The Nickel Man
THE NICKEL MAN
Eleven French scientific romances by Jacques Boucher de Perthes, Pierre Bremond, Léon Daudet, Georges Espitallier, Louis Gallet, Pierre de Nolhac & Ralph Schropp
adapted by Brian Stableford
cover by Phil Cohen
"My work is not lost! By that absence of heart, I recognize my automaton! Homunculus lives; I shall go to recover him." Albert the Great.
US$ 24.95 /GBP 14.99
5x8 tpb, 356 pages
ISBN-13: 978-1-61227-445-4
This is the twelfth in a series of anthologies of exemplary texts in the evolution of the French genre of roman scientifique.
The eleven stories collected here were published between 1832 and 1932. They include three remarkable tales about automata and homonculi, including one in which the manufacture of an artificial human being is credited to the 13th century scholar Albertus Magnus.
Also included are The Uraniad (1844), a protest against Newton's theory of gravity, The Death of Paris (1892), an account of how Paris was destroyed by a new Ice Age, and The Nickel Man (1897) by military historian and journalist Georges Espitallier, in which an eccentric scientist uses galvanic technology to turn his body into a metal statue in an attempt to preserve it.
Contents:
Introduction and Notes by Brian Stableford.
Jacques Boucher de Perthes: Mademoiselle de La Choupillière (1832)
Pierre Bremond: The Uraniad [L'Uraniade, ou Esop juge à la cour d'Uranie, scènes dialoguées au sujet des hypotheses Newtoniennes: songe scientifique] (1844)
Ralph Schropp: The Automaton: A Story Taken from a Palimpsest [L'Automate, récit tiré d'un palimpseste] (1878)
Louis Gallet: The Death of Paris [La Mort de Paris] (1892)
Léon Daudet: The Automaton [L'Automate] (1898)
Georges Espitallier: The Nickel Man [L'Homme en nickel] (1897)
Pierre de Nolhac: The Night of Pius XII [La Nuit de Pie XII] (1932)
Pierre de Nolhac: A Lovely Summer's Day [Une Belle Journée d'été] (1932)
Pierre de Nolhac: Babel at Ferney [Babel à Ferney] (1932)
Pierre de Nolhac: A Season in Auvergne [Une Saison en Auvergne] (1932)
Pierre de Nolhac: The Journal of Dr. J. H. Smithson [Le Journal du Dr. J.H. Smithson] (1932)