# It's not what you think it is **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [February 24, 2003, 1:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/its-not-what-you-think-it-is/157150 "2003-02-24T13:52:40Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 10\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![CalMeacham](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/calmeacham/32/35_2.png) [@CalMeacham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CalMeacham)\ **Post date:** [February 24, 2003, 1:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/its-not-what-you-think-it-is/157150/1 "2003-02-24T13:52:40Z")
I keep coming across examples of stories/situations that everyone is familiar with and associate with one story or book, but which has been used before. My favorite example is when I descrive Heinlein’s book **The Puppet Masters** to people as “James Bond meets Invasion of the Body Snatchers” – only Heinlein’s book predates both James Bond _and_ Jack Finney’s “The Body Snatchers” and the movie they based on it. Try these examples: A group of people wake up from their long trip and find themselves on a world that is mostly wild and untamed. They find that the dominant intelligent creatures are apes, and that the apes are stratified by species – gorilla warriors, chimp thinkers, etc. It turns out they’re on Earth in the far future. It’s not Pierre Boulle’s **Planet of the Apes** , but a novel almost a decade older. The future of the galaxy-wide human expansion seems destined for a highly capable human boy who ends up in control of a desert planet that is populated by people from a traditional desert Earth culture who control giant creatures that produce a spice that is essential for certain purposes and is highly sought-after. People fight for control of the planet. This novel is _not_ Frank Herbert’s **Dune** , but predates it. ---
**Author:** ![Rocketeer](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/rocketeer/32/4437_2.png) [@Rocketeer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rocketeer)\ **Post date:** [February 24, 2003, 2:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/its-not-what-you-think-it-is/157150/2 "2003-02-24T14:15:55Z")
Well, ya got me on Number One, but Number Two is Cordwainer Smith’s Norstrilia stories. ---
**Author:** ![CalMeacham](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/calmeacham/32/35_2.png) [@CalMeacham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CalMeacham)\ **Post date:** [February 24, 2003, 2:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/its-not-what-you-think-it-is/157150/3 "2003-02-24T14:26:20Z")
Bingo! One for Rocketeer. ---
**Author:** ![Rocketeer](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/rocketeer/32/4437_2.png) [@Rocketeer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rocketeer)\ **Post date:** [February 24, 2003, 9:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/its-not-what-you-think-it-is/157150/4 "2003-02-24T21:33:45Z")
Hmmm. This thread, deserving though it may be of life and prosperity, is obviously a victim of Rocketeer, Slayer of Threads. Sorry 'bout that:( ---
**Author:** ![Sir\_Rhosis](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/d9b06d/32.png) [@Sir\_Rhosis](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sir_Rhosis)\ **Post date:** [March 4, 2003, 1:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/its-not-what-you-think-it-is/157150/5 "2003-03-04T01:09:11Z")
^^^It’s not your fault, it’s just that Cal is the most widely-read, erudite SF scholar on the SDMB. There, I sucked up, Cal, tell us the other answer. 😃 Sir Rhosis ---
**Author:** ![DrFidelius](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/drfidelius/32/3447_2.png) [@DrFidelius](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrFidelius)\ **Post date:** [March 4, 2003, 1:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/its-not-what-you-think-it-is/157150/6 "2003-03-04T01:27:59Z")
Are you asking about **The Apes** by Eden Phillpotts. ---
**Author:** ![DrFidelius](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/drfidelius/32/3447_2.png) [@DrFidelius](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrFidelius)\ **Post date:** [March 4, 2003, 1:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/its-not-what-you-think-it-is/157150/7 "2003-03-04T01:29:07Z")
And here is the missing punctuation. ? ---
**Author:** ![KneadToKnow](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kneadtoknow/32/3999_2.png) [@KneadToKnow](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/KneadToKnow)\ **Post date:** [March 4, 2003, 1:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/its-not-what-you-think-it-is/157150/8 "2003-03-04T01:34:31Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by DrFidelius \* > \*\*Are you asking about **The Apes** by Eden Phillpotts. \*\* My sources tell me this came out in 1929, so if he is, he’s drastically underestimating how much it predates Boulle. ---
**Author:** ![CalMeacham](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/calmeacham/32/35_2.png) [@CalMeacham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CalMeacham)\ **Post date:** [March 4, 2003, 3:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/its-not-what-you-think-it-is/157150/9 "2003-03-04T03:47:31Z")
I gotta admit that never heard of Eden Phillpots, or of “The Apes” What I had in mind was L. Sprague de Camp’s **Genus Homo**. The cover of my paperback has a naked human in a zoo, with a cultured, monocle-wearing ape as a guard. (Yes, the apes _do_ put the people in a zoo in the book.) I know that I’ve attributed a lot of the movie’s features to the book. The truth is that de Camp’s book resembles the movie Planet of he Apes more than Boulle’s book. Another one that occurred to me was Orson cott Card’s **A Planet called Treason** , which seems to bear a peculiar resemblance to Cordwainer Smith’s **A Planet Called Ransom**. But given the similarity f names, that _had_ to be intentional. Right? ---
**Author:** ![SmackFu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/53a042/32.png) [@SmackFu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SmackFu)\ **Post date:** [March 4, 2003, 4:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/its-not-what-you-think-it-is/157150/10 "2003-03-04T04:00:08Z")
“…and now you know, the rest of the story.”