Language English Publication date May, 1970 Country United Kingdom | Published in Galaxy Science Fiction Originally published May 1970 Genre Science Fiction | |
Similar The Man Who Ploughed, The Pacifist, Death and the Senator, The Ultimate Melody, The Reluctant Orchid | ||
"Neutron Tide" is a short story written by Arthur C. Clarke. It is among his shortest pieces of writing, consisting solely of a 2-page, detailed description of a futuristic scenario in order to use a pun as a punch-line.
Plot summary
Clarke describes a space battleship flying too close to the gravitational field of a neutron star, and subsequently being torn to bits by the high tidal forces. A military commander revealing this in a meeting says the only identifiable piece of debris was from an engineer's toolkit, resulting in the pun, "star-mangled spanner": a play on the title of the United States' national anthem.
References
Neutron Tide Wikipedia(Text) CC BY-SA