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"If you have a gut response to a story, you are not responding to something new ..you are really responding to a story you were told when you were six or seven…"
- Samuel R. Delany
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| Spaceplane | ||
| A craft able to land on Earth and take off directly for space. |
As far as I know, this is the first use of the word "spaceplane" in science fiction.
| WHAT COULD IT HAVE BEEN?
I CAN'T UNDERSTAND IT, ATMOSPHERIC CONDITIONS ON THIS PLANET WON'T PERMIT SUCH A THING. EITHER SOME POWERFUL BEINGS FROM SPACE, PERHAPS FROM ANOTHER UNIVERSE, ARE ENGAGED IN CONQUEST --- OR --- BUT I WON'T THINK OF THAT! ZARNAK, YOU'RE TO COMMAND A SCOUTING EXPEDITION --- FIND OUT WHAT THIS IS ALL ABOUT!
 (Spaceplane from 'Zarnak' by Max Plaisted) YOU CAN COUNT ON ME, VAECO. I'M LEAVING IMMEDIATELY IN MY SPACEPLANE! |
| Technovelgy from Zarnak,
by Max Plaisted. Published by Thrilling Wonder Stories in 1937 Additional resources -
|
Here is the first panel in which it appears:
(Spaceplane panel from 'Zarnak' by Max Plaisted)
Compare to the space shuttle fro Hell Ship of Space (1940) by Frederic Arnold Kummer, Jr., the shuttle from Stars are Styx (1950) by Theodore Sturgeon, the shuttle ship and Winged Rocket Shuttle from Heinlein's 1951 novel Between Planets, the JAL shuttle from Gibson's 1984 novel Neuromancer and the Clarke Spaceplane from A Quantum Murder (1998) by Peter F. Hamilton.
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Additional
resources:
More Ideas
and Technology from Zarnak
More Ideas
and Technology by Max Plaisted
Tech news articles related to Zarnak
Tech news articles related to works by Max Plaisted
Spaceplane-related
news articles:
- Spaceplane From Virgin Atlantic
| Roborock Saros Z70 Is A Robot Vacuum With An Arm |
| Secret Kill Switch Found In Yutong Buses |
| The Desert Ship Sailed In Imagination |
| The Zapata Air Scooter Would Be Great In A Science Fiction Story |
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'Jason had been guiding the caravan of cars as usual...'
"The robot solemnly hit a ball against the wall, picked it up and teed it, hit it again, over and again...'
'There was a wall ahead... It was riddled with holes that were the mouths of tunnels.'
'...support the interior human structure against Jupiter’s pull.'
'Anything larger than a BB shot it picked up and placed in a tray...'
'The German chemists have discovered how to supply the needed elements in compact, undiluted form...'
'Compounds devised by the biochemists for the rapid building of bone...'
'The car faltered as the external command came to brake...'
'It is about the size and shape of a kitchen stool, gyro-stabilized...'
