To Serve Man

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"To Serve Man" is a science fiction short story written by Damon Knight, later adapted for use as an episode of the 1960s television series The Twilight Zone. In 2001, the story was awarded a Retro Hugo Award for the Best Short Story of 1951.

[edit] Synopsis

The story involves helpful alien emissaries, the pig-like Kanamit (singular Kanama), giving mankind all the necessary tools to survive and to end wars and famine. As a further token of friendship they even freely transport humans to their paradise-like planet.

The aliens accidentally leave behind a book. A United Nations official from Russia named Grigori finds the book and via a Kanamit-English dictionary manages to decipher the book's title, How To Serve Man, and first paragraph, which he explains to the narrator. The paragraph reveals the Kanamit's disquieting motives: How To Serve Man is a cookbook.

[edit] Appearance in other media

  • The story was parodied in an episode of The Simpsons during the first "Treehouse of Horror" Halloween episode, Hungry are the Damned.
  • In Futurama, the phrase is printed on an apron worn by Bender in the episode My Three Suns.
  • It is also mentioned in Spooky Castle as a cookbook in the cooking section of the level "The Library".
  • The television show Buffy the Vampire Slayer also referenced the story, with Buffy's sister Dawn saying "I know! You never know what's coming, the stake is not the power, To Serve Man is a cookbook, I love you! Go away!".
  • In the television series Angel, Charles Gunn is heard exclaiming, "To serve man! It's To Serve Man all over again!" This remark followed the revelation that Jasmine, a goddess whose stated goal is to create a utopia, is actually devouring humans in secret.
  • In Warcraft III if you click various times on a Troll Witch Doctor he screams "It's a cookbook! A COOKBOOK!"
  • On Naked Gun 2 1/2: The Smell of Fear, when a nuclear bomb is about to explode, the during a Presidential Party. Everyone runs around screaming, and a man grabs a woman and says "it's a cook book, it's a cook book!" while holding a book that says: 'To Serve Man'. That man is Lloyd Bochner, who was the main star in the Twilight Zone episode.
  • In World of Warcraft, ogre and troll enemies sometimes drop an item called "An Exotic Cookbook". If you read the cookbook, the title is "To Serve Man".
  • The story itself was later collected in "Bruce Coville's Book of Aliens".
  • In the series Millennium it is referenced in the episode Jose Chung's Doomsday Defense. While discussing a case, Frank Black mentions that a clue is left in a novel titled "To Serve Man" to which Peter Watts replies, "I hope you're not going to tell me it's a cookbook".
  • In the NewsRadio third season finale, a cookbook titled 'How To Serve Man' is given to the people of the station by Jimmy James.
  • In Madagascar, inside the plane where King Julian is holding a meeting. He says "Foosa!" and the meeting explodes into chaos. One lemur is shown holding a book called 'To Serve Lemur', shouting "It's a cook book, it's a cook book!"
  • In 2007, listener-supported radio station WFMU published a collection of recipes by the station's staff as a fund-raiser premium. The title of the book is "To Serve Man: A Musical Cookbook".
  • In the television show Married...With Children episode "Sofa So Good" Al can be heard over the phone in Wanker County yelling, "Peg, To Serve Man, it's a cookbook!"
  • The American deathgrind band Cattle Decapitation released an album in 2002 titled "To Serve Man."
  • In John Ringo's first book, A Hymn Before Battle,"To Serve Man" is mentioned as a classic example of aliens seeming to be benevolent, while in fact using humans for their own purposes.
  • George Scithers, with the permission of (and due acknowledgment to) Damon Knight, has published a book-length work titled 'To Serve Man' which consists almost entirely of straightforward recipes for meat dishes, ostensibly intended to require "long pig" (human flesh) as their main ingredient. On legal advice, Scithers published the book under a pseudonym ("Karl Würf"), but he has made no secret of his authorship. The book was published by Wildside Press' in December 1979. ISBN 978-1880448823.
  • On the Cartoon Network program What-A-Cartoon! Show in a cartoon called Gramps, when the title character (voice by Rob Paulsen) tells his grandchildren a story about how he saved the world from invading aliens in his youth, a man (voiced by Charlie Adler) shows him the book saying To Serve Man and tells him that it is a cookbook, Gramps knocks him away saying "It's been done"!
  • According to a New York Times article from 1 April 2008, "Inside the black budget", an unofficial badge of the 509th Bomb Wing based in Roswell, New Mexico, shows a space alien with huge eyes holding a stealth bomber near its mouth. The text reads "To Serve Man", while the caption below reads "Gustatus Similis Pullus" - dog Latin for "Tastes Like Chicken."
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