Before Eden

"Before Eden" is a science fiction short story by the British author Arthur C. Clarke, first published in June 1961 in Amazing Stories. It was included in Tales of Ten Worlds, a 1962 collection of stories by Clarke, and has been translated into multiple languages. The story, written when speculation about Venus was based entirely on observations from Earth, describes what the environment on the planet's surface could be like. A consequence of interplanetary contamination is imagined.