"The Man Who Went to the Moon—Twice" (1967)

Howard Rodman, who died in 1985, wrote screenplays for TV and movies. His best-known work includes Route 66, Naked City, Coogan's Bluff, and Charley Varrick. Harlan Ellison's introduction to the story discusses Ellison's intention to cast the net wide for this anthology, looking to writers outside of science fiction. Some names he mentions here that didn't make it in include Thomas Pynchon, William Burroughs, and Terry Southern. It's an interesting idea, as Rodman's odd story shows. Get outside of science fiction and you're liable to find something unexpected for science fiction. Certainly that's the case here, though it's not entirely unprecedented—Ray Bradbury, for one, covered territory like this. Our hero, who bears the strange name of Marshall Kiss, ends up in a runaway hot-air balloon at the age of 9. He says the balloon took him to the moon. His story is covered in local papers—it's an obvious kid's confabulation, but all the adults go along with it for human interest newspaper stories, as adults will (see also Santa Claus). Many years later, nearing the age of 90, Kiss is a lonely old man who has outlived his family and friends. To get attention, he makes up a story about going to the moon. But no one is interested because no one goes to the moon anymore. They're all going to Mars now. In his afterword, Rodman says his focus is on the tremendous amount of change in the world that people can see now in a single lifetime. It's a reasonably interesting point but a bit obvious, as there are approximately 7 billion people now living it out, and not like this. What I liked about the story more was seeing the visual focus and narrative rhythms of a screenwriter. For example, when Rodman describes the boy Kiss recounting his story for reporters, neighbors, and others, he adds this sentence: "A horse poked his head through the kitchen window, and a chicken hopped in and hid under the stove." Then, after the boy finishes telling the story, which naturally is full of charming and nostalgic detail: "The horse took his head out the window and went back to cropping grass in the yard. The hen hopped out the door again, leaving an egg behind under the stove." These animals remind me of Green Acres and other '60s television and give some idea of how this story works (or doesn't, as the case may be). It's not my idea of science fiction, but I like the hodgepodge White Album feel this story brings to the larger collection.

Dangerous Visions, ed. Harlan Ellison