a stereotypical inhabitant of outer space; an person of peculiar appearance
The Little Green Man. ]
THE LITTLE GREEN MEN by G. Herb Palin…. The president…was anxious to meet Eddie of New York and the ten little green men from the moon.
The Martians were prepared to catch the first message from the earth. ‘Let me see,’ said the first little green man. ‘I wonder if the first communication will be a flash, a tick or a knock.’ ‘A knock, very likely,’ laughed the second little green man. ‘You know the earth is just full of knockers [sc. a person who habitually criticizes].’ Which shows how wise the Martians really are.
He had saved the little green man’s life, and from that time on, Omar Klegg had been the one white man who could step foot on the bad-land soil of Venus without the aid of blazing needle-beam gats.
And yet I insist on writing fantastic fiction. I would write more, if it wasn’t for the littlegreen men that run out of the woodwork and pull down my socks every time I sit at the typewriter.I have managed to fool these fellows by not wearing socks, but lately they've taken to tugging atmy trousers instead.
And that was when she said the strange thing. She laughed throatily, ‘Oh, the little green men told me.’The little green men! Well, we didn’t think it so strange at the time. I thought it was just a phrase, a gag, one of those things you say.
‘Don’t know what they have in mind unless to bomb the park, people and all, if little green men come out of that thing with ray guns and start killing everybody. Then the bombers could finish off whoever’s left.’ But no little green men came out of the cylinder.
Maddigan twisted his beefy shoulders. ‘Possibly the flying saucers; there are as many different opinions on that phenomenon as there have been saucers sighted. Possibly they arent [sic] extra-terrestrial at all, but even if they're not, it doesn’t mean that we haven’t had, or do not have now, visitors among us.’ ‘Why?’ I asked. ‘Why should these little green men want to come to earth?’ Maddigan waggled a finger at me. ‘I am disappointed in you, Mr. Knight,’ he said peevishly. ‘This is a subject in which you are little versed. You have admitted almost complete ignorance, but still you are contemptuous. You say jokingly, ‘little green men’, and your tone of voice implies that the very thought of alien life is ridiculous. Yet you have no evidence to support your prejudice.’
The little green man with the pink eyebrows and the peacock feather tail appeared upon the porcelain bench in the chemical laboratory.
The Martians really were little green men.
How does it feel to be a little green man in a flying saucer?
So scratch the mysterious eye of the idol of the Great God Foofooroney, complete with sinister Chinamen or lascars or little green men.
antedating 1907
Cites referring to extraterrestrial beings:
Mike Christie submitted a cite from a 1963 reprint of Robert Heinlein's "Time for the Stars"; Andrew Dalke verified it in the 1956 first edition.
Jim Landau suggested locating a cite in Fredric Brown's "Martians, Go Home!"; Mike Christie located a cite in the 1954 first appearance.
Derek Hepburn submitted a 1953 cite from Noel Loomis' "Little Green Man".
James Gunn suggested and Ben Ostrowsky submitted a 1951 cite from Mack Reynolds' "The Case of the Little Green Man".
Dennis Lien identified and Jeff Prucher located a 1949 cite from Fredric Brown's "Mouse".
Fred Galvin submitted a 1948 cite from a letter by Rick Sneary to Startling Stories.
Fred Galvin suggested the story "Mayaya's Little Green Men" by Harold Lawlor, and Alistair Durie submitted cites from this story's 1946 first publication.
Jonathan Lighter submitted 1907 and 1908 citations.
Earliest cite in the OED: 1961.
Last modified 2021-03-08 15:31:56
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