Clifford Simak

[Gizmo]

Hey there. I was just wondering what some of your thoughts on Simak are? Specifically on Way Station?

From all reports he seems like someone who writes simply, not over the top or showy, but at the same time is quite touching and optimistic?

Any thoughts would be much appreciated.

 

[Jeroen]

I have recently read Way Station for the first time. It is the most unique, heartwarming, one-of-a-kind novel.

There is hardly any action in this book. No space battles and otherworldly adventures. Instead it is soft and quiet and Wallace is a low-key, warm character. But I could not put this book down for a second. It is a small and fast-moving story and at the same time a bit philosophical and even mystical. It is filled with alien artifacts that forever remain a mystery and now and then an alien drops by for a cup of coffee. Simak hardly explains anything, but gives us small glimpses of the wonders out there in space. He lifts the curtains only a second to show what is waiting for us when we are ready to join the rest of the universe.

 

[psikeyhackr]

The World That Couldn't Be by Clifford Donald Simak
http://manybooks.net/titles/simakc3202632026.html#

I haven't read it yet but I have liked other stuff by Simak.

psik

 

[Stephen Palmer]

The only one I know is The Fellowship Of The Talisman, which I really enjoyed.

 

[JunkMonkey]

I'm currently reading his Destiny Doll, not his best but it has a compelling 'otherness' which I like. I came across reference to him the other day as being a 'pastoral SF' writer and many of his books do have a gentle or rural setting.

 

[Hitmouse]

Way station is great.

also thoroughly recommend:
City
Cemetery World
The Goblin Reservation
Time is the Simplest Thing

 

[Hobbit]

I'm a big fan too but it is quite different to many other SF writers of the time.

Not big action scenes, but well considered, often now seen as quaint, characterisation.

Am surprised to find he's not more in print than he is.

City, Way Station, Ring Around the Sun and Cemetery World for me.

Mark

 

[Hitmouse]

Simak is one of my favourites, but I think he is probably a minority taste. Bucolic scenarios and campfires rather than flashing spaceships and laser guns. In an odd way he as as idiosyncratic and consistent in his themes as is Ballard.

 

[Gizmo]

Thanks for the replies guys. Appreciated.

So it'd be fair to say that it's character-driven sci-fi?

 

[Hobbit]

Yeah: I'd say so. It's quite gentle and often humourous; its not about big galactic events: they;re usually off-screen.

Mark

 

[Gizmo]

Just one more question:

Does anyone know of a reliable online book delivery service that actually has Simak in stock? It's near impossible to find his work where I live.

 

[Omphalos]

Character driven, yes. But a better description of what he was trying to do is "pastoral." He's also a realist and takes care with his science.

I love Simak. His short fiction is fantastic, and some of his novels are very good (but not all - I think he kind of lost it as he aged). He was a pulp era writer who left for a number of years, but came back when persuaded by Campbell to write for Astounding. He wrote, I think, up until his 90's

The Grotto of the Dancing Bear, Epilog, and The Big Front Yard are wonderful short stories. City and Way Station (especially City, IMHO) are both masterpiece novels, and since both are really unretouched fixups, they read quickly and easily. I always tell people "if you like Bradbury's voice and sensibility then you will likely enjoy Simak too," and most agree with me after having sampled them both.

You can usually find Simak's books in the used vendor market on Amazon. That's how I buy about 50% of my books, and I'm rarely disappoionted. Old Earth Books also has new editions of City and Way Station out now.

 

[JunkMonkey]

I've just finished City by Simak (for the first time) and was disappointed. The book tells the story of how dogs came (with help of robots) to rule the world and at the end faces them with the threat of loosing their dominion to the ants who have evolved sentience. It's not a novel - which I had been expecting - more a collection of linked short stories set within a framing device that presented the stories as if they ancient tales about which there was much debate. Were the things written in the stories true or were they fiction? Did 'Man' ever really exist? If 'Man' did exist did he really build the first Robots and teach dogs to speak? or are they all just part of some complex allegory, the meaning of which has been lost?

The stories are coherent; they don't contradict each other but they do repeat themselves. Later stories referring back to events in the earlier ones a little too laboriously - explaining the backstory in tales published in magazines months, or maybe years, apart is to be expected but when they are collected together in a book some editing has to be done. Maybe it had been. If so, not enough.

And some of the science in here is a bit dubious - at one point we are told that the first talking dogs had to be surgically altered to allow them to speak and that within a few generations their offspring were starting to inherit these characteristics.

 

[Engelbrecht]

I've always enjoyed Simak and his Hugo-winning Way Station (1963) is one of his best (along with City (1952)). His books are generally character driven, with the characters being well drawn everymen, warm and sympathetic. The action is subdued - even if great events are occurring, they are met not with screaming and pyrotechnic action sequences, but rather with quiet wonder and acceptance, accompanied by well-modulated philosophical inquiries. As variously noted above, 'pastoral', 'bucolic' and 'Bradbury-esque' are all good ways to describe his books - even when they take place in towns or cities, they are usually small and of limited scope, and the inhabitants are cut from good, honest plain-spun. These two books should be sought out and read by just about everyone.

Also very good are his The Visitors (1979) and Project Pope (1981, Hugo nominated).

Other books of his that I've read and enjoyed, but wouldn't rank quite as highly are Time and Again (1951), They Walked Like Men (1962), All the Traps of Earth (collection, 1962), All Flesh is Grass (1965, Nebula nominated), Why Call Them Back From Heaven? (1967), A Choice of Gods (1972), Mastodonia (1978), The Fellowship of the Talisman (1978, fantasy), Special Deliverance (1982), Where the Evil Dwells (1982, fantasy).

I also found the following to be below average: Our Children's Children (1974), Shakespeare's Planet (1976), Highway of Eternity (1986).

See the unusually detailed Wikipedia article for more info on these and others.

Lastly, Robert Charles Wilson, especially his earlier books such as A Bridge of Years (1991) and The Harvest (1992) really remind me of Simak.

 

[Mr.O'Toole]

The book tells the story of how dogs came (with help of robots) to rule the world and at the end faces them with the threat of loosing their dominion to the ants who have evolved sentience. .

Actually "City" is about downfall of humankind, not about dogs.

 

[JunkMonkey]

Actually "City" is about downfall of humankind, not about dogs.

The book is very much about the dogs. The interlinking sections are 'written' by a dog talking about the opinions of other dogs as to the possible 'truth' of the stories. The stories themselves deal with the raising of dogs by the Webster family who give them the gift of speech and engineer events to leave them in charge. Humankind don't fall, most humans leave Earth to live on Jupiter, some - even presumably at the end of the novel - are isolated in the city of Geneva, and a few remnants led to a parallel ('Cobbly') world in order to leave the Earth free for dogs to evolve in their own manner free from human influence. It is, in the human and robot members of the Websters family's opinion, the dogs' turn.

 

[psikeyhackr]

The book is very much about the dogs.

It is curious how different people analyze stories.

In the majority of tales there is a foreground story where the characters do and say things and there is the background story which created the situation that the characters in the foreground have to deal with.

Like Nevile Shute's On the Beach. The foreground is the post-nuclear war activities of some survivors in Australia waiting to die. But background story is the nuclear arms race. Which is the really important part of the story? Is the foreground there to simply explicate the background?

I haven't read City so I can't say.

psik

 

[Mr.O'Toole]

The book is very much about the dogs.

This book is also about mutants, Jupiter's colonization, marsian philosophy,
robots and Webster's family.
O! I understand. This book is about ants. It tells how they became intellegent and at the end of novel they conquered all the world.

Now I only need to find out why the book is called "City"...

 

[Omphalos]

It is curious how different people analyze stories.

In the majority of tales there is a foreground story where the characters do and say things and there is the background story which created the situation that the characters in the foreground have to deal with.

Like Nevile Shute's On the Beach. The foreground is the post-nuclear war activities of some survivors in Australia waiting to die. But background story is the nuclear arms race. Which is the really important part of the story? Is the foreground there to simply explicate the background?

I haven't read City so I can't say.

psik

City is about what happens to the human race after they abandon cities, and how the failures of the Webster family affect the outcome. I wrote a detailed review long ago. Here is the intro:

Clifford Simak's masterpiece novel City is an episodic future history of mankind, told in the form of scholarly analysis of myth by our successor race to the planet Earth, intelligent dogs. Although it is in substantial part magical tale, it's mostly science fiction told from the perspective of a far-future intelligent canine who is analyzing fable-like stories of a predecessor race called "men," most of which seem to be of dubious origin, though the narrator thinks that there is some truth to them. Collectively they tell the story of the attempts and failures of the pivotal Webster family which over the years saw the way to human enlightenment, but failed in their quests to achieve it, leaving the human race to instead seek solace through happiness. I have a lot to say about this one; I have literally been thinking about it for decades, so I think I will start with some focused comments on the work in general, then follow with a breakdown of the individual stories, and wrap up with some general comments.

 

[Gizmo]

Thanks guys.
And thanks for that intro Omphalos.
Anyone else know of an online store selling the book besides Amazon and Old Earth Books(only because they say his books are currently unavailable)?