S - Short works
 |
Winner of Nebula Award for best novella, 1985. A far-future story featuring a man from the 1980s inexplicably living in a time of technology as magic, where the great cities of history are reconstructed for the amusement of the small population of Earth. Byzantium, Alexandria, Mohenjo-Daro, New Chicago, complete with legions of "temporaries" (constructed replica humans with programmed roles to play). |
It's not easy to be an anthropologist in the 21st Century. All the primitive cultures are gone, assimilated into a neo-Western global socio-economic sameness. Professor Thomas Schwartz is that useless anthropologist, globe-hopping from lecture to lecture, from Montevideo to Port Moresby, New Guinea, and all the cities are the same. But in his fantasies, he travels on a great interstellar liner surrounded by the representatives of many alien cultures--something to study!
A thoughtful rumination on the possible demise of cultural diversity written for Judy-Lynn del Rey's first Stellar anthology. The story was a conscious effort at 1950s-style "conservative" storytelling, and earned a Hugo nomination.
This is the story of a man obsessed by science fiction. He's read it voraciously since childhood, and collects books and magazines. He calls himself the "flesh-and-blood personification of the Science Fiction Hall of Fame." His friends think he's a nut, of course, to go for that aliens-spaceships-blasters sort of stuff. One can easily read this as a criticism of the kind of juvenile SF Silverberg himself had written in the 50s.
The celebrated young American therapist Richard Bjornstrand commenced his experimental treatment of Miss April Lowry on the third of August, 1987. Within fifteen days the locus of disturbance had been identified, and Dr Bjornstrand had recommended consciousness-penetration treatment, a technique increasingly popular in the United States. Miss Lowry's physician was initially opposed to the suggestion, but further consultations demonstrated the potential value of such an approach, and on the nineteenth of September the entry procedures were initiated. We expect further reports from Dr Bjornstrand as the project develops.
This "consciousness-penetration therapy" somehow puts the therapist into the patient's mind. The mechanics of it are not explained, only the experiences Bjornstrand has in the very strange landscape (seascape, mostly) of April's psyche. The whole thing is very disorienting and interesting.
Quite likely this story appeared elsewhere first (Amazing or Fantastic, probably), but I've been unable to determine exactly where or when.
Nominated for Nebula Award for best novella, 1987. Written as a sort of tribute to the classic Joseph Conrad story of the same name.
This short novel revisits Valentine on Majipoor after the events in Valentine Pontifex. The ruler emerges from the Labyrinth to visit the ancient Piurivar city of Velalisier, but finds it mysteriously changed. There he investigates the brutal murder of one of the archeologists and finds himself once again in conflict with the planet's natives.
Dr John Donaldson is the world's number one expert on the alien language called Kethlan, known from ancient documents on Mars and the Moon, so when a living Kethlan shows up, he is of course called to translate. But it's so unpleasant how alien aliens can be. And the assumptions made on the basis of millennia-old writings may not be accurate today.
The hopes of the Earth ride on a great ship hurtling through no-space. Contact is maintained by Noelle and Yolanda, telepathic twins, one on Earth, the other aboard the ship. Then, fifteen light-years away, they start to lose their connection. It seems that this general scenario has been used elsewhere, but I can't think of it right off. (Heinlein's "Time for the Stars" has been suggested by a well-read visitor.) This is a very enjoyable story with a grand, cosmic ending. It has now been expanded into the novel Starborne.
Earth has spawned three colonies on distant planets: Columbia (founded by Americans), Novaya Ruthenya (founded by Russians), and New Gallia (founded by the French). The motherworld has degenerated into a powerless planet of poets, musicians, and scientists, completely unable to defend itself from the impending invasion by the ruthless Hrossai. But one ancient skill the Earthmen have not lost is that of intrigue, and therein lies their hope.
Three space-faring creatures explore their solar system in search of life, and find something interesting on the Third World.
Later expanded to the novel of the same name.
A fantastic treasure sits on a barren world, waiting for the adventurer brave and cunning enough to take it. But the robot guardian is invincible, and it wants to ask a few questions. A semi-Zen modern sphinx tale.
A surprisingly enjoyable story from the early years. Lloyd Harkins is an electronic technician from 1956 who suddenly finds himself in the far future, in a world where small primitive bands live in a post-holocaust Earth with gigantic aliens and robots roaming around. The interpersonal relationships are a little shallow, but not completely cardboard. And while I generally don't care for modern-man-unexpectedly-thrown-into-the-future stories (of which Silverberg has written quite a few), this one is fun.
Chris Maitland is an ordinary securities analyst in San Francisco. At least on the outside. Inside he has a special gift -- the ability to communicate over long distances with other gifted people. He lives well enough with his secret, and his wife has no idea of his ability. And in fact it makes little difference from day to day. Most of the people around the world who share the gift are mentally unstable, and he gets little joy from conversing with them. But he often lets his mind roam in search of a kindred soul, someone with whom he can share his gift. Then one day he contacts Laurel Hammett, a potter from Phoenix, and they commence upon a strange and beautiful relationship.
Silverberg's preferred title for this story is "Snake and Ocean, Ocean and Snake". Alice K. Turner, fiction editor at Playboy, called it "The Affair".
In the future, all the crime fighting is done by computers. After all, they can examine the facts rationally and deduce who done it better than any human. Or can they? A bored human detective sets off to solve a 30-year-old unsolved case: to find a man who escaped from a perfect prison.
Inspired by The Tablets by Armand Schwerner.
A odd assemblage of scenes, lists, clippings, and so on, which in some ways mocks the pretenses of science fiction (and storytelling in general) while it criticizes contemporary society. Contains the following memorable paragraph a couple pages in:
None of the aforegoing is true. I take pleasure in deceiving. I am an extremely unreliable witness.
A (mostly) non-corporeal life-form falls asleep on a crate on its home world and wakes up in the cargo hold of a spaceship bound for Earth. When it tries to ask for help, it finds the human crew unable to receive its telepathic communication. In fact, it gives them nightmares. When it gets to Earth, things only get worse as it frantically tries to find a way home.
The central idea of this story is the reanimation of the dead, but it's a very different scenario from "Born with the Dead". In life, Bekh was one of the greatest musicians of all time, and now that he is dead, concert promoters revive him for a few hours at a time to perform for the living.
This story is a frustrating combination of fascinating and annoying. The future post-apocalypse society is really interesting, a convincing portrayal of an unusual and peaceful people. The twentieth century man unexpectedly thrown into the future is greedy, selfish, and downright obnoxious (which I suppose is the point, but that doesn't mean I like it). There are some signs of the lyrical writing Silverberg would later develop.
This story is Chapter 6 of Majipoor Chronicles.
Therion Nismile is a soul-painter during the time of Lord Thraym, a long time before Lord Valentine. This is a high-tech art form in which the artist imprints an image directly from his mind (or soul) onto a canvas made sensitive to him. Therion is the greatest soul-painter of his day, but he becomes dissatisfied with the perfection that surrounds him on Castle Mount and leaves civilization to build himself a hut in the forest of Zimroel. There he meets a woman named Sarise, who also lives in the forest. But he is plagued by doubts--is she really a Shapeshifter masquerading as a woman?
Barr Herndon was born into a family of minor nobles on the planet Borlaam. Then the greedy overlord called the Seigneur decided to obliterate the family, leaving Barr the only survivor. Herndon, of course, swears vengeance, but he is an unusually patient man, and first seeks his fortune as a Spacerogue, a kind of interstellar mercenary with a rigid code of honor. But there comes a time when he must choose between his honor and his desire for revenge.
Later expanded into Conquerors from the Darkness.
Silverberg said in the Best of Introduction that this story "pleases me the most" of all those he's written. It has apparently showed up in college texts on writing techniques. It's the story of Tom Two Ribbons, a Sioux in the future coming to terms with his life and his ancestry. The viewpoint shifts as needed between third, first, and even second person. It's a good story, though it won no awards.
This great story was consciously written to update the style of old pulp magazines like Planet Stories. Chollie and Fazio are grunts in the long war against the alien Ovoids. The Ovoids use a nasty biological weapon called a synsym, which invades its victim's nervous system in a particularly nasty way. The two soldiers have a pact: if either of them should be attacked by a synsym, the other will shoot him immediately to avoid infection. But when it comes right down to it, could you really kill your own buddy?
Return to short story main page
Last updated October 21, 2002
[silverberg/oldsite/footer.htm]