Let's Hear it for Silverberg!

[intensityxx]

On the upward swing of my first major scifi learning curve (early 70's) I read anything I could find by Silverberg, who was one of my favorite authors. I realized today that I haven't revisited his works since then. Not a single Silverberg graces my shelves (the old ones are damaged, boxed). So I don't remember which I read, wouldn't remember much of it anyway.

So help me out here, please! There's space on my shelves (barely) to fill with his best, new and old. Which do you consider his masterworks? What has he done recently that's great? Maybe we can turn some whippersnappers on to his stuff too!

[Hobbit]

If you've looked around the recent threads Intensity you'll notice I've picked up a load of Silverberg recently.

Such a broad field: but for short stories his recent Phases of the Moon collection is very good - been dipping into that lately, with stories from the 1950's onwards. (One of the last stories here, Roma Eterna has been expanded from a story to a recent novel. Anybody read the novel? Any good?)

For his novels, then there's a lot. But the ones that I remember most today would be Nightwings. And Dying Inside. Downward to the Earth, anyone?


This is a good one that I got for about 3-4 dollars a couple of years ago - includes the novels A Time of Changes; Downward to the Earth; The Second Trip; Dying Inside; and Nightwings.

For those who want something more Fantasy based, there's Lord Valentine's Castle, though it is Fantasy with Sf elements, acknowledged by both Silverberg and James Gunn.

Other threads:

Majipoor by Silverberg

As a sidenote: Silverberg has won the most awards of any living author around - five Nebula Awards and four Hugo Awards (and I think most nominations? - probably both!)

Later edit: Here's a nice link to a book list: HERE

Hobbit

[intensityxx]

I think maybe you triggered my memory with your buys recently, Hobbit . Thanks for the suggestions.

I consulted Emohawk's Suggested Reading List for more ideas as well.

[Dawnstorm]

Dying Inside is one of the best books I've ever read!

I've tried two others, they were so-so, so I can't even remember their names.

But I love Dying Inside!

Have one with a great cover, too. David Selig (is that the name?) sitting infront of the mirror.

[Lowlander]

I think Nightwings is his best book. Actually it's not really a novel but three novellas published in the 60's in Galaxy.

Other good book are :
-Downward to the Earth (SF version of Heart of Darkness)
-Hawksbill Station (colony of political prisoners sent
back in time)
-Shadrach in the Furnace (political novel about far future Earth)
-Time of Changes (very good novel, a prince on an alien world start a religious revolution)

[Yobmod]

I thought Nightwings was quite good. Just felt it was missing something to make it great, but can't put my finger on it. I would say the same about the Stochastic Man, good but not great. I was never impressed by his newer (Majipoor) stuff either.

OTOH Dying Inside and the Book of Skulls were both excellent, and remain near the top of my good books list.

My Silverberg reading list consists of:

A Time of Changes (nebula)
Dying Inside (JWC, H & N Nom)
The Stochastic Man (H & N Nom)
Thorns (H & N Nom)
Up the Line (H & N Nom)
Tower of Glass (H & N Nom)
The Book of Skulls (H & N Nom)
Shadrach in the Furnace (H & N Nom)
Born with the Dead (nebula, locus)
Nightwings (H & N Nom)
Sailing to Byzantium (nebula)
Gilgamesh in the Outback (hugo)
The Secret Sharer (locus, H & N Nom)
The World Inside
Downward to Earth
Lord Valentine's Castle (locus)
Legends

[Yobmod]

Here's a cool interview:
http://www.scifi.com/sfw/issue276/interview.html

Rob tells us what books he considers his best.

[toriphile]

Here is my list:

Novels:
Dying Inside - one of the most beautiful novels I've ever read.
Thorns
Son of Man
Time of Changes
The World Inside
Nightwings
Tower of Glass
The Book of Skulls
Shadrach in the Furnace
Man in the Maze
Downward to the Earth
Lord Valentine's Castle
Tom O'Bedlam
Face of the Waters
Kingdoms of the Wall

Short works:
Passengers
Sundance
Born with the Dead
Dancers in the Time-flux
Multiples
Sailing to Byzantium
To See the Invisible Man
The Secret Sharer
Homecoming
Flies

[tdeanatoz@yahoo]

I agree with everyone here: Robert Silverberg is one of the greatest science fiction writers ever. To list all of his impressive novels and short stories would probably fill up the memory space of this forum!

Hobbit: Silverberg actually spent several years writing all of the [*Roma Eterna] stories, so it has to be considered a collection of linked stories, only slightly revised for book publication:

Prologue • (linking) original
With Caesar in the Underworld • (na) Asimov’s Oct/Nov 2002
A Hero of the Empire • (nv) F&SF Oct/Nov ’99
The Second Wave • (nv) Asimov’s Aug 2002
Waiting for the End • (nv) Asimov’s Oct/Nov ’98
An Outpost of the Realm • (ss) IASFM Nov ’91 {as "An Outpost of the Empire"}
Getting to Know the Dragon • (nv) Far Horizons, ed. Robert Silverberg, Avon Eos, 1999
The Reign of Terror • (nv) Asimov’s Apr, 2003
Via Roma • (na) Asimov’s Apr ’94
Tales from the Venia Woods • (ss) F&SF Oct ’89
To the Promised Land • (nv) Omni May ’89

It's interesting to note that, chronologically, Silverberg wrote the final story first, in 1989, then took 13 years to write the first one last of all!

I read all of these stories individually as they were published, so I really can't say what the book as a whole would be like to read from start to finish. I'm going to have the same problem with an upcoming Stephen Baxter collection,THE THIRD EXPANSION.

Everyone needs to go get a copy of Silverberg's career retrospective, PHASES OF THE MOON. The story introductions alone are worth the price of the book.

I just remembered one other great thing about Silverberg: His semi-pornographic novels of the 1950's and 60's. I own GANG GIRL and SUMMERTIME AFFAIR,and they are priceless! A list of all things Silverbergian can be found at his website, www.majipoor.com

[Kamakhya]

Hmmm....I must be the only person around who thinks Silverberg is way overrated. I thought Dying Inside was pretty poor. I found it rather dull and the lead character reminded me of Thomas Covenant...whiny and self-absorbed.

Oh well...maybe I will give him another go, but I've read what people call his best works and none sat all that well with me.

[Yobmod]

Usually i find self-absorbed and whiny characters to be more realistic.

I read Dying Inside as an allegory for ageing, and losing sexual function and balding - seems to me that Selig reacted as most people would react, by turns obnoxious and self-pitying.

As for being dull, well i guess there were no laser battles - but i found the fundemantal changes that occur in Seligs life to be facinating. Silverberg did a great job of writing a character in the twilight of his years, that only had his reminisces to keep him company, and a lot of regrets.

[tdeanatoz@yahoo]

From the back cover of GANG GIRL, by "Don Elliott" (Robert Silverberg), Nightstand Books, Nov. 1959:

TEEN-AGE BUM...

is what some called her. Others were more direct; they called Lora a bitch. And Whitey? He liked her hot body, liked the way she looked hungry, liked the way she made love. But when he wanted to carve his initials in her, she had him killed.

Girls on the loose, guys equally deadly with an Italian stiletto or a French kiss. The world of gutters and rooftops where hungry bodies get their first warped encounters with sex.

A blistering novel of teen-age orgies, mass rapes and mayhem, told with uncensored honesty about a ...

...GUTTER WORLD OF LUST

And from the inside front cover:

With a sudden wrench she yanked her sweater off. A moment later her bra dropped to the floor. She threw her shoulders back, thrusting her high, round breasts outward at him. Her nipples rose stiffly, telling him of her desire.

"You see these?" she demanded. "They're yours, Squirrel. But you gotta earn 'em. You killed to get 'em - now you've gotta kill to keep 'em!"

Great stuff, great stuff.

[intensityxx]

[tdeanatoz@yahoo]

One other thing I remembered about ROMA ETERNA: The first story written, "To the Promised Land," is the one that reveals the divergence point between this universe and our own, so those of us who had already read it knew what it was, but since it's the last story in the book, readers will have to wait until the end to find out, which is probably the way it should be.

[ArthurFrayn]

I've written elsewhere here, that Robert Silverberg is probably my favorite SF writer -although I have to admit, I've not read a lot of his later (80's and beyond)output.

Apart from Dying Inside which is one of my favorite SF novels of all time (number one or two depending on how I feel that day), I'd recommend two that are less discussed than many of his novels, and I think should be better known -Thorns and Tower of Glass.
Thorns is a very unusual book, and seems to be a very approriate read in our age of reality television.
The two principal characters are:
an astronaut who's been physically reassembled by aliens who thought to improve on the design, and a 17 year old virgin who's eggs have been used in an experiment to foster a hundred children.
Basically they are regarded as a couple of famous freaks. They are linked romantically by a manipulative media mogul, and sent on a "televised"(for lack of a better word) event honeymoon, throughout the solar system.
It's a poignant character study set in an imaginative travelogue.

Tower of Glass is about a driven amoral industrialist who uses his android work force to build a communication tower to make radio contact with intelligent life in space. The novel handles the notion of an android slave class, in the most interesting and sensitive fashion that I have seen.

Actually, I'll mention a a third; since I also like Son of Man a lot, and read it every 5 years or so.
The hero finds himself in a timeflux with other members of the human race, in all manner of physical diversity, from throughout man's existence. Sort of a Time Machine meets Last and First Men meets To Your Scattered Bodies Go. A vivid, psychedelic, technicolor SFFantasy mindblower.This book might be too "sixties" for some, however.

And yes, Bob did write a ton of dirty books for greenbacks, and he's never denied it.