Project Gutenberg 2023-10-20 Public domain in the USA. 137 Silverberg, Robert 1935 Knox, Calvin M. Martin, Webber Mitchell, Clyde Jarvis, E. K. Burke, Ralph Bowman, Bill The overlord's thumb $aNew York, NY :$bRoyal Publications, Inc., $c1957. Produced from Infinity March 1958 Greg Weeks, Mary Meehan and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net "The Overlord's Thumb" by Robert Silverberg is a science fiction novella written in the late 1950s. The story centers around Colonel John Devall, the head of a Terran cultural and military mission on the alien planet Markin. The novella explores themes of cultural interaction and the moral dilemmas faced by a superior civilization in its dealings with less advanced societies. The narrative follows Colonel Devall as he grapples with a serious incident: his nephew, Lieutenant Paul Leonards, accidentally kills an alien while on a botanical expedition. The alien society demands that Leonards be handed over for trial, not merely for murder, but for blasphemy against their sacred laws, complicating the situation. Devall is faced with a challenging choice – to assert Earth's dominance by protecting his nephew or to respect the alien culture by allowing them to conduct their trial. Ultimately, he opts to hand over Leonards, leading to an unexpected twist when the trial reveals a ritualistic method of proving innocence. The outcome reinforces the theme of equality among intelligent life and leaves Devall contemplating the implications of their actions on future missions. (This is an automatically generated summary.) 20230909095615silverberg 1957 US Reading ease score: 74.4 (7th grade). Fairly easy to read. en Science fiction Short stories Human-alien encounters -- Fiction Life on other planets -- Fiction PS Text Category: Science-Fiction & Fantasy 75092 2025-07-28T12:06:50.326322 text/html 50526 2023-10-20T09:03:03 text/html 407351 2025-07-28T12:06:53.679333 application/epub+zip 407063 2025-07-28T12:06:51.591345 application/epub+zip 186116 2025-07-28T12:06:50.822328 application/epub+zip 808633 2025-07-28T12:06:55.145277 application/x-mobipocket-ebook 800764 2025-07-28T12:06:53.129375 application/x-mobipocket-ebook 66717 2025-07-28T12:06:50.106256 text/plain; charset=us-ascii 46912 2023-10-20T09:03:03 text/plain; charset=us-ascii 16655 2025-07-28T12:06:55.293279 application/rdf+xml 30365 2025-07-28T12:06:51.166275 image/jpeg 5095 2025-07-28T12:06:50.990276 image/jpeg 1230373 2025-07-28T12:06:50.353286 application/octet-stream application/zip Archives containing the RDF files for *all* our books can be downloaded at https://book.klll.cc/wiki/Gutenberg:Feeds#The_Complete_Project_Gutenberg_Catalog en.wikipedia More titles under Jorgensen, Ivar