《The Spiral Intelligence》作者： - Frank Belknap Long【EPUB】

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FRANK BELKNAP LONG (Illustrations by Charles Hornstein) When one comprehends the vastness of the cosmos, the seemingly infinite procession of galaxies that compose it, each with its millions of suns and still more millions of worlds revolving around those suns, it is staggering to conceive of the diversity of life forms that could evolve within the universe. Picturing such life forms and situations that might relate to them requires more than mere imagination on a writer's part, it demands a real gift of words and feeling. Rarely has a science-fiction writer so sensitively captured the essence of alienity as has the author of this fine story. DONALD BREWSTER was alone. From the blazing wreckage of his spaceship to the canopy of foliage overhead the forest itself seemed to be conspiring against him, to be whispering and protesting as only a forest can when its age-old privacy has been invaded. An immense emerald prison was the forest, fragrant with growing things, strident with the cries of snowy-crested birds. It was a prison without bars, beautiful and strange and frightening. It was a naturalist's paradise, and on Earth it would have challenged an explorer to take pride in loneliness and walk with squared shoulders. But what pain could be greater than the pain of loneliness light- years from Earth, what agony of frustration harder to endure than the crystallization of emotion which took place in a man when his heart whispered that he would never see Earth again. Never again the russet-and-gold splendor of an autumn landscape or the gleam of sunlight on familiar meadows. Never again a journey by sea and land—a journey made for delight alone with a woman tender