Contact, First

Preternatural? With all the benefits of our science and history we earthlings still seem to find it impossible to communicate effectively. It is a rare moment in time that peace extends around our little planet.

What is to be expected then when our people make contact with creatures or intelligences from other worlds? Perhaps the answers to our problems of the past, present and future are to be found in the fertile imaginings of such renowned writers as these:

Introduction (First Contact) • essay by Damon Knight

First Contact • (1945) • novelette by Murray Leinster

Doomsday Deferred • (1949) • shortstory by Murray Leinster [as by Will F. Jenkins ]

The Hurkle Is a Happy Beast • (1949) • shortstory by Theodore Sturgeon

Not Final! • (1941) • shortstory by Isaac Asimov

The Blind Pilot • (1960) • shortstory by Charles Henneberg

The Silly Season • (1950) • shortstory by C. M. Kornbluth

Goldfish Bowl • (1942) • novelette by Robert A. Heinlein [as by Anson MacDonald ]

In Value Deceived • (1950) • shortstory by H. B. Fyfe

The Waveries • (1945) • shortstory by Fredric Brown

In the Abyss • (1896) • shortstory by H. G. Wells