Clifford D. Simak
City

EDITOR'S PREFACE NOTES ON THE FIRST TALE I. CITY NOTES ON THE SECOND TALE II. HUDDLING PLACE NOTES ON THE THIRD TALE III. CENSUS NOTES ON THE FOURTH TALE IV. DESERTION NOTES ON THE FIFTH TALE V. PARADISE NOTES ON THE SIXTH TALE VI. HOBBIES NOTES ON THE SEVENTH TALE VII. AESOP NOTES ON THE EIGHTH TALE VIII. THE SIMPLE WAY

NOTES ON THE EIGHTH TALE

There is some suspicion that the eighth and final tale may be a fraud, that it has no place in the ancient legend, that it is a more recent story made up by some storyteller hungering for public acclamation.

Structurally, it is an acceptable story, but the phraseology of it does not measure up to the narrative skill that goes into the others. Another thing is that it is too patently a story. It is too clever in its assembly of material, works the several angles from the other tales too patly together.

And yet, while no trace of historic basis can be found in any of the other tales, which are indisputably legendary, there is historic basis for this tale.

It is a matter of record that one of the closed worlds is closed because it is a world of ants. It is now an ant world – has been an ant world for uncounted generations.

There is no evidence that the ant world is the original world on which the Dogs arose, but neither is there evidence that it is not. The fact that research has not uncovered any world which can lay claim to being the original world would seem to indicate that the ant world might in fact be the world that was called the Earth.

If that is so, all hope of finding further evidence of the legend's origin may be gone forever, for only on the first world could there be artifacts which might prove beyond contention the origin of the legend. Only there could one hope to find the answer to the basic question of Man's existence or his non-existence. If the ant world is the Earth, then the closed city of Geneva and the house on Webster Hill are lost to us forever.