PLANET OF THE APES

A distant planet, Sorus, is reached by Ulysse, a French journalist, a physician and a misanthropic professor. There they are met by a young woman, Nova, whose vacant eyes betray the fact that although she is physically perfect, she is of intelligence. A master race of apes, who have evolved a civilization antamount to human, put Ulysse in a cage and use him for Pavlovian experimentation. Only through the intervention of a she-ape, Zira, is he temporarily reprieved... Within the cadre of science fiction, this is satire where paradoxes and parallels converge. It can be read as either, and when it gets right down to monkey business it is dismayingly entertaining.