"Sense of Obligation"

1961 Harrison, Harry [Max] (1925-2012). “Sense of Obligation.” Analog Science Fact--Fiction 68.1 - 3 (September - November 1961): 8-48; 98-139; 121-59. Rpt. as Planet of the Damned. New York: Bantam, 1962. UK ed. as Sense of Obligation. London: Dennis Dobson, 1967. MoU-St, NLS

An evil, authoritarian, overpopulated dystopia contrasted with a people from a scientific humanist society built around competitive games that is presented as a good society. The games included contests in chess and poetry as well as things like archery and fencing. Separate contests for men and women. While successful, it was an experiment by outsiders to remold a barbarian planet. The author was born Henry Maxwell Dempsey, with his father changing the surname to Harrison shortly after his birth, and he legally changed his name to Harry Max Harrison at age thirty. He was born and raised in the U. S. and lived in Mexico for a year, in Denmark for seven years, and then in the U.S., Ireland, and England for many years, and he died in England.