A Gun for Dinosaur

Last updated
"A Gun for Dinosaur"
Short story by L. Sprague de Camp
A Gun for Dinosaur.jpg
Ed Emshwiller's illustration of the
story in Galaxy Science Fiction
CountryUnited States
LanguageEnglish
Genre(s) Science fiction
Publication
Published in Galaxy Science Fiction
Media typePrint (Magazine)
Publication dateMarch, 1956
Chronology
Series Reginald Rivers
Arrleft.svg 
—		 Arrright.svg
The Cayuse

"A Gun for Dinosaur" is a classic time travel science fiction story [1] [2] [3] by American writer L. Sprague de Camp [4] [5] as part of his Rivers of Time series. [5] [6] It tells the story of four men who travel into the past to hunt dinosaurs from the Cretaceous. The dinosaurs from this period include Tenontosaurus , Hadrosaurus, Gryposaurus , Qianzhousaurus and Gravitholus , as well as Aerosteon , Tylocephale and Hypacrosaurus .

Contents

It was first published in the magazine Galaxy Science Fiction for March, 1956, and first appeared in book form in the anthology The World That Couldn't Be and 8 Other SF Novelets (Doubleday, 1959). [4] [5] It has since been reprinted in numerous other anthologies, including The Time Curve (1968), 3000 Years of Fantasy and Science Fiction (1972), Dawn of Time (1979), [4] [5] Science Fiction A to Z (1982), Grand Masters' Choice (1989), Dinosaurs! (1990), Dinosaurs (1996), Timescapes: Stories of Time Travel (1997), The SFWA Grand Masters, Volume 1 (1999), The World Turned Upside Down (2005), and The Best Time Travel Stories of the 20th Century (2005), [5] as well as such collections of de Camp's work as A Gun for Dinosaur and Other Imaginative Tales (1963), The Best of L. Sprague de Camp (1978), [4] [5] Rivers of Time (1993), and Years in the Making: the Time-Travel Stories of L. Sprague de Camp (2005). [5] It has been translated into French, [5] German, Italian, [4] [5] Czech [4] and Dutch. [4] [5] It has also been adapted into radio and comic book form. [4] [7]

Plot

The story takes the form of a first-person narrative by the protagonist, time-traveling hunter Reginald Rivers, told to Mr. Seligman, a prospective client of his time safari business. Seligman's contributions to the conversation are omitted and must be inferred from those of Rivers. Rivers informs the client that he is not big enough to hunt the dinosaurs of the Cretaceous period and illustrates his point with an extended anecdote from a previous expedition, which forms the main portion of the tale.

On the occasion in question, Rivers and his partner, Chandra Aiyar, conduct two other clients to the past. One of them, Courtney James (based on Jack Parsons [8] ), is a vain, arrogant and spoiled playboy; the other, August Holtzinger, is a small, timid man recently come into wealth (time safaris are not cheap). Before the journey, they testfire some guns on the firing range to settle on weapons for each of them. Holtzinger's small size makes him incapable of effectively handling the elephant gun which Rivers recommends (the recoil knocks him over) and, against his better judgment, Rivers lets Holtzinger travel on the safari with a lighter-caliber weapon.

James proves unmanageable by shooting at every creature in sight and spoiling Holtzinger's shots. Ultimately James's foolishness gets him in real trouble, when he inadvertently empties his rifle over a slumbering Qianzhousaurus , which consequently wakes up and goes for him and Aiyar. James panics and tries to flee but runs into Aiyar and knocks them both down. Holtzinger tries to save them by shooting the dinosaur, but his gun is not powerful enough to kill it, and his act only attracts it toward the shooter. Despite the best efforts of Rivers and Aiyar to save Holtzinger, the Qianzhousaurus snaps him up and makes off with his body. After a fruitless track for the Qianzhousaurus so that Holtzinger's body could be recovered, a furious quarrel with James ensues. He and the guides each blame the other for their companion's death, which leads to a fist fight between James and Rivers in which James is defeated. James tries to shoot Rivers but is knocked out by Aiyar. James then swears revenge.

Later, after the expedition has returned to the present, James convinces Professor Prochaska, the inventor of the time chamber, to send him back to the Cretaceous again but at a moment just prior to the emergence of the safari's earlier visit. His plan is to shoot Rivers and Aiyar just when they originally came out of the time machine. Since that obviously had not happened, however, the space-time continuum avoids the paradox by spontaneously snapping James back to the present, with the forces involved instantly killing him.

Revision and continuations

De Camp revised the story slightly for its inclusion in Rivers of Time to update obsolete paleontological terms and dated references. [9] In one instance the result was unfortunate; in the original version of the story, Rivers estimates Seligman's weight in both pounds and stone; [10] in the revised version both measures are rendered as kilograms, resulting in Rivers appearing to make the same calculation twice. [11]

Many years after writing the story, de Camp penned eight more tales of its protagonist, time-traveling hunter Reginald Rivers; all nine stories were then collected as Rivers of Time (1993). [12] A tenth tale of Rivers, "Gun, Not for Dinosaur", authored by Chris Bunch, later appeared in Harry Turtledove's 2005 tribute anthology honoring L. Sprague de Camp, The Enchanter Completed . [6] [13]

Reception

The story was a nominee for the 1956 Hugo Award for Best Novelette.

P. Schuyler Miller singles out the story as "one of the classic time-travel stories invading the years of the dinosaurs." [1]

S. E. Cotts calls it "one of my favorites," noting that "[i]ts subject, about a safari into the past, has been successfully tackled by other writers, but this version has solid merit." [14]

Sam Moskowitz, who felt de Camp's "plots less incisive" during this period, cited this story as an "outstanding exception" discussing "with an air of quiet authority the problem of what type of gun and what methodology were best suited to shooting dinosaurs." [15]

Don D'Ammassa calls it "an undeniably classic story of the dangers of time travel." [2]

Harry Turtledove deems the piece a "classic, ... at the same time a fine character study, a meditation on time-travel paradoxes (here treated as something the continuum seeks to avoid rather than a likely result of voyaging into the past), and a splendid re-creation of a vanished world. De Camp makes the reader feel the heat and humidity of the world to which Reginald Rivers and his band of hunters are transported--and feel the bites from insects with mouthparts evolved to pierce dinosaur hide. He does a masterful job of discussing the difficulties inherent in hunting extinct behemoths with weapons small enough for one man to handle. When troubles arise, they do so as a natural consequence of the characters' personalities, and are more moving and convincing because of that." He feels the story "has also aged very well, despite the vast increase in paleontological knowledge in the past half-century." [3]

Influence and literary responses

See also

Related Research Articles

"A Sound of Thunder" is a science fiction short story by American writer Ray Bradbury, first published in Collier's magazine on June 28, 1952, and later in Bradbury's 1953 collection The Golden Apples of the Sun.

<i>Lest Darkness Fall</i> 1941 novel by L. Sprague de Camp

Lest Darkness Fall is a 1939 alternate history science fiction novel by the American author L. Sprague de Camp. Lest Darkness Fall is similar in concept to Mark Twain's A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court, but the treatment is very different.

<i>Requiem</i> (short story collection) Retrospective on Robert A. Heinlein

Requiem: New Collected Works by Robert A. Heinlein and Tributes to the Grand Master is a retrospective on Robert A. Heinlein (1907–1988), after his death, edited by Yoji Kondo.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Catherine Crook de Camp</span> American novelist

Catherine Crook de Camp was an American science fiction and fantasy author and editor. Most of her work was done in collaboration with her husband L. Sprague de Camp, to whom she was married for sixty years. Her solo work was largely non-fiction.

<i>The Best of L. Sprague de Camp</i> 1978 collection of writings by L. Sprague de Camp

The Best of L. Sprague de Camp is a collection of writings by American science fiction and fantasy author L. Sprague de Camp, first published in hardback by Nelson Doubleday in February 1978 and in paperback by Ballantine Books in May of the same year as a volume in its Classic Library of Science Fiction. The book was reprinted by Ballantine in May 1986. It was reissued in trade paperback and ebook editions by Phoenix Pick in December 2014. It has also been translated into German.

<i>A Gun for Dinosaur and Other Imaginative Tales</i> 1963 short story collection by L. Sprague de Camp

A Gun for Dinosaur and Other Imaginative Tales is a short story collection by American science fiction and fantasy author L. Sprague de Camp, first published in hardback by Doubleday in 1963, and in paperback by Curtis Books in 1969. The first British edition was issued by Remploy in 1974. It has also been translated into German.

<i>Aristotle and the Gun and Other Stories</i> 2002 collection of short stories by L. Sprague de Camp

Aristotle and the Gun and Other Stories is a collection of short stories by American science fiction and fantasy author L. Sprague de Camp. It was published in hardcover in August 2002 by the Gale Group as part of its Five Star Speculative Fiction Series.

Rivers of Time is a 1993 collection of science fiction short stories by American writer L. Sprague de Camp, first published in paperback by Baen Books. All but one of the pieces were originally published between 1956 and 1993 in the magazines Galaxy, Expanse, The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction, Analog, and Asimov's Science Fiction, and the Robert Silverberg-edited anthology The Ultimate Dinosaur. The remaining story was first published in the present work.

<i>Years in the Making: The Time-Travel Stories of L. Sprague de Camp</i> 2005 collection of short stories

Years in the Making: the Time-Travel Stories of L. Sprague de Camp is a collection of science fiction stories by American author L. Sprague de Camp, edited by Mark L. Olson and illustrated by Bob Eggleton. It was first published in hardcover by NESFA Press in February 2005, with a NESFA/Science Fiction Book Club edition following in September of the same year.

<i>The Enchanter Completed: A Tribute Anthology for L. Sprague de Camp</i> 2005 anthology of short stories edited by Harry Turtledove

The Enchanter Completed: A Tribute Anthology for L. Sprague de Camp is a 2005 gedenkschrift honoring American science fiction and fantasy author L. Sprague de Camp, in the form of an anthology of short stories edited by Harry Turtledove. It was first published in paperback by Baen Books. All but one of the pieces are original to the anthology; the remaining one, Frederik Pohl's "The Deadly Mission of P. Snodgrass", was originally published in 1964 in the magazine Galaxy.

Richard Foss is an American journalist, science fiction author, and food historian who has also chaired science fiction conventions and worked as a travel agent, restaurant reviewer, theater director, and instructor in Elizabethan history and culinary history at Osher Institute/UCLA Extension.

<i>The Exotic Enchanter</i> 1995 anthology edited by L. Sprague de Camp and Christopher Stasheff

The Exotic Enchanter is an anthology of four fantasy short stories edited by American writers L. Sprague de Camp and Christopher Stasheff. The Exotic Enchanter is the second volume in the continuation of the Harold Shea series by de Camp and Fletcher Pratt. It was first published in paperback by Baen Books in 1995; an ebook edition followed from the same publisher in September 2013. All the pieces are original to the anthology.

<i>Dinosaurs!</i> (1990 anthology) 1990 anthology

Dinosaurs! is a themed anthology of science fiction short works edited by Jack Dann and Gardner Dozois. It was first published in paperback by Ace Books in June 1990, and as an ebook by Baen Books in November 2014.

Bibliography of science fiction, fantasy, historical fiction and nonfiction writer L. Sprague de Camp:

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Aristotle and the Gun</span> Short story by L. Sprague de Camp

"Aristotle and the Gun" is a time travel and alternate history science fiction story by American writer L. Sprague de Camp.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Employment (short story)</span> Short story by Lyon Sprague de Camp

"Employment" is a science fiction story by American writer L. Sprague de Camp, pioneering the concept of de-extinction. It was first published in the magazine Astounding Science-Fiction for May, 1939. The story appeared under the pseudonym Lyman R. Lyon as the magazine's policy did not allow the name of any author to be repeated on the same contents page, and de Camp had another piece in the same issue under his actual name. It first appeared in book form in the anthology Imagination Unlimited. It later appeared in the anthologies Men of Space and Time, and Science Fiction Inventions, as well as the de Camp collection The Best of L. Sprague de Camp. It was credited to de Camp's real name in all publications subsequent to its first appearance. The story has been translated into German.

<i>The Best Time Travel Stories of the 20th Century</i>

The Best Time Travel Stories of the 20th Century is an anthology of science fiction time travel short stories edited by Harry Turtledove and Martin H. Greenberg. It was first published in trade paperback by Del Rey/Ballantine in January 2005. The book has been translated into Portuguese.

<i>The World Turned Upside Down</i> (anthology) 2005 short story anthology

The World Turned Upside Down is an anthology of science fiction and fantasy short stories edited by David Drake, Eric Flint and Jim Baen. It was first published in hardcover and ebook by Baen Books in January 2005; a Science Fiction Book Club edition followed from Baen Books/SFBC in February of the same year. The first paperback edition was issued by Baen in June 2006.

<i>Dinosaurs</i> (1996 anthology)

Dinosaurs is an anthology of science fiction short works edited by Martin H. Greenberg. It was first published in hardcover by Donald I. Fine in February 1996, with a second edition issued by Niagara/Ulverscroft in October of the same year.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">In-Group</span> 1952 science fiction short story by L. Sprague de Camp

"In-Group" is a science fiction short story by L. Sprague de Camp. It was first published in the magazine Marvel Science Fiction for May, 1952. and later reprinted in the magazine Skyworlds for February 1978. It first appeared in book form in the collection A Gun for Dinosaur and Other Imaginative Tales. The story has been translated into Italian and German.

References

  1. 1 2 Miller, P. Schuyler. "The Reference Library", in Analog Science Fact - Science Fiction, v. 71, no. 5, July 1963, p. 90.
  2. 1 2 D'Ammassa, Don. "de CAMP, L. Sprague", in Twentieth-Century Science-Fiction Writers (3rd ed.), Chicago : St. James Press, c1991, p. 192.
  3. 1 2 Turtledove, Harry. "Introduction," in Years in the Making: The Time-Travel Stories of L. Sprague de Camp, Framingham, MA : NESFA Press, 2005, p. 12-13.
  4. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 Laughlin, Charlotte; Daniel J. H. Levack (1983). De Camp: An L. Sprague de Camp Bibliography. San Francisco: Underwood/Miller. pp. 173–174.
  5. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 A Gun for Dinosaur title listing at the Internet Speculative Fiction Database
  6. 1 2 Reginald Rivers series listing at the Internet Speculative Fiction Database
  7. ↑ Willis, Jesse. "X Minus One: A Gun For Dinosaur based on the short story by L. Sprague de Camp," August 30, 2011.
  8. ↑ L. Sprague de Camp, Time and Chance: An Autobiography, Donald M. Grant: Hampton Falls, NH, 1996, p. 213
  9. ↑ De Camp, L. Sprague (1993). Rivers of Time. New York: Baen. p. 258.
  10. ↑ De Camp, L. Sprague. "A Gun for Dinosaur," in Galaxy Science Fiction, v. 11, no. 5, March 1956, p. 7: "How much d'you weigh? A hundred and thirty? Let's see, that's under ten stone, which is my lower limit."
  11. ↑ De Camp, L. Sprague. "A Gun for Dinosaur," in Rivers of Time (New York : Baen, 1993, p. 1: "How much d'you weigh? Fifty-four kilos? Let's see—that's under sixty kilos, which is my lower limit."
  12. ↑ Rivers of Time title listing at the Internet Speculative Fiction Database
  13. ↑ The Enchanter Completed: A Tribute Anthology for L. Sprague de Camp title listing at the Internet Speculative Fiction Database
  14. ↑ Cotts, S. E. "The Spectroscope" in Amazing Stories , v. 37, no. 9, September 1963, p. 125.
  15. ↑ Moskowitz, Sam. "L. Sprague de Camp" in Seekers of Tomorrow , 1967, p. 168.
  16. ↑ Goodwin, Mark B. "Take a Closer Look." In Dig v. 12, no. 6, July/Aug. 2010, pp. 8-12.
  17. ↑ De Camp, L. Sprague (1993). Rivers of Time. New York: Baen. pp. 14–15.
  18. ↑ Leonard Richardson. "On The Origin Of Awesome Dinosaurs." News You Can Bruise, weblog post dated Tue Jul 14 2009 16:48. Retrieved 20:10, 25 July 2009 (UTC)
  19. ↑ Leonard Richardson. "Let Us Now Praise Awesome Dinosaurs." Archived 2009-07-17 at the Wayback Machine . Strange Horizons weekly, 13 July 2009. Retrieved 20:16, 25 July 2009 (UTC)
Preceded by
none
 Reginald Rivers series
"A Gun for Dinosaur"		Succeeded by
This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.