The Best of Cordwainer Smith

The Plot The twelve stories in this collection, written separately and published between 1950 and 1964, fit into a consistent future history that covers human development from the Second Age of Space to the era of rights for underpeople and the Rediscovery of Man. Many of the stories involve the Instrumentality, a ruling bureau- cracy that is not always admirable but ultimately manages ?to keep man man.?

Set in the Second Age of Space, ?Scanners Live in Vain? concerns the scanners, men surgically cut off from their senses in order to endure the pain of space...