TTHC    389: Manuscript received at SMLA June 24, 1953.            

(1954 APR): IF {ill. by Freas}

(1954 JUL): IF {UK} Vol.1 #9
(1954): BEYOND THE BARRIERS OF SPACE AND TIME {Ed.: Judith Merrill}Random House, hb, $2.95
(1975): EVIL EARTHS {Ed.: Aldiss} Weidenfeld & Nicholson, ?, L4.25
(1975): STRANGE GIFTS {Ed.: Silverberg} Thomas Nelson, hb, $6.95
(1980): THE GOLDEN MAN  {Ed.: Hurst} Berkley, pb, 04288
(1986): WORLD'S OF IF: A RETROSPECTIVE ANTHOLOGY {ed.: Pohl, Greenberg, Olander} Bluejay, tp,
(1987): THE FATHER THING
(1991): SECOND VARIETY, Citadel Twilight,

Contents:

• The Golden Man
• Return Match
• The King Of The Elves
• The Mold Of Yancy
• Not By Its Cover
• The Little Black Box
• The Unreconstructed M
• The War With The Fnools
• The Last Of The Masters
• Meddler
• A Game Of Unchance
• Sales Pitch
• Precious Artifact
• Small Town
• The Pre-Persons

To the Short Stories page

TGM Story Introductions by PKD

"The Golden man"

    Here I am saying that mutants are dangerous to us ordinaries, a view which John W. Campbell, Jr. deplored. We were supposed to view them as our leaders. But I always felt uneasy as to how they would view us. I mean, maybe they wouldn't want to lead us. Maybe from their superevolved lofty level we wouldn't seem worth leading. Anyhow, even if they agreed to lead us, I felt uneasy as to where we would wind up going. It might have something to do with buildings marked SHOWERS but which really weren't.

SRG 52

   When one lives in and accepts a society of unanimity, any abberation affronts the unimaginitive and provokes, or at least, invites repressive reactions. Repression lives in many forms. Dick sets up two of these  for the reader in "The Golden Man" (legalized murder) and "The Little Black Box" (legalized manhunts). In the first story a disasterous war has visited upon the world a terrifying problem, human mutation. The world's governments dedicate themselves to rooting out and destroying deviants, such as telepaths, telekinetics, and those with multiple organs or misshapen bodies or non-human features. But what happens when the deviant is so superior that, like a god, he dwarfs normal men in both intellect and physical ability? Superiority will not be denied. Change is undeniable znd, ironically, the "normal" becomes the deviation; the legal murderer will be exterminated.