Flight to Venus story
A man plots to dupe the public into believing that he made an expedition to the planet Venus.
12 total · 6 major · 6 minor
| Theme | Level | Motivation |
|---|---|---|
| criminal fraud | major | Professor Morteshang plotted to dupe the people of Earth into thinking he went on a voyage to Venus with a view to cashing in on a book deal, but then he really ended up going. Alfred Smith was serving a prison sentence for having committed mail fraud. |
| interplanetary space travel | major | Professor Randall Morteshang commandeered a rocketship to Venus. Failed manned missions to Mars and the Moon were also mentioned. |
| ironic twist of fate | major | Professor Morteshang plotted to fool the public into believing that he had gone on an expedition to Venus, but after his plan went wrong and he actually ended up going to Venus the press made the public think it was a hoax. |
| malicious hoaxes in society | major | Professor Morteshang plotted to fool the public into believing that he had gone on an expedition to Venus, but after his plan went wrong and he actually ended up going to Venus the press made the public think it was a hoax. |
| speculative spaceship | major | Professor Morteshang built a rocketship and flew it to the planet Venus. |
| Venusian extraterrestrial | major | Professor Morteshang returned from an expedition to Venus with a trio of green tinged Venusians. |
| brother and sister | minor | Two Venusians, Vomi and Loama, were siblings. |
| coping with an overly hard handshake | minor | The reporter Mr. Shepherd greeted Morteshang with a "vigorous handshake" with a gleam in his eye. |
| coping with having a bad reputation | minor | The press destroyed Professor Morteshang's reputation by convincing the public that his expedition to Venus was an elaborate hoax. |
| mind reading technology | minor | Venusian scientists were planning to use some procedure on Morteshang to read his mind that would leave him "a babbling idiot for the rest of his life", if he survived. |