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The Quest For Saint Aquin
"The Quest for Saint Aquin" is a science fiction short story by the American writer Anthony Boucher, originally published in 1951 in ''New Tales of Space and Time''. "The Quest for Saint Aquin" was among the stories selected in 1970 by the Science Fiction Writers of America as one of the best science fiction short stories published before the creation of the Nebula Awards. As such, it was published in ''The Science Fiction Hall of Fame Volume One, 1929-1964''. Plot summary In a post-apocalyptic technocratic future Earth, religion has been banned and the Catholic church has gone underground, relying on secret cells and symbols as in the days of the early church. The central character is a crypto-priest named Thomas who is charged by the secret pope with finding the resting place of a semi-legendary figure called Aquin (a hint to Saint Thomas of Aquin). Aquin had been an evangelist of great power who converted all those who listened to him preach, and his body supposedly never rotte ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Anthony Boucher
William Anthony Parker White (August 21, 1911 – April 29, 1968), better known by his pen name Anthony Boucher (), was an American author, critic, and editor who wrote several classic mystery novels, short stories, science fiction, and radio dramas. Between 1942 and 1947, he acted as reviewer of mostly mystery fiction for the ''San Francisco Chronicle''. In addition to "Anthony Boucher", White also employed the pseudonym " H. H. Holmes", which was the pseudonym of a late-19th-century American serial killer; Boucher would also write light verse and sign it "Herman W. Mudgett" (the murderer's real name). In a 1981 poll of 17 detective story writers and reviewers, his novel ''Nine Times Nine'' was voted as the ninth best locked room mystery of all time. Background White was born in Oakland, California, and went to college at the University of Southern California. He later received a master's degree from the University of California, Berkeley. After a friend told him that "Willia ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Donkey
The domestic donkey is a hoofed mammal in the family Equidae, the same family as the horse. It derives from the African wild ass, ''Equus africanus'', and may be classified either as a subspecies thereof, ''Equus africanus asinus'', or as a separate species, ''Equus asinus''. It was domesticated in Africa some years ago, and has been used mainly as a working animal since that time. There are more than 40 million donkeys in the world, mostly in underdeveloped countries, where they are used principally as draught or pack animals. While working donkeys are often associated with those living at or below subsistence, small numbers of donkeys or asses are kept for breeding or as pets in developed countries. A male donkey is known as a ''jack'' or ''jackass'', a female is a ''jenny'' or ''jennet'', and an immature donkey of either sex is a '' foal''. Jacks are often mated with female horses (mares) to produce '' mules''; the less common hybrid of a male horse (stallion) and j ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
1951 Short Stories
Events January * January 4 – Korean War: Third Battle of Seoul – Chinese and North Korean forces capture Seoul for the second time (having lost the Second Battle of Seoul in September 1950). * January 9 – The Government of the United Kingdom announces abandonment of the Tanganyika groundnut scheme for the cultivation of peanuts in the Tanganyika Territory, with the writing off of £36.5M debt. * January 15 – In a court in West Germany, Ilse Koch, The "Witch of Buchenwald", wife of the commandant of the Buchenwald concentration camp, is sentenced to life imprisonment. * January 20 – Winter of Terror: Avalanches in the Alps kill 240 and bury 45,000 for a time, in Switzerland, Austria and Italy. * January 21 – Mount Lamington in Papua New Guinea erupts catastrophically, killing nearly 3,000 people and causing great devastation in Oro Province. * January 25 – Dutch author Anne de Vries releases the first volume of his children's novel '' Journey Through the ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Post-apocalyptic Short Stories
Apocalyptic and post-apocalyptic fiction is a subgenre of speculative fiction in which the Earth's (or another planet's) civilization is collapsing or has collapsed. The apocalypse event may be climatic, such as runaway climate change; astronomical, such as an impact event; destructive, such as nuclear holocaust or resource depletion; medical, such as a pandemic, whether natural or human-caused; end time, such as the Last Judgment, Second Coming or Ragnarök; or more imaginative, such as a zombie apocalypse, cybernetic revolt, technological singularity, dysgenics or alien invasion. The story may involve attempts to prevent an apocalypse event, deal with the impact and consequences of the event itself, or it may be post-apocalyptic, set after the event. The time may be directly after the catastrophe, focusing on the psychology of survivors, the way to keep the human race alive and together as one, or considerably later, often including that the existence of pre-catastrophe civ ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Heat Death Of The Universe
The heat death of the universe (also known as the Big Chill or Big Freeze) is a hypothesis on the ultimate fate of the universe, which suggests the universe will evolve to a state of no thermodynamic free energy, and will therefore be unable to sustain processes that increase entropy. Heat death does not imply any particular absolute temperature; it only requires that temperature differences or other processes may no longer be exploited to perform work. In the language of physics, this is when the universe reaches thermodynamic equilibrium. The Heat Death theory has become the leading theory in the modern age with the fewest unpredictable factors. If the topology of the universe is open or flat, or if dark energy is a positive cosmological constant (both of which are consistent with current data), the universe will continue expanding forever, and a heat death is expected to occur, with the universe cooling to approach equilibrium at a very low temperature after a very long ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
The Last Question
"The Last Question" is a science fiction short story by American writer Isaac Asimov. It first appeared in the November 1956 issue of Science Fiction Quarterly and was anthologized in the collections Nine Tomorrows (1959), The Best of Isaac Asimov (1973), Robot Dreams (1986), The Best Science Fiction of Isaac Asimov (1986), the retrospective Opus 100 (1969), and in Isaac Asimov: The Complete Stories, Vol. 1 (1990). While he also considered it one of his best works, “The Last Question” was Asimov's favorite short story of his own authorship, and is one of a loosely connected series of stories concerning a fictional computer called Multivac. Through successive generations, humanity questions Multivac on the subject of entropy. The story overlaps science fiction, theology, and philosophy. History In conceiving Multivac, Asimov was extrapolating the trend towards centralization that characterized computation technology planning in the 1950s to an ultimate centrally-managed ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Isaac Asimov
yi, יצחק אזימאװ , birth_date = , birth_place = Petrovichi, Russian SFSR , spouse = , relatives = , children = 2 , death_date = , death_place = Manhattan, New York City, U.S. , nationality = Russian (1920–1922)Soviet (1922–1928)American (1928–1992) , occupation = Writer, professor of biochemistry , years_active = 1939–1992 , genre = Science fiction (hard SF, social SF), mystery, popular science , subject = Popular science, science textbooks, essays, history, literary criticism , education = Columbia University ( BA, MA, PhD) , movement = Golden Age of Science Fiction , module = , signature = Isaac Asimov signature.svg Isaac Asimov ( ; 1920 – April 6, 1992) was an American writer and professor of biochemistry at Boston University. During his lifetime, Asimov was considered one of the "Big Three" science fiction writers, along with Robert A. Heinlein and Arthur C. Clarke. A prolific writer, he wrote or edited more than 500 books ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Reason (Asimov)
"Reason" is a science fiction short story by American writer Isaac Asimov, first published in the April 1941 issue of '' Astounding Science Fiction'' and collected in ''I, Robot'' (1950), ''The Complete Robot'' (1982), and ''Robot Visions'' (1990). It is part of Asimov's ''Robot'' series, and was the second of Asimov's positronic robot stories to see publication. Plot summary Powell and Donovan are assigned to a space station which supplies energy via microwave beams to the planets. The robots that control the energy beams are in turn co-ordinated by QT-1, known to Powell and Donovan as Cutie, an advanced model with highly developed reasoning ability. Using these abilities, Cutie decides that space, stars and the planets beyond the station don't really exist, and that the humans that visit the station are unimportant, short-lived and expendable. QT-1 makes the lesser robots disciples of a new religion, which considers the power source of the ship to be "Master". QT-1 teache ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Quarber Merkur
''Quarber Merkur'' is a German language literary magazine of speculative fiction (science fiction, fantasy, etc.). It is published in Austria since 1963 and edited by Franz Rottensteiner. The name of the magazine is derived from , a ravine part of the Piesting river valley in Lower Austria. In 2004, on the occasion of the hundredth issue, Rottensteiner was awarded a special Kurd Laßwitz Award The Kurd Laßwitz Award (german: link=no, Kurd-Laßwitz-Preis) is a science fiction award from Germany. The award is named after the science fiction author Kurd Laßwitz. Eligible for nomination in all categories except for the ''Foreign Work'' ca .... (The nomination for special awards stated the occasion of 50 years of the journal. References External links * 1963 establishments in Austria Fantasy fiction magazines German-language magazines Magazines established in 1963 Speculative fiction magazines Science fiction magazines established in the 1960s {{Europe-lit-mag-stu ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Stanislaw Lem
Stanislav and variants may refer to: People *Stanislav (given name), a Slavic given name with many spelling variations (Stanislaus, Stanislas, Stanisław, etc.) Places * Stanislav, a coastal village in Kherson, Ukraine * Stanislaus County, California * Stanislaus River, California * Stanislaus National Forest, California * Place Stanislas, a square in Nancy, France, World Heritage Site of UNESCO * Saint-Stanislas, Mauricie, Quebec, a Canadian municipality * Stanizlav, a fictional train depot in the game '' TimeSplitters: Future Perfect'' * Stanislau, German name of Ivano-Frankivsk, Ukraine Schools * St. Stanislaus High School, an institution in Bandra, Mumbai, India * St. Stanislaus High School (Detroit) * Collège Stanislas de Paris, an institution in Paris, France * California State University, Stanislaus, a public university in Turlock, CA * St Stanislaus College (Bathurst), a secondary school in Bathurst, Australia * St. Stanislaus College (Guyana), a secondary school in ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
New Testament
The New Testament grc, Ἡ Καινὴ Διαθήκη, transl. ; la, Novum Testamentum. (NT) is the second division of the Christian biblical canon. It discusses the teachings and person of Jesus, as well as events in first-century Christianity. The New Testament's background, the first division of the Christian Bible, is called the Old Testament, which is based primarily upon the Hebrew Bible; together they are regarded as sacred scripture by Christians. The New Testament is a collection of Christian texts originally written in the Koine Greek language, at different times by various authors. While the Old Testament canon varies somewhat between different Christian denominations, the 27-book canon of the New Testament has been almost universally recognized within Christianity since at least Late Antiquity. Thus, in almost all Christian traditions today, the New Testament consists of 27 books: * 4 canonical gospels (Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John) * The Acts of the Apostl ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Orthodox Jew
Orthodox Judaism is the collective term for the traditionalist and theologically conservative branches of contemporary Judaism. Theologically, it is chiefly defined by regarding the Torah, both Written and Oral, as revealed by God to Moses on Mount Sinai and faithfully transmitted ever since. Orthodox Judaism, therefore, advocates a strict observance of Jewish law, or ''halakha'', which is to be interpreted and determined exclusively according to traditional methods and in adherence to the continuum of received precedent through the ages. It regards the entire ''halakhic'' system as ultimately grounded in immutable revelation, and beyond external influence. Key practices are observing the Sabbath, eating kosher, and Torah study. Key doctrines include a future Messiah who will restore Jewish practice by building the temple in Jerusalem and gathering all the Jews to Israel, belief in a future bodily resurrection of the dead, divine reward and punishment for the righteous and th ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
