GRAY LENSMAN
By E. E. SMITH, Ph. D.
[Transcriber's Note: This etext was produced from
Astounding Science Fiction
October, November, December 1939, January 1940.
Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that
the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.]
PROLOGUE
This is not, strictly speaking, a biography. It is not, it cannot be, comprehensive enough to be called that. Nor, since of necessity it must be limited, both in length and in scope, can it be called a history. It is, perhaps, best described as a record—the record of the activities of Galactic Co-ordinator Kimball Kinnison, Gray Lensman, of Tellus, during the Boskonian War.
Nevertheless this record, what there is of it, is in essence biographical; and the biographer of such a man as Kinnison has a peculiar task. In one way it is easy, in two others it is difficult in the extreme.