What's He Doing in There? by Fritz Leiber
"What's He Doing in There?" by Fritz Leiber is a humorous science fiction short story written in the late 1950s. The narrative centers around a cultural anthropologist's encounter with the first Martian visitor to Earth, highlighting themes of miscommunication and cultural taboos. The story deftly explores the absurdity of human and alien interactions, particularly when reflecting on the mundane aspects of life like bathroom etiquette. The plot unfolds as the Martian, havinglanded on Earth, retreats to the bathroom for an extended period, prompting concern from the professor and his family about what he might be doing. Speculation runs wild as they consider the possible consequences of the Martian's actions, ranging from illness to cultural misunderstandings. The story builds tension and humor around the family's anxiety, revealing the alien's innocent intentions and misconceptions about terrestrial customs when he eventually emerges, blissfully unaware of the fuss he has caused. Ultimately, it serves as a delightful exploration of cross-cultural interactions, emphasizing the challenges and misunderstandings inherent in communications between vastly different beings. (This is an automatically generated summary.)
Read now or download (free!)
| Choose how to read this book | Url | Size | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Read online (web) | https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/29504.html.images | 38 kB | ||||
| EPUB3 (E-readers incl. Send-to-Kindle) | https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/29504.epub3.images | 181 kB | ||||
| EPUB (older E-readers) | https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/29504.epub.images | 179 kB | ||||
| EPUB (no images, older E-readers) | https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/29504.epub.noimages | 72 kB | ||||
| Kindle | https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/29504.kf8.images | 303 kB | ||||
| older Kindles | https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/29504.kindle.images | 296 kB | ||||
| Plain Text UTF-8 | https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/29504.txt.utf-8 | 32 kB | ||||
| Download HTML (zip) | https://www.gutenberg.org/cache/epub/29504/pg29504-h.zip | 178 kB | ||||
| There may bemore files related to this item. | ||||||
Similar Books
About this eBook
| Author | Leiber, Fritz, 1910-1992 |
|---|---|
| Illustrator | Bowman |
| Title | What's He Doing in There? |
| Series Title | Produced from Galaxy Science Fiction December 1957. |
| Note | Reading ease score: 74.6 (7th grade). Fairly easy to read. |
| Credits | Produced by Greg Weeks, Stephen Blundell and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net |
| Language | English |
| LoC Class | PS: Language and Literatures: American and Canadian literature |
| Subject | Science fiction |
| Subject | Short stories |
| Subject | Martians -- Fiction |
| Subject | Human-alien encounters -- Fiction |
| Category | Text |
| EBook-No. | 29504 |
| Release Date | Jul 24, 2009 |
| Copyright Status | Public domain in the USA. |
| Downloads | 130 downloads in the last 30 days. |
| Project Gutenberg eBooks are always free! | |
