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FIRST PUBLICATION

•   If, May 1954 {ill. by Orban}

 HISTORY:

    "Prominent Author" was received at the SMLA on Apr 20, 1953. The Agency placed it at If and it was published for the first time in the May 1954 issue. After that the story was selected for the first PKD collection, A HANDFUL OF DARKNESS in 1955. Then, 32 years later, its final appearance in THE COLLECTED STORIES.

    In his novel THE CRACK IN SPACE Philip K. Dick refers to "Prominent Author."

    The story itself is a precursor to THE CRACK IN SPACE (1965) in that a businessman takes the ‘jiffi-scuttler’ short-cut through space to his office and finds a thin spot in the wall of the tunnel itself. On the other side of the wall little people run around and send miniature messages to him. He translates these and sends messages back. Soon he realizes that these people are starting to worship him and in the end, when he’s caught by his boss and fired, he receives one last missive from the little people and discovers, with satisfaction, that he is the author of a famous book: The Holy Bible.

    PKD in this story once again deals with the theme of scale. Similar in feeling to "The Builder", "Prominent Author" rates ô ó ó

See THE CRACK IN SPACE

Other Magazine and Anthology appearances.    Click here for Cover Pix:

1954 Aug		IF, #10 {UK}
1955		A HANDFUL OF DARKNESS, Rich & Cowan, hb, ?,?,? (?)
1987		THE COLLECTED STORIES OF PKD

NOTES:

Ebay (Nov 2001): "Prominent Author" in If.  0 bids. $4

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