Intuit was published by NESFA Press on behalf of CactusCon, the 1987 NASFiC to celebrate Hal Clement as Guest of Honor.
Intuit is a collection of Hal Clement's Laird Cunningham stories, about a problem-solving interstellar traveler in the far future of some of Clement's other novels like Close to Critical, Mission of Gravity and Star Light. In each of the four stories, Cunningham is faced with a unique problem — marooned by hijackers outside his spaceship on a hot, airless planet, drifting across a sunless sea in a boat with an alien, trying to talk an ancient, alien AI into not killing him — and uses his head to solve it. These stories are a descendent of — a perfection of — the old SF problem story. Not only do they present a genuine, plausible problem, but the solution is genuine also.
One story "Status Symbol" and the long introduction "Intuition: The Guide Who Needs Steering" are new to this book. Another story, "Uncommon Sense" won the Hugo for Best Short Story of 1945.
The book was published in a limited edition of 800, of which 225 are a numbered, boxed state and 25 are a lettered, boxed state. It is out of print.
Table of Contents
- Introduction by Poul Anderson
- Author's Foreword: Intuition: The Guide Who Needs Steering
- Uncommon Sense
- The Logical Life
- Stuck with It
- Status Symbol (original)
![[Hal Clement photo]](images/Clement-Hal-200.JPG)
Hal Clement
Hal Clement was the pseudonym of the exemplar of hard science fiction, Harry C. Stubbs. He created the pseudonym while working for his Master's degree in Astronomy at Harvard, fearing his professor would not want him to be "wasting" his time. He did not know that this same professor submitted science fiction to Hugo Gernsback's magazines. Hal's first published story was "Proof" which appeared in the June 1942 issue of Astounding Science Fiction. Then, like many other sf writers, the War intervened.
Following bomber combat duty in Europe with the Army Air Corps in World War II, Harry returned home, learned to drive a car, became a high-school chemistry teacher, and wrote Hugo-winning science fiction.
Hal was a fixture at many sf conventions, where he always had time to talk to his fellow fans.
NESFA Press has also published a three-volume set of Hal Clement's novels and shorter stories which all remain in print: The Essential Hal Clement:- Volume 1: Trio for Slide Run and Typewriter
- Volume 2: Music of Many Spheres
- Volume 3: Variations on a Theme by Sir Isaac Newton
Printing History
Hardcover, 5.25" x 7.25", xx+164 pp., ISBN 0-915368-35-8 1987, $13.00, 550 copies, $10.00 in advance and at the convention, September 1987. out of print!
Boxed hardcover, 5.25" x 7.25", xx+164 pp.,ISBN 0-915368-90-0, 225 copies boxed and numbered, $20.00 in advance and at the convention; 25 copies boxed and lettered, reserved for the CactusCon Convention Committee, September 1987. out of print!