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"I received a nice letter the other day from the Dalai Lama. He had read 'The Nine Billion Names of God'. It is about a computer at a Tibetan monastery."
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Clara Newton is forbidden by her father to marry her true love. She resolves to enter into a state of voluntary suspended animation until he dies, when his will can no longer be enforced.
This is the first use of this idea in science fiction, as far as I know. The phrase "suspended animation" seems to have been in use since the late eighteenth century to describe animals that hibernate.
A true Victorian tragedy, the story ends with Clara entering into the Frigorific Refuge as a bride:
Without delay the necessary papers of admission were drawn up and signed and the proper registration was made upon the books of the establishment. For an instant husband and wife rested in each other's arms. Then she, still cheerful, followed the attendants toward the inner door, while he, pressing both hands upon his tearless eyes, turned away sobbing.
A moment later the intense cold of the congealing chamber caught the bride and wrapped her close in its icy embrace.
The story also describes suspended animation as the "frigorific process known as the Werkomer process".
This is the earliest direct reference to the idea of suspended animation or cryogenic freezing, as far as I know.
Compare to cold-sleep from Robert Heinlein's Methuselah's Children (1941), the eternity drug from Far Centaurus (1944) by A.E. van Vogt, stasis from Heinlein's Door Into Summer (1951), the adiabatic pods from The Lady Who Sailed The Soul (1960) by Cordwainer Smith, cold-pack from Dr. Futurity (1960) by Philip K. Dick, bibs from Cantata 140 (1964) by Philip K. Dick,
corpsicle from Pohl's The Age of the Pussyfoot (1965), the hibernaculum from 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968) by Arthur C. Clarke, cryosleep from Flight of Exiles (1972) by Ben Bova and the EverRest Cryotorium from Roger Zelazny's Flare (1992).
Just for fun, contrast with Cosmoline (Warm Sleep) from War Dogs (2014) by Greg Bear. Comment/Join this discussion ( 0 ) | RSS/XML | Blog This | Additional
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