As distance gives us added critical perspective on the mass of science fiction produced during the 1950s and the 1960s, certain authors emerge as unusual shaping forces. One such author is certainly Paul Myron Anthony Linebarger, a professor of Asiatic politics at the Johns Hopkins University who began publishing science fiction in 1950 under the odd name Cordwainer Smith. Linebarger's fiction was no less unusual than his major pseudonym, and for many years he was regarded as something of an oddity, an author whose stories, full of bizarre or whimsical images and characters, seemed apart from traditional science-fiction themes and concepts. But with the publication of The Best of Cordwainer Smith in 1975, Linebarger began to be seen as a seminal force in contemporary science fiction.

Much of the apparent eclecticism of Linebarger's fiction can be traced to his background, for he had a particularly colorful life. Born in Milwaukee...