Richard Powers’ cover of the McFadden Press 1964 edition of Alan Nourse’s Tiger By the Tail typifies Powers’ unique, immediately identifiable, and highly creative approach to science fiction illustration.
Though eminently capable of creative technically realistic (albeit imaginary!) depictions of space vehicles, as well as the human form and facial expressions, Powers instead presents viewers with a mixture of symbolic visual elements, fragments of landscapes, and stylized color patterns, only one element of which is actually related to the book’s title: Orange and black tiger stripes at the lower left, held by tiger-striped, vaguely humanoid and not-really-even-human figure on the right.
For this edition of Tiger By the Tail, that’s all you’ll see of the “tiger”! (If you read the original story, you’ll understand the symbolism of Powers’ art…)
The other really science-fictiony elements on the cover are the silhouette of a figure at the lower right, and, a weirdly oval, semi-transparent spacecraft rising from a crater, in the center.
Whether or not these elements “fit” the anthology’s stories is not really relevant.
They set and fit a literary mood, and generate a sense of curiosity…
Contents
Tiger By The Tail, from Galaxy Science Fiction, November, 1951
Nightmare Brother, from Astounding Science Fiction, February, 1953
PRoblem, from Galaxy Science Fiction, October, 1956
The Coffin Cure, from Galaxy Science Fiction, April, 1957
Brightside Crossing, from Galaxy Science Fiction, January, 1956
The Native Soil, from Fantastic Universe, July, 1957
Love Thy Vimp, from The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction, April, 1952
Letter of The Law, from If, January, 1954
Family Resemblance, from Astounding Science Fiction, April, 1953
