An audiobook adaptation originally created by Caedmon Audio in 1979 as a four-disk LP collection named Science Fiction Soundbook. Re-released on audio cassette in the 1990s, each of the following stories have been abridged slightly, and read by a single narrator.
William Shatner narrates:
- "The Psychohistorians", from Isaac Asimov's The Foundation Trilogy.
- "Mimsy Were the Borogoves", attributed to Henry Kuttner alone.
- The Martian Chronicles, featuring "There Will Come Soft Rains" and "Usher II" by Ray Bradbury.
- "The Green Hills of Earth", by Robert A. Heinlein.
- and "Gentlemen Be Seated" (hidden as a subtitle)
William Shatner and Leonard Nimoy Read Four Science Fiction Classics provides examples of:
- Adaptation Distillation: Many of the stories are abridged from their normal length. The Martian Chronicles suffers the most, getting shortened to "There Will Come Soft Rains" and "Usher II".
- Audio Adaptation: William Shatner reads abridged versions of "The Psychohistorians" and "Mimsy Were the Borogoves", and Leonard Nimoy reads abridged versions of The Martian Chronicles and "The Green Hills of Earth".
- Billed Above the Title: The covers of the original LP sleeves each describe their contents by listing the author's name, the title (or series title, then story title), and then the narrator at the top of the sleeve, leaving plenty of room for the cover design.
- Biography: The back of the 1994 audio cassette case and the back of the 1979 sleeves of the original vinyl records have short blurbs about the narrators:
- William Shatner starred as James T. Kirk in Star Trek, directed feature films and acted in A Shot In The Dark, as well as authoring Star Trek Memories and other science fiction stories.
- Leonard Nimoy starred as Spock in Star Trek and as Paris in Mission: Impossible, acted in films like The Balcony and Deathwatch, as well as hosting In Search of... and director of several other feature films.
- Boxed Set: The original four-disk LP collection was packaged in a single box to hold each record sleeve. The cover art for the box borrowed the art used for the sleeve cover of Isaac Asimov's "Foundation: The Psychohistorians", and focused on the cigar-shaped spaceship.
- Computer Voice: "The Psychohistorians": Whenever William Shatner reads from the Encyclopedia Galactica, his voice is edited to take on a reverb, making him sound more computer-like.
- Exactly What It Says on the Tin: Guess who the narrators are, how many stories they read, and what genre they are.
- In Case You Forgot Who Wrote It: The revised title starts by naming the narrators of this adaptation (William Shatner and Leonard Nimoy), who were even more famous than they were in 1975 when they first recorded it.
- Orwellian Retcon: When this audiobook adaptation was first published on vinyl, it was titled simply Science Fiction Soundbook. When it was republished as a set of four audio cassettes in the 1990s, Harper Collins capitalized on the Star Trek popularity by renaming it with the narrators in the title.
- Pen Name: In both the audio cassette release and the original vinyl release, Henry Kuttner is mentioned to have written "Mimsy Were the Borogoves" under the pseudonym of Lewis Padgett (although the cassette set misspells it as "Paggett"). The back of the vinyl sleeve includes an introduction by C. L. Moore, who claims that her husband wrote the entire story himself in one sitting.
- Retro Rocket: The sleeve cover of the original LP for Isaac Asimov's "Foundation: The Psychohistorians" uses a cigar-shaped rocket with wide fins and inflated landing gear at the base. The cover for the Boxed Set focused on that same image. On that rocket is the spaceship-and-sun symbol described within the story as the symbol of the Galactic Empire, whose ship is also a simple oval with flames from one end.
