Grotto of the Dancing Deer : And Other Stories

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One of the most notable features of the works, and particularly the earliest short stories, of Clifford D. Simak was his frequent use of colloquial language; in fact, sometimes his characters became so “colloquial” as to suggest parody. And such usages were particularly jarring when they came from the mouths of people working in a highly technological environment like outer space (see “Mr. Meek Plays Polo” for one example). To modern ears and eyes, such language appears completely unrealistic. Who would believe that future people would be so primitive, so uneducated?

Some of these usages, I would suggest, were deliberate, exaggerations intended to remind us that the future would still have a place for people with simple lives reflecting simple mores, even if they had to handle complicated technologies. How better to show that the character typically found in down-home, unsophisticated country dwellers would continue to be around in the future?

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