1950: ‘Transfer Point’ by Anthony Boucher

Hertzsprung-Russell rating: F10³

Available in: Adventures In Tomorrow

An alien in the year 4000 reads a C20 pulp scifi story about a time machine, builds it, then goes back in time to C20 to write the story he learned about the time machine from. Personally, I hate pulp in my scifi, so I read only the strained, pulp-free kind. Seriously, though: you can’t write a time-travel story without paradox. It’s like writing a tragedy with no sadness – there’s no fucking point. So just pretend it’s your creepy drunken uncle you see once a year at Christmas, embrace it, and hope it doesn’t get a boner.

1951: ‘Generation Of Noah’ by William Tenn

Hertzsprung-Russell rating: F1

Available in: The Wooden Star

A Cold War-era urbanite moves his family to a remote farm in anticipation of an impending Commie A-bomb attack. There, he drills them in the fundamentals of root vegetable farming, iodine consumption, and all-pervading nuclear paranoia. It’s like ‘Green Acres’ with a bomb shelter. The best thing about being a farmer during WWIII is that nuclear fallout completely obscures the sun so, technically, you’re always up before dawn.

1952: ‘Stair Trick’ by Mildred Clingerman

Hertzsprung-Russell rating: M10^-3

Available in: A Cupful Of Space

A short, beautiful, surreal story in which the basement of a nondescript dive bar contains a portal to another dimension. And that’s why you should patronize locally-owned watering holes instead of faux-Irish chain ‘pubs’; in addition to never forcing you to listen to a Chinese girl in a kilt tell you the special of the day is traditional Irish lasagna with a pint of Bud for $13.99, they also contain portals to other dimensions.

1953: ‘The Model Of A Judge’ by William Morrison

Hertzsprung-Russell rating: B/A1

Available in: The Third Galaxy Reader

 

A highly intelligent alien is captured (couldn’t be that intelligent, if they caught him), tortured, brainwashed, and imprisoned on Earth where his superior mind is used to judge a cake-baking contest. Insidious, to be sure. If, however, such initial brutality could guarantee the moistness of all future Earth desserts, I believe we’d have no choice but to support it.

1954: ‘One Way Street’ by Jerome Bixby

Hertzsprung-Russell rating: A10^2.5

Available in: Robert Adams’ Book Of Alternate Worlds

So many alternate history tales go wrong because they posit realities which differ from ours in ways only appreciated by historical scholars (‘Imagine if Jacob van Arteveld had aligned against Bruges and Ypres in 1337; what a deliciously topsy-turvy world we’d live in now!’). In Earth II of ‘One Way Street’, Toulouse-Lautrec was of average height. Awesome.

1955: ‘The Dragon’ by Ray Bradbury

Hertzsprung-Russell Rating: M10^-4

Available in: The Day It Rained Forever

Things you can’t argue with: a shark attack, gravity, the Mafia and the fact that Ray Bradbury is perhaps the greatest writer of the 20^th century in any genre. ‘The Dragon’ is a remarkable fusion of fantasy and time travel, simply constructed and beautifully presented. And if you argue, I’ll send a Mafioso shark to your house to push you down.

1956: ‘Tomb Tapper’ by James Blish

Hertzsprung-Russell rating: G10⁴

Available in: Galactic Cluster

Do you like surprise endings? For example; would it thrill you if, instead of the question mark you were expecting at the end of this sentence, there was a miniature picture of Bob Uecker instead Then you should read this story. It has a surprise ending that’ll make that question mark/Uecker thing seem hackneyed and pathetic by comparison. Much like Bob Uecker himself (bet you didn’t see that coming, Uecker!)

1957: ‘Goddess In Granite’ by Robert F. Young

Hertzsprung-Russell rating: F10⁴

Available in: The Worlds Of Robert F. Young

An interplanetary mountaineer becomes sexually obsessed with a woman-shaped mountain and decides to ‘tap’ that. Mostly with a mountain-climbing hammer. But he gets his pitons in a knot when he reaches the top and realizes he’s not the first one to plant his flag in her moist, quivering peak. That ignominious, igneous bitch! That’s why, geologically speaking, I’m an isthmus man.

1958: ‘Shark Ship’ by C.M. Kornbluth

Hertzsprung-Russell rating: G/K10^6.5+

Available in: A Mile Beyond The Moon

C.M.K. doesn’t seem to have a bad writing bone in his body; not a punny tibia or hackneyed distal phalange to be found. ‘Shark Ship’ begins as a story about a future civilization living at sea, and ends up touring the abandoned slums of New York City. Like a Nazi slipping on a banana peel it’s all at once scary and hilarious, and proves that the Jew-run banana peel industry is still very much a threat.

1959: ‘The Mind Spider’ by Fritz Leiber

Hertzsprung-Russell rating: A/F10

Available in: The Mind Spider And Other Stories

This story has something for everyone: a family of telepaths and an unfathomably evil presence from beyond the stars imprisoned at the South Pole which they band together to defeat. On second thought, this story doesn’t really have something for everyone. In fact, the segment of people this story appeals to is incredibly small: the intersection of the Venn diagram for readers who enjoy both familial telepathy and imprisoned evil looks like Smurfette’s vagina. Still, ich liebe Leiber.