Yahoo Answers is shutting down on May 4th, 2021 (Eastern Time) and beginning April 20th, 2021 (Eastern Time) the Yahoo Answers website will be in read-only mode. There will be no changes to other Yahoo properties or services, or your Yahoo account. You can find more information about the Yahoo Answers shutdown and how to download your data on this help page.
Trending News
Sci-Fi Fans....what are the names of these 2 short stories??
These 2 stories have haunted me for years...I read them more than 20 years ago and I have mentioned them many times in my life as possibilities for the future(or possibilities for the present)
The first story centered on 3 people(2 girls and a guy) that wake up on an endless staircase. No food. No water. Gradually, they are "taught" to abuse each other to receive rewards of food and water. What is the name of this story?
The second involves the colonization of a distant planet. The colonists board rockets and head for the stars with full fan-fair but there is a dark secret: the rockets are poorly constructed and all of the "colonists" die. The whole plan of the "colonization" is to kill off anyone who is dumb enough to get on the rockets. What is the name of this story???
The second one is not The Rocket.
“The Rocket” as it's name suggests, is based upon a rocket. The main character is a junk man and is given a rocket to boil down and sell the metal for money. However this man has a fascination with space and rockets and wants to ride the rocket with his family to the stars.
The story I am looking for involves thousands of people who the government wants to get rid of. So much so that the Government sends out letters "from the colonists" saying "how happy they are" to their relatives.
5 Answers
- 1 decade agoFavorite Answer
The first story is probably the novel "House of Stairs" by William Sleator (there were, however, 3 girls and 2 boys).
The second story is "The Marching Morons" by C. M. Kornbluth. The premise was that stupid people had had so many more kids than the intelligent and well-educated that the vast majority of humanity were morons by today's standards. The relatively few descendants of the intelligent had to spend their entire lives taking care of the majority, until a 20th-century man was woken up from suspended animation and suggested the plan you mention to kill off the majority.
- Anonymous1 decade ago
Not an answer you wanted.
The second theme recurs in a number of books, essentially its the plot of Frederik Pohl's The Space Merchants and also occurs in the Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy series, where Earth is colonized by the phone sanitizers and other worthless members of a society. Neither is the short story you want, but just examples of how the theme has been used at later points.
I recognize the first without the stair case idea, but I seem to remember more than just three people. A locked enviroment instead of a stair case. Something where the rules kept changing and some refused to abuse the others even to survive. It bothers me I can't remember the author. I've read a lot of sci-fi short stories over the years. Now it is starting to haunt me
- 1 decade ago
The first one sounds like The House of Stairs by William Sleator, only its a book, not a short story. I have no idea on the second one, sorry.
- Kevin kLv 71 decade ago
Not sure about the first, but the second sounds like one of Ray Bradbury's stories in "The Illustrated Man."
- How do you think about the answers? You can sign in to vote the answer.
- mikeLv 41 decade ago
1st story is - " A Brief History of the Republicans"
2nd is - " The Democrats Suckered the Republicans Again "
