Soldier from Tomorrow

by Harlan Ellison

Release: October 1957
Format: Novelette
Genre: Science Fiction
Audience: Adults
Content: Definite Time Travel
Original Language: English

Qarlo Clobregnny (aka pryt sizfifwunohtootoonyn), psychologically and physically conditioned as a foot soldier from the moment of birth, is transported from the time of Great War VII to a 1950s subway platform where he and his story eventually become a force in an unexpected direction.

A few years later, the story was the basis of an Outer Limits episode.

No matter how violent, how involved, how pushbutton-ridden Wars became, it always simmered down to the man on foot. It had to, for men fought men still.

DEBUT

“Soldier from Tomorrow,” Fantastic Universe, October 1957.

VARIANTS

2 English variants

TRANSLATIONS

Translations to French

DERIVATIVE WORKS

“Soldier” by Harlan Ellison and Leslie Stevens, directed by Gerd Oswald, (ABC-TV, USA 19 September 1964).

TAGS(SPOILERS!)

Groupings

Cited in Time Machines by Paul J. Nahin ()

TIME TRAVEL ITINERARY: We haven’t yet mapped out the time travel itinerary.

INDEXER NOTES (SPOILERS!)

French title—We believe that the qualifier—(1ere version)—appears on the story’s title page. It is to distinguish this prose story from the TV script—“Soldat” (2eme version)—that also appears in the French collection <em>Du pays de la peur.</em>