Invasion from Mars, a 1949 anthology selected by Orson Welles

Invasion from Mars: Interplanetary Stories, selected by Orson Welles (1949)

At left: Paperback original (New York: Dell Publishing Co., 1949), #305, 191 p. Ten short stories with an introduction by Orson Welles. Cover painting by Malcolm Smith.

Although the anthology contains ten short stories, only four pertain to Mars:

• “Invasion from Mars,” by Howard Koch. This is the script to the famous radio adaptation of H. G. Wells’ classic novel The War of the Worlds (1898), which was presented by Orson Welles and his Mercury Theatre on the Air, October 30, 1938.

• “The Green Hills of Earth,” by Robert A. Heinlein, from The Saturday Evening Post (February 8, 1947). A “space bum” wanders around the universe writing songs.

• “Expedition,” by Anthony Boucher, from Captain Future Magazine (1943). The Martians attempt another invasion of Earth.

• "The Million Year Picnic,” by Ray Bradbury, from Planet Stories (Summer 1946). “Another group of fugitives from the grim results of man’s inhumanity to man finds a fairer sanctuary on Mars.” This story later became the final selection in The Martian Chronicles (1950).

The full list of stories published in Invasion from Mars: Interplanetary Stories is detailed in the Internet Speculative Fiction Database.