling it “too extreme” for a periodical that regularly featured marauding robots, exploding spaceships, and alien reptile overlords on its cover. Other editors seemed to agree.

It’s not hard to see why. Fifteen years before the word cyborg was invented, and with no preliminary exposition, the story plunged the reader into the passions, intimacies, and life-and-death conflicts of cybernetically augmented human beings. Man-machine hybrids had appeared before in fiction (including a celebrated tin woodman whose total-body prosthesis lacked a heart, and the robotically resurrected actress in C. L. Moore’s groundbreaking feminist sci-fi tale “No Woman Born”), but Linebarger’s central character — a courageous cyborg named Martel — was both a sleeker machine and a more acutely rendered human character than readers of the pulps were used to. Martel and his fellow cyborgs, known as “Scanners,” had their own lexicon of shop talk, expressive body language, code of ethics, professional guild, rousing songs, and finely honed sense of discipline. They were more like Marines than robots."


4 out of 5

http://blogs.plos.org/neurotribes/2010/09/21/tripping-cyborgs-and-organ-farms-the-fictions-of-cordwainer-smith/

Lecture 6 Onward and Outward: The 1950s, Space Travel, Apocalypticism, and the Beautiful Weirdness of Cordwainer Smith - Michael Drout

In : From Here to Infinity: An Exploration of Science Fiction Literature

by Michael Drout

SFF audio says most of this lecture is devoted to Cordwainer Smith.


Unseen.


http://www.sffaudio.com/?p=822

Cordwainer Smith - Frank Northern Magill

Critical Survey of Short Fiction: Current writers. Index By Frank Northen Magill

"Book overviewThis series contains 515 essays, revolving around authors of short fiction. Essays are arranged alphabetically by author and provide in-depth overviews of short-story writers. Each essay contains full birth and death data, substantial listings of literary works by genre, and an analysis and survey of the major themes and techniques in the writer's work, using specific titles for examples. Finally, there is a list of other publication by genre, and an annotated bibliography.

Snippet view - Item notes: v. 7 - 1981 - 2901 pages -"


Unseen.

http://books.google.com.au/books?id=cAgnAAAAMAAJ&q=cordwainer+smith&dq=cordwainer+smith&lr=&cd=124

A Cordwainer Smith Checklist - Mike Bennett

Title A Cordwainer Smith Checklist
Issue 37 of Booklet Series
Drumm booklet
Author Mike Bennett
Publisher Chris Drumm Books, 1991
ISBN 0936055499, 9780936055497
Length 28 pages


Unseen.

http://books.google.com.au/books?id=EenIPAAACAAJ&dq=cordwainer+smith&lr=&cd=92

Cordwainer Smith - Don D'Ammassa

From his Encyclopedia of Science Fiction :

"Cordwainer Smith was the pseudonym of Paul Linebarger, a specialist in political science who spent extensive time in Asia and who wrote three mainstream novels under other pen names. Al-though his first science fiction story appeared in 1928, he would not return to that form until the appearance of “SCANNERS LIVE IN VAIN” (1948),
the first of his stories of the Instrumentality, a complex future history in which star travel is dangerous because of the existence of discorporate and malevolent intelligences. Space travel is achieved in safety only after humans learn to enhance the intelligence of certain lower animals and develop their own psi powers. Smith began to develop the concept in more detail with a series of short stories during the 1950s, including excellent tales like “THE GAME OF RAT AND DRAGON” (1955).
Smith hit his stride as a short story writer during the 1960s, producing one classic tale after an-other, most of them set in the Instrumentality universe. The Instrumentality begins as a rigid dictatorship. The uplifted animals are virtually slaves, and the repressive rulers tighten their grip by discovering and monopolizing the secret of immortality. Opposed to the rule of the Instrumentality are the Underpeople, an amorphous rebel group consisting of humans and uplifted animals. Smith never directly resolves this conflict, although some of his stories appear to be set in a distant future in which the inequities of the Instrumentality have been largely overcome. Stories like “The Lady Who Sailed the Soul” (1960), “A Planet Named Shayol” (1961), “The Ballad of Lost C’Mell” (1962), and “The Dead Lady of Clown Town” (1964) expanded and embellished Smith’s universe while telling distinct and often emotionally moving stories. His first collection, You Will Never Be the Same (1963), mixed Instrumentality stories with others not in the series.
The Planet Buyer (1964) was the first Instrumentality novel. The protagonist has literally purchased the Earth, but when he sets out to visit his new property, he discovers that various people would much prefer it if he failed to arrive. It was meant to be published jointly with the collection, The Underpeople (1968). Eventually they did appear in one volume as Norstrilia (1975). Several other collections followed including Space Lords (1965), Under Old Earth and Other Explorations (1970), and Stardreamer (1971), which in combination reprinted virtually all of Smith’s short fiction. Virtually the same contents were later recombined as The Best of Cordwainer Smith (1975, also published as The Rediscovery of Man) and The Instrumentality of Mankind (1979). A subset of stories set in the latter days of the Instrumentality formed the quasi-novel, Quest of Three Worlds (1966). An even more comprehensive omnibus volume, also titled The Rediscovery of Man, appeared in 1993.
The proliferation of titles disguises the fact that Smith’s actual output was quite small, which makes his high stature among genre writers even more impressive. He had a distinct narrative style that often makes the reader accept a situation that might otherwise seem ludicrous, like a love affair between a human and a semi-intelligent cat. Many of his characters seem to have stepped out of a legend, although without losing their human qualities. Images from genuine legends, like the Trojan Horse, occur periodically in his work. Although there is an element of satire in most of the stories, it is subtle and never approaches parody. We always care about what is happening because he makes even the most bizarre situations seem real. Smith was one of a handful of writers whose literary sensibilities dramatically transformed science fiction during the 1960s, and the fact that he is rarely imitated is an indication of the uniqueness of his talent and not of a lack of influence on his fellow writers."


4.5 out of 5

Cordwainer Smith - John Clute

From the Encyclopedia of Science Fiction, edited with Peter Nicholls

"Most famous pseudonym of Paul Myron Anthony Linebarger (1913-1966), US writer, political scientist, military adviser in Korea and Malaya (though not Vietnam). A polyglot, he spent many of his early years in Europe, Japan and China, in the footsteps of his father, Paul M.W. Linebarger, a sinologist and propagandist for Sun Yat-sen. He was a devout High Anglican, deeply interested in psychoanalysis and expert in "brainwashing" techniques, on which he wrote an early text, Psychological Warfare (1948; rev 1954). Right-wing in politics, he played an active role in propping up the Chiang Kai-shek regime in China before the communist takeover.His
interest in China was profound - he studied there, and there edited his father's The Gospel of Chuang Shan (1932 chap France), writing as well several texts of his own, beginning with Government in Republican China (1938); the style of some of his later stories reflects his attempts to translate a Chinese narrative and structural style into his sf writing, not perhaps with complete success, as the fabulist's voice he assumed (FABULATION) verged towards the garrulous when opened out into English
prose. He began to publish sf with "War No. 81-Q" as by Karloman Jungahr for The Adjutant - a high-school journal - in 1928; the tale bore some relationship to the Instrumentality of Mankind Universe into which almost all his mature work fitted. Before beginning to write that mature work, however, CS served with the US Army Intelligence Corps in China during WWII and published 3 non-sf novels: Ria (1947) and Carola (1948), both as by Felix C. Forrest, and Atomsk: A Novel of Suspense (1949) as by Carmichael Smith. After that date he published fiction only as CS.His
first CS story, and one of the finest of his mature tales, "Scanners Livein Vain" (1950), appeared obscurely in FANTASY BOOK 5 years after it had been rejected by the more prestigious sf journals (although John W. CAMPBELL Jr had penned an encouraging rejection note from ASF), perhaps because its foreboding intensity made the editors of the time uneasy, perhaps because it plunges in medias res into the Instrumentality
Universe, generating a sense that much remains untold beyond the dark edges of the tale. Scanners are space pilots; the rigours of their job entail the functional loss of the sensory region of their brains. The story deals with their contorted lives and with the end of the form of space travel necessitating the contortions: it is clear that much has happened in the Universe before the tale begins, and that much will ensue. The Instrumentality dominated the rest of CS's creative life, which lasted 1955-66, with individual stories making up the bulk of several collections
- including You Will Never Be the Same (coll 1963), Space Lords (coll 1965), Under Old Earth and Other Explorations (coll 1970 UK) and Stardreamer (coll 1971) - before being re-sorted into 2 definitive vols, The Best of Cordwainer Smith (coll 1975; vt The Rediscovery of Man 1988 UK) ed John J. PIERCE and The Instrumentality of Mankind (coll 1979); and subsequently resorted again, this time definitively, as The Rediscovery of Man: The Complete Short Fiction of Cordwainer Smith (coll 1993). A similar complexity obscured the publication of his only full-scale sf novel,
Norstrilia (1975), which first appeared as 2 separate novels - each in fact an extract from the original single manuscript - as The Planet Buyer (1964 Gal as "The Boy who Bought Old Earth"; rev 1964) and The Underpeople (1964 Worlds of If as "The Store of Heart's Desire"; rev 1968). Along with Quest of the Three Worlds (coll of linked stories 1966), the 2 re-sorted collections and Norstrilia assemble all of CS's sf.The Instrumentality of Mankind covers several millennia of humanity's uncertain progress into a FAR-FUTURE plenitude. Before the period of "Scanners Live in Vain" a shattered Earth is dubiously revitalized by the family of a Nazi scientist
who awake from SUSPENDED ANIMATION to found the Instrumentality, a hereditary caste of rulers, under whose hegemony space is explored by scanners, then by ships which sail by photonic winds, then via planoforming, which is more or less instantaneous. Genetically modified animals are bred as slaves ( GENETIC ENGINEERING). On the Australian colony planet of Norstrilia, an IMMORTALITY drug called stroon is
discovered, making the planet very rich indeed and granting the oligarchy on Earth eternal dominance, with no one but Norstrilians and members of the Instrumentality being permitted to live beyond 400 years. (Norstrilia deals with a young heir to much of the planet's wealth who travels to Earth, which he has purchased, discovering en passant a great deal about the animal-descended Underpeople.) Human life becomes baroque, aesthetical, decadent. But a fruitful concourse of Underpeople and aristocrats generates the Rediscovery of Man - as witnessed in tales like
"The Dead Lady of Clown Town" (1964), "Alpha Ralpha Boulevard" (1961) and "The Ballad of Lost C'Mell" (1962), which embodies a sympathetic response to the Civil Rights movement of the 1960s - through which disease, ethnicity and strife are deliberately reintroduced into the painless world. Much later an adventurer makes a Quest through Three Worlds in a Universe seemingly benign.The Instrumentality of Mankind remains, all the same, a fragment - as, therefore, does CS's work as a whole - for the long conflict between Underpeople and Instrumentality, the details of which are recounted by CS with what might be called oceanic sentiment, is never resolved; and CS's habitual teasing of the reader with implications of a fuller yet never-told tale only strengthens the sense of an almost coy incompletion. This sense is also reinforced by the Chinese ancestry of some of CS's devices, which inspired in him a narrative voice that, in ruminating upon a tale of long ago, seemed to confer, both with the reader and with general tradition, about the tale's meaning. Alfred Doblin (1878-1957) ( GERMANY) has also been suggested as a significant influence, both for his early expressionist work set in China, like Die drei Sprunge
des Wang-Lun ["The Three Leaps of Wang-Lun"] (1915), and for his surreal metamorphic sf novels - none translated - like Wadzeks Kampf mit der Dampfmaschine ["Wadzek's Struggle with the Steam-Machine"] (1918) and Berge, Meere und Giganten ["Mountains, Sea and Giants"] (1924; rev vt Giganten ["Giants"] 1931). CS's best later stories glow with an air of complexity and antiquity that, on analysis, their plots do not not always sustain. Much of the structuring of the series is lyrical and incantatory
(down to the literal use of rather bad poetry, and much internal rhyming) but, beyond stroon, and Norstrilia, and Old Earth and the absorbingly described SPACESHIPS, much of the CS Universe remains only glimpsed. Whether such a Universe, recounted in such a voice, could ever be fully seen is a question which, of course, cannot be answered."

4.5 out of 5

Wikipedia - Instrumentality Of Mankind

Instrumentality of Mankind
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

In the science fiction of Cordwainer Smith, the Instrumentality of Mankind refers both to Smith's personal future history and universe and to the central government of humanity. The Instrumentality of Mankind is also the title of a paperback collection of short stories by Cordwainer Smith published in 1979 (now superseded by the later The Rediscovery of Man, which collects all of Smith's short stories).Contents [hide]
1 Origin and History
2 Characteristics
3 Individual members
4 Possible sources of inspiration
5 Cultural references
6 Selected bibliography
7 External links

[edit]
Origin and History

In the history of Cordwainer Smith's "Instrumentality" universe, the Instrumentality originated as the police force of the Jwindz or "perfect ones" on a post-nuclear-holocaust Earth. After attaining power and the expansion of humans in space, they eventually entered a somewhat stagnant phase in which a fixed lifespan of four-hundred years was imposed on the human inhabitants of the planets where the Instrumentality directly ruled, all the hard physical labor was done by rightless animal-derived "underpeople", and children were never raised by their biological parents. This somewhat empty and sterile system was reformed and enlivened by the "Rediscovery of Man", the backdrop against which Smith's novel Norstrilia and the majority of his short stories, covering thousands of years of fictional time, are set. The cycle does not come to a final resolution (there were hints dropped about a mysterious trio of "robot, rat, and Copt" which were not followed up, possibly because of Smith's own death).
[edit]
Characteristics

Though the Instrumentality does not directly administer every planet, it claims ultimate guardianship over the destiny of the human race. For example, it strictly bans the export of religion from planet to planet. Its members, the Lords and Ladies of the Instrumentality, are collectively all-powerful and often somewhat callously arbitrary. Although their motives are genuinely benign, they act with utmost brutality when survival is at stake.

Here is an explanation from the story "Drunkboat":
"The Instrumentality was a self-perpetuating body of men with enormous powers and a strict code. Each was a plenum of the low, the middle, and the high justice. Each could do anything he found necessary or proper to maintain the Instrumentality and keep the peace between the worlds. But if he made a mistake or committed a wrong—ah, then, it was suddenly different. Any Lord could put another Lord to death in an emergency, but he was assured of death and disgrace himself if he assumed this responsibility. The only difference between ratification and repudiation came in the fact that Lords who killed in an emergency and were proved wrong were marked down on a very shameful list, while those who killed other Lords rightly (as later examination might prove) were listed on a very honorable list, but still killed. With three Lords, the situation was different. Three Lords made an emergency court; if they acted together, acted in good faith, and reported to the computers of the Instrumentality, they were exempt from punishment, though not from blame or even reduction to civilian status. Seven Lords, or all the Lords on a given planet at a given moment, were beyond any criticism except that of a dignified reversal of their actions should a later ruling prove them wrong.
"This was all the business of the Instrumentality. The Instrumentality had the perpetual slogan 'Watch, but do not govern; stop war, but do not wage it; protect, but do not control; and first, survive!'"
[edit]
Individual members

Some prominent Lords and Ladies of the Instrumentality:
Lord Jestocost, descendant of Lady Goroke
Lady Panc Ashash (as a posthumous personality recording)
Lord Femtiosex
Lord Sto Odin
Lord Crudelta
Lady Alice More, partner of the seventh Lord Jestocost.
Lady Arabella Underwood
Lady Johanna Gnade

The names Goroke, Femtiosex, Sto Odin and Panc Ashash are number-word names of the type common during the Instrumentality's decadent period: "five-six" in Japanese is Go-Roku, in Hindi it is Panc-Ashash, and in Swedish Femtiosex (literally "fifty-six"). 'Tiga-belas' and 'Veesey-koosey', the names of supporting and main characters of the Instrumentality story Think Blue, Count Two, also mean 'thirteen' (Indonesian tiga and belas) and 'five-six' (Finnish viisi and kuusi), respectively. Sto Odin is "a hundred and one" in Russian. The name Jestocost is based on the word for "cruelty" in Russian (жестокость), and Crudelta is the equivalent in Italian (crudeltà, feminine). Gnade is a German word meaning "grace" or "mercy".
[edit]
Possible sources of inspiration

The term "Lords of the Instrumentality" may have been partly inspired by the Lords of the Admiralty, an institution of prime importance in the history of the British Empire. The Instrumentality also has similarities to the future world government of Rudyard Kipling's short stories "With the Night Mail" and "As Easy as ABC". Anglican Christianity, to which Smith belonged, refers frequently to "instrumentality", meaning agent or intermediary.
[edit]
Cultural references

The Human Instrumentality Project in the Neon Genesis Evangelion anime series is a reference to Cordwainer's works.

A password used in the anime Serial Experiments Lain, "Think Bule Count One Tow" (used by Lain's father) is a misspelled reference to Think Blue, Count Two.

The Dreadstar comic book features the Church of the Instrumentality which is a space empire. The church has created a race of cat-people, similar to the underpeople of the Instrumentality of Mankind.
[edit]
Selected bibliography
The Rediscovery of Man (short story collection, including all of the Instrumentality of Mankind stories)
Norstrilia (novel; set relatively late in the chronology of the future history)
[edit]
External links
On idealism and morality in the Instrumentality of Mankind


4.5 out of 5

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Instrumentality_of_Mankind

Wikipedia - The Rediscovery Of Man

The Rediscovery of Man
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The Rediscovery of Man: The Complete Short Science Fiction of Cordwainer Smith (ISBN 0-915368-56-0) is a 1993 book containing the complete collected short fiction of science fiction author Cordwainer Smith. It was edited by James A. Mann and published by NESFA Press.

Most of the stories take place in Smith's future history set in the universe of the Instrumentality of Mankind; the collection is arranged in the chronological order in which the stories take place in the fictional timeline. The collection also contains short stories which do not take place in this universe.

Within the context of the future history, the Rediscovery of Mankind refers to the Instrumentality's re-introduction of chance and unhappiness into the sterile utopia that they had created for humanity. Other than Smith's novel, Norstrilia, which takes place in the same future history, the book collects all of Smith's known science fiction writing.
[edit]
List of Instrumentality of Man stories
"No, No, Not Rogov!"
"War No. 81-Q" (version 2) (not previously collected)
"Mark Elf"
"The Queen of the Afternoon"
"Scanners Live in Vain"
"The Lady Who Sailed The Soul"
"When the People Fell"
"Think Blue, Count Two"
"The Colonel Came Back from the Nothing-at-All"
"The Game of Rat and Dragon"
"The Burning of the Brain"
"From Gustible's Planet"
"Himself in Anachron" (first publication)
"The Crime and the Glory of Commander Suzdal"
"Golden the Ship Was-Oh! Oh! Oh!"
"The Dead Lady of Clown Town"
"Under Old Earth"
"Drunkboat" (much rewritten version of "The Colonel Came Back from the Nothing-at-All")
"Mother Hitton's Littul Kittons"
"Alpha Ralpha Boulevard"
"The Ballad of Lost C'Mell"
"A Planet Named Shayol"
The stories which comprise the novel Quest of the Three Worlds:
"On the Gem Planet"
"On the Storm Planet"
"On the Sand Planet"
"Three to a Given Star"
"Down to a Sunless Sea"
[edit]
Other stories
"War No. 81-Q"
"Western Science Is So Wonderful"
"Nancy" (originally published as "The Nancy Routine")
"The Fife of Bodidharma"
"Angerhelm"
"The Good Friends"
[edit]
External link

E-texts available as part of Baen books' "Webscription" service:
"We the Underpeople" contents
"When the People Fell" contents


3 out of 5

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Rediscovery_of_Man

Wikipedia - Norstrilia

Norstrilia
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Norstrilia is the only novel published by Paul Linebarger under the pseudonym Cordwainer Smith, which he used for his science-fiction works (though several related short stories were once packaged together as a short novel The Quest of the Three Worlds). It takes place in Smith's Instrumentality of Mankind universe, and was heavily influenced by the classic Chinese novel Journey to the West.Contents [hide]
1 Plot
1.1 Setting
1.2 Plot summary
2 Publication history
3 References

[edit]
Plot
[edit]
Setting

The central character of Norstrilia is Roderick Frederick Ronald Arnold William MacArthur McBan the Hundred and Fifty-First, an inhabitant of a planet known as "Old North Australia", or simply "Norstrilia"; this is the only location in the Instrumentality of Mankind fictional universe which produces the precious immortality drug "stroon", which indefinitely delays aging in humans. Stroon (or the "Santaclara drug") is a substance harvested from the huge diseased sheep the Norstrilians raise, and which has the curious property of being resistant to all attempts at artificial synthesis by the most advanced science of the period. Since the Norstrilians have an effective monopoly, stroon sells for astronomical prices, and Norstrilia is fabulously wealthy (wealthier than any other single planet). To safeguard their archaic way of life (resembling Australian ranchers with a British cultural inheritance), the Norstrilians are forced to develop the most advanced defense force and weaponry known (see Mother Hitton's Littul Kittons); to protect their culture, imports from other worlds are taxed at rates exceeding 20 million per cent, reducing what would be a staggering fortune on another planet to humble penury on Norstrilia itself. Since stroon permits what is practically immortality, they are also forced to cull their young in order to prevent overpopulation (only those children who pass the tests of the "Garden of Death" enter adulthood).
[edit]
Plot summary

Rod McBan is the last male descendent of one of the oldest Norstrilian families, and is the last heir to one of the best ranches, the Station of Doom. As such, he has been spared the culling three times, though he is generally considered unfit, as his ability to communicate telepathically with other Norstrilians is erratic and unreliable. After his last test — which he finally passes with the aid of a Lord of the Instrumentality and his own freak telepathic talents — he learns that an envious former friend, who suffers from an allergy to stroon and so is condemned to live a mere 150 years or so, seeks to kill him, using the pretext that the test was biased and administered unfairly.

Rod survives one assassination attempt. To escape the danger, he amasses an immense fortune overnight by playing the futures market in stroon, following a plan formulated by his ancient computer (which has certain more-or-less illegal quasi-military capabilities) which was passed down to him by an eccentric ancestor. By the next day, he is the wealthiest person in history. Noticing this, the Instrumentality changes the rules so it cannot happen again, but in typical fashion, lets him keep his money to see what he will do with it. Wild rumors begin to circulate about him. He is believed to have "bought Old Earth" (the home planet of mankind), though the reality of his convoluted financial deals and investments is considerably more complex.

For his safety, Rod is sent to Earth, where his unprecedented fortune quickly makes him a magnet for all manner of crooks and revolutionaries. After a series of adventures among the "underpeople" (animals genetically modified to resemble humans and possessing intellects that sometimes surpass their masters, used as slaves and generally despised) in the company of the bewitching Cat-woman C'mell, he meets their leader, E'Telekeli, an experimental creature of bird origin with enormous psychic powers. In exchange for most of Rod's immense fortune (to be used to campaign for the rights of the underpeople), he and Lord Jestocost, a Lord of the Instrumentality who is sympathetic to the underpeople's cause, send Rod safely back to Norstrilia, after fixing his telepathic disability and providing a psychological remedy for Rod's enemy.
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Publication history

Before being published in a single novel in 1975, portions of Norstrilia were published as two short novels: The Planet Buyer in 1964, and as The Underpeople in 1968.
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References
Norstrilia, 1975. Cordwainer Smith, Ballantine Books, ISBN 0-345-24366-8
Norstrilia, 1995. Cordwainer Smith, NESFA Press, ISBN 0-915368-61-7
We the Underpeople, 2006. Cordwainer Smith, Baen Books, ISBN 1-4165-2095-3


4 out of 5

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Norstrilia