Clifford D. Simak
See first quotes from Clifford D. Simak
39 Quotations from Clifford D. Simak
| alternate future n. | 1950 Time Quarry in Galaxy Science Fiction Nov. 146/1 That meant that Asher Sutton could not, would not be allowed to die before the book was written. However it were written, the book must be written or the future was a lie. Sutton shrugged. The tangled thread of logic was too much for him. There was no precept, no precedent upon which one might develop the pattern of cause and result. Alternate futures? Maybe, but it didn’t seem likely. Alternate futures were a fantasy that employed semantics-twisting to prove a point, a clever use of words that covered up and masked the fallacies. |
| asteroid belt n. | 1932 Asteroid of Gold in Wonder Stories Nov. 515/1 The two tiny slabs of rock, revolving about each other, made up a part of the asteroid belt, all that remained of a mythical planet between Mars and Jupiter (which must have disrupted into the thousands of tiny fragments many millions of years before). |
| atomics n. 1 | 1944 Huddling Place in Astounding Science-Fiction July 137/1 Webster smiled at the fireplace with its blazing wood…. Useless because atomic heating was better—but more pleasant. One couldn’t sit and watch atomics and dream and build castles in the flames. |
| atomics n. 2 | 1943 Hunch in Astounding Science-Fiction July 32/2 My men are rounding up the Asteroid jewels. Got bushels of them so far. Putting them under locks you'd have to use atomics to get open. |
| Earthian n. 1 | 1943 Hunch in Astounding Science-Fiction July 19/1 It was a roundabout way, a long way, an awkward way to read the language of Mars, Monk reflected. Martian to Jovian to Earthian. But it was better than no way at all. |
| Earthian n. 2 | 1943 Hunch in Astounding Science-Fiction July 19/1 It was a roundabout way, a long way, an awkward way to read the language of Mars, Monk reflected. Martian to Jovian to Earthian. But it was better than no way at all. |
| earthlike adj. | 1981 Project Pope (1982) 22 So far as the planet is concerned, I know nothing except that it is Earthlike. No trouble for humans to live there. |
| Earth-type adj. 2 | 1956 in Galaxy Oct. 106/1 It’s Earth-type, oxygen, and the climate’s fine so far. |
| everywhen adv. | 1965 All Flesh is Grass (1979) 148 So they went everywhere for fun, I thought. And everywhen, perhaps. They were temporal ghouls, feeding on the past. |
| first contact n. | 1965 All Flesh is Grass (1979) 190 And I knew that it was hopeless, that here was a problem which could not be solved, that the human race would bungle its first contact with an alien people. There would be talk and argument, discussion, consultation—but all on the human level, all from the human viewpoint, without a chance that anyone would even try to take into account the alien point of view. |
| floater n. | 1967 Werewolf Principle (1968) 44 Carefully Blake guided the chair-like floater to the ground at one end of the barrier, close to the clump of birch, snapped off the gravity field as it came to rest. For a moment he sat in the chair unmoving… Finally he got out of the floater and from its back unstrapped the hamper of lunch to get at his fishing tackle. He set the hamper to one side on the grassy bank from which the clump of birches grew. |
| force field n. | 1954 Dusty Zebra in Galaxy Magazine Sept. 93/2 There was some feeble force-field operating inside of it—feeble yet strong enough to play hell with the electrical circuits and fancy metering machinery he has at the lab. |
| hive mind n. | 1960 Golden Bugs in Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction June 107/1 I'm convinced that these aliens must necessarily operate on the hive-mind principle. We face not one of them alone nor the total number of them but we face the sum total of them as a single unit, as a single mind and a single expression of purpose and performance. |
| home star n. | 1939 Cosmic Engineers in Astounding Science-Fiction Apr. 142/2 Swinging in a great, erratic orbit on the very edge of this nebulalike mass of raw planetary matter was a planet, a planet which they recognized. One of the planets of their old home star, fourth out from the Sun. It had been stolen from their Sun, now was swinging in an orbit of its own. |
| Jovian n. 2 | 1943 Hunch in Astounding Science-Fiction July 19/1 It was a roundabout way, a long way, an awkward way to read the language of Mars, Monk reflected. Martian to Jovian to Earthian. But it was better than no way at all. |
| Martian n. 2 | 1943 Hunch in Astounding Science-Fiction July 19/1 It was a roundabout way, a long way, an awkward way to read the language of Mars, Monk reflected. Martian to Jovian to Earthian. But it was better than no way at all. |
| Martian adj. | 1956 Time & Again ix. 42 Earth news…was followed by Martian news. |
| planetfall n. | 1956 in Galaxy Magazine Oct. 106/1 ‘Get sobered up,’ I ordered curtly. ‘We made planetfall. We’ve got work to do.’ |
| planet-hop v. | 1972 Choice of Gods 70 It was blind luck I found them. I had started back, you see, and was planet hopping, but going on a different tack than the one I’d followed going on. You have to be extremely careful, as I suppose you know, in choosing the planets that you use. |
| probability world n. | 1950 Time Quarry in Galaxy Science Fiction Dec. 118/2 You and I may be no more than puppets in some probability world that will pinch out tomorrow. |
| robotic n. | 1950 Time Quarry in Galaxy Science Fiction Oct. 18/1 Across the board stood a beautifully machined robotic. The man reached out a hand, thoughtfully played his knight. The robotic clicked and chuckled. It moved a pawn. |
| scanner n. | 1950 Time Quarry in Galaxy Science Fiction Oct. 23/1 Thorne would give it the works. He would set it up in solidographs, down to the last shattered piece of glass and plastic. He would have it analyzed and diagramed and the robots would put it in scanners that would peel it and record it molecule by molecule. |
| space-armored adj. | 1938 Reunion on Ganymede in Astounding Science-Fiction Nov. 69/2 On one of the higher snow-swept hills, a short distance from the arena, reared a massive block of marble, swarming with space-armored sculptors. |
| space field n. 2 | 1939 Cosmic Engineers in Astounding Science-Fiction Feb. 58/2 There was no stir of life about the buildings that huddled between the space-field and the mountains. |
| space-going adj. | 1932 Mutiny on Mercury in Wonder Stories Mar. 1174/1 It was plainly up to him to destroy the transport. It was too dangerous to leave it in the hands of the mutineers. With it, they could leave Mercury. It was the only space-going ship on the planet. |
| spacehand n. | 1977 Madness from Mars in Best Science-Fiction Stories 126 Aboard it were five brave men—Thomas Delvaney, the expedition’s leader; Jerry Cooper, the red-thatched navigator; Andy Smith, the world’s ace cameraman, and two space-hands, Jimmy Watson and Elmer Paine, grim old veterans of the Earth-Moon run |
| space-suited adj. | 1939 in Astounding Science Fiction Feb. 59/1 As he spoke, the lock of the radio shack opened and a spacesuited figure strode across the field to meet them. |
| space tunnel n. | [1939 Cosmic Engineers in Astounding Science-Fiction Apr. 120/2 The soft swirl of light that marked the opening of the time-space tunnel lay between and beyond two blasted towers.] |
| spaceward adj. | 1941 Masquerade in Astounding Science-Fiction Mar. 61/2 Let one of those gadgets fail—let one of those spaceward beams sway as much as a fraction of a degree—Curt shuddered at the thought of a beam of terrific power smashing into a planet—perhaps into a city. |
| spaceward adv. | 1932 Mutiny on Mercury in Wonder Stories Mar. 1174/1 The ship, he saw, had nosed upward and was tearing spaceward. |
| spaceway n. | 1956 So Bright the Vision Fantastic Universe Aug. 21/1 We got to keep them drooling over what is going to happen next to sloe-eyed Annie, queen of the far-flung space[-]ways. |
| time-path n. | 1939 Cosmic Engineers in Astounding Science-Fiction Apr. 125/1 You came trundling down a crazy time-path to seek me out. So that I could tell you the things you need to know. |
| timestream n. | 1931 World of the Red Sun in Wonder Stories Dec. 879/1 You're traveling in time, my lad… You aren’t in space any more. You are in a time stream. |
| time travel n. | 1931 World of the Red Sun in Wonder Stories Dec. 879/2 They had thought of only one thing, time travel. |
| time-travelling n. | 1973 Our Children's Children in Worlds of If June 63/1 The President has accepted at face value this story of time traveling and…it seems to me there should be some further study of the matter before we commit ourselves. |
| time warp n. | 1939 Cosmic Engineers in Astounding Science Fiction Apr. 134/2 They will use a time warp… They will bud out from their universe, but in doing so they will distort the time factor in the walls of their hypersphere. |
| Venusian adj. | 1956 Time & Again ix. 42 Earth news…was followed by Martian news, by Venusian news, by the column from the asteroids. |
| visiphone n. | 1944 Ogre in Astounding Science-Fiction Jan. 151/1 Nelson Harper…was lighting up his pipe when the visiphone signal buzzed and the light flashed on… Mackenzie’s face came in, a face streaked with dirt and perspiration, stark with fear. |
| warp v. | 1932 Hellhounds of the Cosmos in Astounding Stories June 342/1 You propose to warp a third-dimensional being into a fourth dimension. How can a third-dimensional thing exist there? You said a short time ago that only a specified dimension could exist on one single plane. |