james_nicoll ([info]james_nicoll) wrote,
@ 2007-12-16 11:01:00
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Cordwainer Smith cartoon
A three-panel description of Smith's Instrumentality universe.

When the artist says "But there's an older edition that only has about half of them. It's an ideal introduction to Smith's work," she is wrong. The Best of Cordwainer Smith is a good introduction to Smith's work, although I prefer Norstilia on the logical grounds that that was how I encountered him, but the NESFA hardcover is clearly superior to the Ballantine MMPK in terms of completeness and durability.


Nicked from filkerdave.

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[info]mmcirvin
2007-12-16 04:56 pm UTC (link)
The NESFA hardcover of Norstrilia is great too; it explains the history of the work and includes some fix-up material for the two-volume editions in an appendix.

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[info]lauriemann
2007-12-16 06:34 pm UTC (link)
I think so too!. My husband Jim edited both books, and spent an awful lot of time working on the fixes.

Jim has always been a huge fan of Smith. The one time Jim ever appeared in a Worldcon Masquerade was at MidAmeriCon. We dressed as underpeople!

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[info]t_guy
2007-12-16 06:40 pm UTC (link)
I'd swear my edition of Best of has 'War No. 81-Q' in it, but web sources dispute this. Is there more than one 'best of...'? Mine's Del Rey... edited by J. J. PIerce (who may or may not be the John J. Pierce of Captain Marvel and 'Alter and Captain Ego' fame).

T Guy

Disclaimer: all the above is subject to my memories of the sensational 'seventies.

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[info]james_nicoll
2007-12-16 06:53 pm UTC (link)
You might be thinking of the follow up to Best, The Instrumentality of Mankind.

It contained:

Timeline from The Instrumentality of Mankind(The Best of Cornwainer Smith) • (1975) • essay by John J. Pierce
Introduction (The Instrumentality of Mankind) • (1979) • essay by Frederik Pohl
No, No, Not Rogov!
War No. 81-Q
Mark Elf
The Queen of the Afternoon
When the People Fell
Think Blue, Count Two
The Colonel Came Back from Nothing-at-All
From Gustible's Planet
Drunkboat
Western Science Is So Wonderful
Nancy
The Fife of Bodidharma
Angerhelm
The Good Friends

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[info]krfsm
2007-12-16 10:47 pm UTC (link)
I need to get me that one, because it ONLY contains stories not in the SF Masterworks collection.

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[info]t_guy
2007-12-17 12:54 am UTC (link)
Definitely not the same: the one I'm thinking of commences with 'Scanners Live in Vain,' omits some of those you list, and - I'm almost certain, contains some others you don't list - I'm sure I recall 'The Ballad of Lost C'Mell' and 'The Lady Who Sailed the Soul.'

It's the companion volume to 'Best Of's for Eric Frank Russell and, IIRR, Edmond Hamilton, maybe L. Sprague de Camp, and almost certainly Kuttner, Moore or both. Late 1970s or early '80s.

ISTR the following in it of those you list:

No, No, Not Rogov!
War No. 81-Q
Think Blue, Count Two
The Colonel Came Back from Nothing-at-All

'Think Blue, Count Two' is one of my favourites, btw.

Does rasfw have an acronym for anthologies a la YASID? YAAID?

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[info]t_guy
2007-12-17 12:59 am UTC (link)
Apologies for the punctuation, and tomorrow I'll have a look in The Box I think it's in.

And, yes, a collection by Smith should be on the shelves rather than in a box. Possibly next to the EFR companion vol, which is 1978, intro by Alan Dean Foster, a Del Rey book published by Ballantine Books.

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[info]burger_eater
2007-12-16 07:27 pm UTC (link)
Which should I start with: We the Underpeople or The Rediscovery of Man?

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[info]threeringedmoon
2007-12-16 09:03 pm UTC (link)
We have the hardcover: time to put it on the to be read shelf: it has been a long time since I have done a reread.

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[info]lydy
2007-12-17 04:34 am UTC (link)
The Best of Cordwainer Smith is the best place to start, if only because it has "The Game of Rat and Dragon" in it. It is, I think, the most lyrical of the collections because of the way the stories resonate against each other. The Rediscovery of Man is for completists, a wonderful thing to take out and read bits of -- or all the way through, but it lacks the coherence that The Best Of... has. Nostrilia is wonderful, but sufficiently different from his shorts that I don't recommend it first. I think he's easier to adjust to in bite sized hunks.

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(Anonymous)
2007-12-17 04:20 pm UTC (link)
So, what's the deal with the Roman legionary-dude, #5 down the line from Miss Kitty?

JC, Pete Tillman
--
"In my stories I use exotic settings, but the settings are like the
function of a Chinese stage. They are intended to lay bare the human
mind, to throw torches over the underground lakes of the human soul,
to show the chambers wherein the ageless dramas of self-respect,
God, courage, sex, love, hope, envy, decency and power go on forever."
-- Cordwainer Smith, www.cordwainer-smith.com

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[info]krfsm
2007-12-18 08:16 am UTC (link)
Might be the two robots (though I can't recall if Smith called them that) assisting the Lord Sto Odin when he went down to the Bezirk to face Sun Boy and his piece of congohelium. Story's titled Under Old Earth, IIRC.

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