If All Men Were Brothers, Would You Let One Marry Your Sister?

"If All Men Were Brothers, Would You Let One Marry Your Sister?" is a science fiction short story by American writer Theodore Sturgeon. It first appeared in Harlan Ellison's anthology Dangerous Visions in 1967.

Plot

An Earthman visits the planet Vexvelt, which is shunned by the rest of the colonized universe for unknown reasons. He finds it a utopian paradise, but then discovers to his shock and horror that incest is actively encouraged there.

Reception

"If All Men Were Brothers, Would You Let One Marry Your Sister?" was a finalist for the 1967 Nebula Award for Best Novelette.[1]

Paul Kincaid has called it "beautifully constructed" and "oddly lyrical", and a story "upon which Sturgeon's reputation can comfortably rest", but noted that its tone can be "loud and hectoring", and conceded that the basic premise of Vexvelt being shunned for a reason nobody knows "doesn't altogether make sense".[2] Brian Stableford has described it as a "curious moral parable", whose "wild optimism (...) is as unappealing as it is unconvincing",[3] while Brian Aldiss felt that the title was "cutesy",[4] and Algis Budrys called it "just plain terrible".[5]

References
  1. "If All Men Were Brothers, Would You Let One Marry Your Sister" at Science Fiction Writers of America; retrieved October 13, 2017
  2. The Nail and the Oracle - Volume XI: The Complete Stories of Theodore Sturgeon, reviewed by Paul Kincaid, at the SF Site; published 2007; retrieved October 14, 2017
  3. Outside the Human Aquarium: Masters of Science Fiction, by Brian Stableford; published 1995 by Wildside Press
  4. The Detached Retina, by Brian Aldiss; published 1995 by Syracuse University Press
  5. Budrys, Algis (April 1968). "Galaxy Bookshelf". Galaxy Science Fiction. pp. 155–163.


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