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Phases of the Moon: Stories of Six Decades
Now ibooks proudly presents a collection of Silverberg's best short fiction, as selected by the author. The 1950 The Road to Nightfall, The Macauley Circuit, Sunrise on Mercury, Warm Man. The 1960 To See the Invisible Man, Flies, Passengers, Nightwings, Sundance. The 1970 Good News from the Vatican, Capricorn Games, Born with the Dead, Schwartz Between the Galaxies. The 1980 The Far Side of the Bell-Shaped Curve, The Pope of the Chimps, Needle in a Timestack, Sailing to Byzantium, Enter a Soldier. Later, Enter Another. The 1990 Hunters in the Forest, Death Do Us Part, Beauty in the Night. The 2000 The Millennium Express, With Caesar in the Underworld.
622 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 2004
About the author
Robert Silverberg
2,337 books1,630 followersThere are many authors in the database with this name.
Robert Silverberg is a highly celebrated American science fiction author and editor known for his prolific output and literary range. Over a career spanning decades, he has won multiple Hugo and Nebula Awards and was named a Grand Master by the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America in 2004. Inducted into the Science Fiction and Fantasy Hall of Fame in 1999, Silverberg is recognized for both his immense productivity and his contributions to the genre's evolution.
Born in Brooklyn, he began writing in his teens and won his first Hugo Award in 1956 as the best new writer. Throughout the 1950s, he produced vast amounts of fiction, often under pseudonyms, and was known for writing up to a million words a year. When the market declined, he diversified into other genres, including historical nonfiction and erotica.
Silverberg’s return to science fiction in the 1960s marked a shift toward deeper psychological and literary themes, contributing significantly to the New Wave movement. Acclaimed works from this period include Downward to the Earth, Dying Inside, Nightwings, and The World Inside. In the 1980s, he launched the Majipoor series with Lord Valentine’s Castle, creating one of the most imaginative planetary settings in science fiction.
Though he announced his retirement from writing in the mid-1970s, Silverberg returned with renewed vigor and continued to publish acclaimed fiction into the 1990s. He received further recognition with the Nebula-winning Sailing to Byzantium and the Hugo-winning Gilgamesh in the Outback.
Silverberg has also played a significant role as an editor and anthologist, shaping science fiction literature through both his own work and his influence on others. He lives in the San Francisco Bay Area with his wife, author Karen Haber.
Robert Silverberg is a highly celebrated American science fiction author and editor known for his prolific output and literary range. Over a career spanning decades, he has won multiple Hugo and Nebula Awards and was named a Grand Master by the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America in 2004. Inducted into the Science Fiction and Fantasy Hall of Fame in 1999, Silverberg is recognized for both his immense productivity and his contributions to the genre's evolution.
Born in Brooklyn, he began writing in his teens and won his first Hugo Award in 1956 as the best new writer. Throughout the 1950s, he produced vast amounts of fiction, often under pseudonyms, and was known for writing up to a million words a year. When the market declined, he diversified into other genres, including historical nonfiction and erotica.
Silverberg’s return to science fiction in the 1960s marked a shift toward deeper psychological and literary themes, contributing significantly to the New Wave movement. Acclaimed works from this period include Downward to the Earth, Dying Inside, Nightwings, and The World Inside. In the 1980s, he launched the Majipoor series with Lord Valentine’s Castle, creating one of the most imaginative planetary settings in science fiction.
Though he announced his retirement from writing in the mid-1970s, Silverberg returned with renewed vigor and continued to publish acclaimed fiction into the 1990s. He received further recognition with the Nebula-winning Sailing to Byzantium and the Hugo-winning Gilgamesh in the Outback.
Silverberg has also played a significant role as an editor and anthologist, shaping science fiction literature through both his own work and his influence on others. He lives in the San Francisco Bay Area with his wife, author Karen Haber.
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August 30, 2019
A great collection from one of the masters of science fiction!
June 22, 2020
The title says it all. This hefty volume collects stories from Robert Silverberg’s six decades in the business, having some from each ten year span. So without further ado…
The 1950s segment kicks off with ‘Road To Nightfall’. There has been war for two decades and things are getting grim in New York. Katterson was discharged from the army two years before and is struggling to survive. The worst thing is the lack of food. This story was so dark for the time that Silverberg had some trouble selling it. ‘The Macauley Circuit’ is about machines getting in on the arts. ‘Sunrise on Mercury’ is classic fifties Science Fiction with the slightly pulp style of writing that still survived in the genre. There is some glowering and communications buttons are jabbed while pale cheeks quiver as spacemen struggle to explore the solar system. I love this kind of thing.
In the introduction, Silverberg states that he banged out a story a day back then, taking Friday off to peddle them round New York magazines. He seems almost apologetic about them now – ‘not half bad’ – but there’s really no need. He broke into a better quality market with ‘Warm Man’ which appeared in the esteemed ‘Magazine Of Fantasy And Science Fiction’. This is a ‘mature’ work set in American suburbia. I preferred the spaceships.
In the 1960s, editor Fredrick Pohl decried Silverberg‘s hack work and declared that he should write the best stories of which he was capable. ‘To See The Invisible Man’ was the advent of the new Silverberg. In the year 2104, in a shiny modern city, a man is sentenced to one year of invisibility. No one will touch, speak to him or acknowledge his existence for a year. His crime: coldness to his fellow citizens. This story aptly demonstrates the transition from cold engineering problems to warm, emotional, human issues that touch the heart. Are they better stories? You decide.
‘Flies’ is a brutal story that appeared in Harlan Ellison’s ‘Dangerous Visions’ anthology in 1965. ‘Passengers’ is another grim tale in which humans are possessed, now and then, by alien minds that take over their bodies and ‘ride’ them for several days. They are careless of the host so a victim wakes up hungry, thirsty and sore with no memory of what his or her body has been used for. ‘Nightwings’ is a brilliant novella set in a far future where aliens once invaded Earth and have threatened to come back. Society is stratified on almost mediaeval lines with guilds for various trades. Our hero is a Watcher, one tasked with scanning the skies every night for any sign of alien invaders. ‘Nightwings’ is Silverberg at his incomparable best. The sixties selection concludes with ‘Sundance’ which raises the difficult conundrum of what constitutes a sentient life form.
The 1970s brings us ‘Good News From The Vatican’ as the cardinals elect the first robot pope. It won the 1971 Nebula Award for best short story. ‘Capricorn Games’ is one of those yarns about sophisticated parties where well-heeled professionals, artists and intellectuals get together. I guess you have to be familiar with that kind of milieu to do it well. At this party, the attraction is an immortal man whose stalked by a beautiful young lady. He has the measure of her.
‘Born With The Dead’ is a long novella on a favourite theme, the dead coming back to life. A man yearns for his wife but she is one of the reborn and they have a different view of things. It’s pretty downbeat. Silverberg handled this topic in ‘Recalled To Life’ a 1962 Ace novel which I don’t have to hand but remember enjoying more. This is followed by the light-hearted ‘Schwartz Between The Galaxies’ in which the author plays Philip. K. Dick-ian tricks with the reader. What is real? Schwartz between the galaxies getting to know interesting aliens or Schwartz the anthropologist on Earth, lecturing on the homogenisation of cultures all over the world into a bland, uniform dullness. The issues raised in this story brought to mind Alan Bloom’s book ‘The Closing Of The American Mind’, but that was published in 1987 and Silverberg’s story dates from 1973. Science Fiction ahead of the pack again!
The 1980s selection opens with ‘The Far Side Of The Bell-Shaped Curve’, a clever little time travel story. Ilsabet and Reichenbach are time travelling tourists who meet up in Sarajevo, 1914, to watch the assassination of Archduke Ferdinand then hop around together when they fall in love, taking in Shakespeare’s London and Nero’s Rome. Time tourists are free to visit anywhere before 2187. Ilsabet meets another tourist and starts to spend more time with him and the jealous Reichenbach plots murder. The conclusion is a clever twist. With the assorted ‘Back To The Future’ films, even ‘Doctor Who’ getting out of trouble and ‘By His Bootstraps’ (Robert A. Heinlein, 1941), you need to be smart to make this sort of thing surprising. Silverberg is smart.
‘The Pope Of The Chimps’, written in June 1981, is about apes. Silverberg explores what happens when smart chimps learn that humans die, a fact which has hitherto been kept from them. If anyone left the research area never to return, the chimps were told he had gone away. The experiment is being conducted to examine how humans made the leap to abstract thought which separated them from animals. The chimps have been taught sign language and bred over generations for intelligence. Silverberg has a thing about popes. He has a thing about time travel, too. ‘Needle In A Timestack’ raises the tricky issue of what to do if someone is messing with your timeline, something which apparently causes a cottony taste in your mouth.
‘Sailing To Byzantium’ won the Nebula Award and missed out on the Hugo by four votes so it’s obviously pretty damn good. A twentieth-century man, Charles Phillips, lives the life of Reilly, permanently touring with his hosts from city to city. Timbuktu, New Chicago, Mohenjo-Daro, Alexandria – any city from human history can be recreated in this future paradise. The Earth has only a few million real people left but there are millions of humanoid androids that play the part of slaves and citizens in the recreated cities. Phillips can’t remember much about his past life but assumes that he was snatched from time, another novelty in an age of permanent playtime. As the story develops he learns more.
‘Enter A Soldier: Later: Enter Another’ was written for an anthology in which computer-generated simulacra of historical figures would engage in intellectual conflict. Silverberg’s contribution was to pit Francisco Pizarro, conqueror of Peru, against Socrates. He nicely captures both and makes the encounter hugely entertaining. He also demonstrates that Socrates would have been really annoying in person, like an irritating three-year-old who keeps asking ‘But why, mummy? Why?’ No wonder they poisoned him. The method by which the simulacra are created, holograms programmed with all the knowledge we have about the persons, seemed pretty far-fetched in 1987 but I believe it is not utterly inconceivable that gamer science might one day achieve it for real.
So to the 1990s. ‘Hunters In The Forest’ combines time travel and dinosaurs, two of Silverberg’s favourite themes. In the future, tourists can hop back to the late Cretaceous Period for a look around but they have to get back in their ship after a few hours because it automatically returns home. This is clever and, as always, skillfully rendered. ‘Death Do Us Part’ wrestles with immortality again. If it’s any consolation to mortal Mister Silverberg, he has achieved a reputation that will long endure, I think, at least in human terms. In cosmic terms we are all ants.
‘Beauty In The Night’ does not start with beauty as a woman gives birth to her illegitimate son on the dirty floor of a restaurant storeroom in Salisbury, England. There is less beauty as it proceeds when the boy’s dear old dad turns up to make his life hell. The backdrop is an alien invasion of Earth by entities who treat us with complete disdain. Silverberg accurately captures the worst aspects of the English underclass which is probably why I found it all a bit depressing. However, it’s a very good story.
What better way to introduce the 2000‘s than with ‘The Millennium Express‘, one of those yarns where Silverberg has fun with historical characters. Here are Albert Einstein, Pablo Picasso and Ernest Hemingway celebrating the end of the year 2999 by blowing things up. The historical theme continues ‘With Caesar In The Underworld’, part of Silverberg’s ‘Roma Eterna’ series, an alternative history of that mighty empire in which it lasts a while longer than it really did, mainly because those pesky Christians never took control. This tale takes place in the year 529AD our time and involves the succession to the throne as the old Emperor is dying. The Caesar of the story is not Julius, obviously, as Caesar was a title bestowed on many. I’m a bit dubious about alternative history normally but Silverberg does it well. (He does everything well, damn it!) Sound knowledge of actual history no doubt helps.
‘Against The Current’ is one of those stories without a real ending, in this case about a car dealer going backwards in time for no apparent reason. ‘Defenders Of The Frontier’ is a military tale written for an anthology titled ‘Warriors’. Rather than battle, about which the author admits he doesn’t know much, it focuses on other aspects of military life. Cleverly done with a neat conclusion. The last tale here, ‘The Prisoner’ has a twist ending and is full of lively imagery, as you might expect from a fantasy about dreams.
The introductions to the tales are as good as the works themselves. Silverberg is an entertaining writer and the story of his development in the field and his dropping out of it now and then is interesting. Would-be writers and lesser performers will find his ideas stimulating and reading the stories is a master class in fiction. Like Asimov and Stephen King, two other writers who produced short story collections with intros, Silverberg is engaging when discussing his own work.
Six decades of Silverberg makes for a hefty volume but I think his career can be summed up in one sentence. He has won more Nebulas than Hugos. (The Nebula Award is voted for by writers and the Hugo by readers.) He knows this himself and realised in the seventies that he was more popular with other writers than with readers. In a way, this is flattering because it means he’s too good to be popular. He is probably the best Science Fiction writer in the history of the genre so far, hence all those Nebulas. However, he’s not the most popular Science Fiction writer.
This is a magnificent collection from an awesome talent and deserves a place on the shelf of any SF aficionado.
Eamonn Murphy
This review first appeared at https://www.sfcrowsnest.info/
The 1950s segment kicks off with ‘Road To Nightfall’. There has been war for two decades and things are getting grim in New York. Katterson was discharged from the army two years before and is struggling to survive. The worst thing is the lack of food. This story was so dark for the time that Silverberg had some trouble selling it. ‘The Macauley Circuit’ is about machines getting in on the arts. ‘Sunrise on Mercury’ is classic fifties Science Fiction with the slightly pulp style of writing that still survived in the genre. There is some glowering and communications buttons are jabbed while pale cheeks quiver as spacemen struggle to explore the solar system. I love this kind of thing.
In the introduction, Silverberg states that he banged out a story a day back then, taking Friday off to peddle them round New York magazines. He seems almost apologetic about them now – ‘not half bad’ – but there’s really no need. He broke into a better quality market with ‘Warm Man’ which appeared in the esteemed ‘Magazine Of Fantasy And Science Fiction’. This is a ‘mature’ work set in American suburbia. I preferred the spaceships.
In the 1960s, editor Fredrick Pohl decried Silverberg‘s hack work and declared that he should write the best stories of which he was capable. ‘To See The Invisible Man’ was the advent of the new Silverberg. In the year 2104, in a shiny modern city, a man is sentenced to one year of invisibility. No one will touch, speak to him or acknowledge his existence for a year. His crime: coldness to his fellow citizens. This story aptly demonstrates the transition from cold engineering problems to warm, emotional, human issues that touch the heart. Are they better stories? You decide.
‘Flies’ is a brutal story that appeared in Harlan Ellison’s ‘Dangerous Visions’ anthology in 1965. ‘Passengers’ is another grim tale in which humans are possessed, now and then, by alien minds that take over their bodies and ‘ride’ them for several days. They are careless of the host so a victim wakes up hungry, thirsty and sore with no memory of what his or her body has been used for. ‘Nightwings’ is a brilliant novella set in a far future where aliens once invaded Earth and have threatened to come back. Society is stratified on almost mediaeval lines with guilds for various trades. Our hero is a Watcher, one tasked with scanning the skies every night for any sign of alien invaders. ‘Nightwings’ is Silverberg at his incomparable best. The sixties selection concludes with ‘Sundance’ which raises the difficult conundrum of what constitutes a sentient life form.
The 1970s brings us ‘Good News From The Vatican’ as the cardinals elect the first robot pope. It won the 1971 Nebula Award for best short story. ‘Capricorn Games’ is one of those yarns about sophisticated parties where well-heeled professionals, artists and intellectuals get together. I guess you have to be familiar with that kind of milieu to do it well. At this party, the attraction is an immortal man whose stalked by a beautiful young lady. He has the measure of her.
‘Born With The Dead’ is a long novella on a favourite theme, the dead coming back to life. A man yearns for his wife but she is one of the reborn and they have a different view of things. It’s pretty downbeat. Silverberg handled this topic in ‘Recalled To Life’ a 1962 Ace novel which I don’t have to hand but remember enjoying more. This is followed by the light-hearted ‘Schwartz Between The Galaxies’ in which the author plays Philip. K. Dick-ian tricks with the reader. What is real? Schwartz between the galaxies getting to know interesting aliens or Schwartz the anthropologist on Earth, lecturing on the homogenisation of cultures all over the world into a bland, uniform dullness. The issues raised in this story brought to mind Alan Bloom’s book ‘The Closing Of The American Mind’, but that was published in 1987 and Silverberg’s story dates from 1973. Science Fiction ahead of the pack again!
The 1980s selection opens with ‘The Far Side Of The Bell-Shaped Curve’, a clever little time travel story. Ilsabet and Reichenbach are time travelling tourists who meet up in Sarajevo, 1914, to watch the assassination of Archduke Ferdinand then hop around together when they fall in love, taking in Shakespeare’s London and Nero’s Rome. Time tourists are free to visit anywhere before 2187. Ilsabet meets another tourist and starts to spend more time with him and the jealous Reichenbach plots murder. The conclusion is a clever twist. With the assorted ‘Back To The Future’ films, even ‘Doctor Who’ getting out of trouble and ‘By His Bootstraps’ (Robert A. Heinlein, 1941), you need to be smart to make this sort of thing surprising. Silverberg is smart.
‘The Pope Of The Chimps’, written in June 1981, is about apes. Silverberg explores what happens when smart chimps learn that humans die, a fact which has hitherto been kept from them. If anyone left the research area never to return, the chimps were told he had gone away. The experiment is being conducted to examine how humans made the leap to abstract thought which separated them from animals. The chimps have been taught sign language and bred over generations for intelligence. Silverberg has a thing about popes. He has a thing about time travel, too. ‘Needle In A Timestack’ raises the tricky issue of what to do if someone is messing with your timeline, something which apparently causes a cottony taste in your mouth.
‘Sailing To Byzantium’ won the Nebula Award and missed out on the Hugo by four votes so it’s obviously pretty damn good. A twentieth-century man, Charles Phillips, lives the life of Reilly, permanently touring with his hosts from city to city. Timbuktu, New Chicago, Mohenjo-Daro, Alexandria – any city from human history can be recreated in this future paradise. The Earth has only a few million real people left but there are millions of humanoid androids that play the part of slaves and citizens in the recreated cities. Phillips can’t remember much about his past life but assumes that he was snatched from time, another novelty in an age of permanent playtime. As the story develops he learns more.
‘Enter A Soldier: Later: Enter Another’ was written for an anthology in which computer-generated simulacra of historical figures would engage in intellectual conflict. Silverberg’s contribution was to pit Francisco Pizarro, conqueror of Peru, against Socrates. He nicely captures both and makes the encounter hugely entertaining. He also demonstrates that Socrates would have been really annoying in person, like an irritating three-year-old who keeps asking ‘But why, mummy? Why?’ No wonder they poisoned him. The method by which the simulacra are created, holograms programmed with all the knowledge we have about the persons, seemed pretty far-fetched in 1987 but I believe it is not utterly inconceivable that gamer science might one day achieve it for real.
So to the 1990s. ‘Hunters In The Forest’ combines time travel and dinosaurs, two of Silverberg’s favourite themes. In the future, tourists can hop back to the late Cretaceous Period for a look around but they have to get back in their ship after a few hours because it automatically returns home. This is clever and, as always, skillfully rendered. ‘Death Do Us Part’ wrestles with immortality again. If it’s any consolation to mortal Mister Silverberg, he has achieved a reputation that will long endure, I think, at least in human terms. In cosmic terms we are all ants.
‘Beauty In The Night’ does not start with beauty as a woman gives birth to her illegitimate son on the dirty floor of a restaurant storeroom in Salisbury, England. There is less beauty as it proceeds when the boy’s dear old dad turns up to make his life hell. The backdrop is an alien invasion of Earth by entities who treat us with complete disdain. Silverberg accurately captures the worst aspects of the English underclass which is probably why I found it all a bit depressing. However, it’s a very good story.
What better way to introduce the 2000‘s than with ‘The Millennium Express‘, one of those yarns where Silverberg has fun with historical characters. Here are Albert Einstein, Pablo Picasso and Ernest Hemingway celebrating the end of the year 2999 by blowing things up. The historical theme continues ‘With Caesar In The Underworld’, part of Silverberg’s ‘Roma Eterna’ series, an alternative history of that mighty empire in which it lasts a while longer than it really did, mainly because those pesky Christians never took control. This tale takes place in the year 529AD our time and involves the succession to the throne as the old Emperor is dying. The Caesar of the story is not Julius, obviously, as Caesar was a title bestowed on many. I’m a bit dubious about alternative history normally but Silverberg does it well. (He does everything well, damn it!) Sound knowledge of actual history no doubt helps.
‘Against The Current’ is one of those stories without a real ending, in this case about a car dealer going backwards in time for no apparent reason. ‘Defenders Of The Frontier’ is a military tale written for an anthology titled ‘Warriors’. Rather than battle, about which the author admits he doesn’t know much, it focuses on other aspects of military life. Cleverly done with a neat conclusion. The last tale here, ‘The Prisoner’ has a twist ending and is full of lively imagery, as you might expect from a fantasy about dreams.
The introductions to the tales are as good as the works themselves. Silverberg is an entertaining writer and the story of his development in the field and his dropping out of it now and then is interesting. Would-be writers and lesser performers will find his ideas stimulating and reading the stories is a master class in fiction. Like Asimov and Stephen King, two other writers who produced short story collections with intros, Silverberg is engaging when discussing his own work.
Six decades of Silverberg makes for a hefty volume but I think his career can be summed up in one sentence. He has won more Nebulas than Hugos. (The Nebula Award is voted for by writers and the Hugo by readers.) He knows this himself and realised in the seventies that he was more popular with other writers than with readers. In a way, this is flattering because it means he’s too good to be popular. He is probably the best Science Fiction writer in the history of the genre so far, hence all those Nebulas. However, he’s not the most popular Science Fiction writer.
This is a magnificent collection from an awesome talent and deserves a place on the shelf of any SF aficionado.
Eamonn Murphy
This review first appeared at https://www.sfcrowsnest.info/
August 7, 2015
Way back in the seventies I used to be an avid SF reader, but my tastes have changed a lot and in most cases I no longer find it remotely as interesting as before.
I enjoyed only a few stories from this anthology, the classic and extremely memorable Nightwings(1968) which curiously seems to cry out for a Japanese illustrator of genius, the grim Passengers(1968) and even grimmer Born with the Dead(1974) and parts of the dialogue between Socrates and Pizarro in Enter a soldier. Later: Enter another(1989).
If truth be told I found Silverberg´s introductions to his stories more interesting than many of the stories, mainly for the perspective they provide both on his life and the history of SF.
If you are still a SF buff interested in twists on (in)mortality, death and time travel, you should definitely read some of these stories; if you like Silverberg you will find some of his best stories here; if your are not very interested in SF, this anthology will probably not change your mind.
I enjoyed only a few stories from this anthology, the classic and extremely memorable Nightwings(1968) which curiously seems to cry out for a Japanese illustrator of genius, the grim Passengers(1968) and even grimmer Born with the Dead(1974) and parts of the dialogue between Socrates and Pizarro in Enter a soldier. Later: Enter another(1989).
If truth be told I found Silverberg´s introductions to his stories more interesting than many of the stories, mainly for the perspective they provide both on his life and the history of SF.
If you are still a SF buff interested in twists on (in)mortality, death and time travel, you should definitely read some of these stories; if you like Silverberg you will find some of his best stories here; if your are not very interested in SF, this anthology will probably not change your mind.
April 21, 2012
The best of the best, from the best. Silverberg is the best writer of Short SF ever! Read Sundance!
June 2, 2021
It's staggering to think that one person is responsible for all of these stories. The following is a list of the ones that left the biggest impression on me:
"Nightwings" (I ran out and got the complete novel I was so hooked.)
"Born with the Dead" (Probably my favorite in the bunch. It's not a day at the beach, it's a hike up a mountain, but thankfully the view was worth the climb.)
"Sundance" (Right up there with Octavia Bulter's novel Kindred on the required reading list for all Americans.)
"Needle in a Timestack" (Has an affable Robert Heinlein-esque quality to it. Silverberg's approach is usually cool and cerebral. This time he makes an effort to be the reader's pal and he succeeds.)
"Flies" (Stomach-churning horror story. Maybe he wanted to show his friend Harlan Ellison how it's done: "Oh, yeah? Well, two can play at that game.")
"Sailing to Byzantium" (I think this love story's a failure but it's a very interesting failure.)
"Passengers" (Liked how it was written and wondered if it was a key influence on comic book writer Alan Moore.)
"To See an Invisible Man" (Silverberg could have had a whole career out of just doing stuff like this. See Bradbury, Ray.)
"Nightwings" (I ran out and got the complete novel I was so hooked.)
"Born with the Dead" (Probably my favorite in the bunch. It's not a day at the beach, it's a hike up a mountain, but thankfully the view was worth the climb.)
"Sundance" (Right up there with Octavia Bulter's novel Kindred on the required reading list for all Americans.)
"Needle in a Timestack" (Has an affable Robert Heinlein-esque quality to it. Silverberg's approach is usually cool and cerebral. This time he makes an effort to be the reader's pal and he succeeds.)
"Flies" (Stomach-churning horror story. Maybe he wanted to show his friend Harlan Ellison how it's done: "Oh, yeah? Well, two can play at that game.")
"Sailing to Byzantium" (I think this love story's a failure but it's a very interesting failure.)
"Passengers" (Liked how it was written and wondered if it was a key influence on comic book writer Alan Moore.)
"To See an Invisible Man" (Silverberg could have had a whole career out of just doing stuff like this. See Bradbury, Ray.)
July 10, 2022
Na to, že se má jednat o "to nejlepší", kvalita povídek (aspoň podle mé stupnice líbí/nelíbí) značně kolísá.
Jsou tu některé moc pěkné kousky, které jsem si opravdu s chutí přečetla, ale taky některé dost nudné. Suma sumárum mi to vychází podle hodnocení jednotlivých povídek průměrně na nějakých 3,38 hvězdičky, takže zaokrouhluju matematicky - dolů.
Knížku jsem původně koupila v papírové podobě, ale strašně špatně se mi četla, protože úvod k povídkám je psaný pěkně čitelným bezpatkovým písmem, zatímco samotné povídky hůř čitelným patkovým. Obráceně by to pro mě bylo lepší. Taky záložka by se tak tlusté knize hodila.
Dopadlo to tak, že jsem nakonec raději koupila elektronickou. A papírovou ráda pošlu dál.
Jsou tu některé moc pěkné kousky, které jsem si opravdu s chutí přečetla, ale taky některé dost nudné. Suma sumárum mi to vychází podle hodnocení jednotlivých povídek průměrně na nějakých 3,38 hvězdičky, takže zaokrouhluju matematicky - dolů.
Knížku jsem původně koupila v papírové podobě, ale strašně špatně se mi četla, protože úvod k povídkám je psaný pěkně čitelným bezpatkovým písmem, zatímco samotné povídky hůř čitelným patkovým. Obráceně by to pro mě bylo lepší. Taky záložka by se tak tlusté knize hodila.
Dopadlo to tak, že jsem nakonec raději koupila elektronickou. A papírovou ráda pošlu dál.
December 10, 2021
Někde se v průběhu letu muselo něco stát se mnou a mým vkusem, protože si pamatuji, že Silverberg se mi vždy líbil, ale tady tomu výběru jsem vůbec nemohl přijít na chuť.
Většinou mám rád autorská vysvětlování a předmluvy, ale tady mi přišly nesnesitelně samolibé a prázdné. A povídky hrozně monotematické - např. S mrtvými narozeni je mrazivá povídka, ale právě proto, že podobných tématicky podobných po-smrtných povídek je tam více, rozmělňuje se to.
Zajímavý byl Papež šimpanzů, Plout do Byzance, Vstoupí voják - všechno v osmdesátých letech.
Nějak jsem z toho rozčarován.
Většinou mám rád autorská vysvětlování a předmluvy, ale tady mi přišly nesnesitelně samolibé a prázdné. A povídky hrozně monotematické - např. S mrtvými narozeni je mrazivá povídka, ale právě proto, že podobných tématicky podobných po-smrtných povídek je tam více, rozmělňuje se to.
Zajímavý byl Papež šimpanzů, Plout do Byzance, Vstoupí voják - všechno v osmdesátých letech.
Nějak jsem z toho rozčarován.
January 3, 2025
Robert, seems to be good name for sci-fi authors. Silverberg, along with Heinlein and Sheckley, is one of the best sci-fi writers you can read, believe me, I have read a few. He is a magnificent
author who writes realistic science fiction. To somebody who does not or has not read sci-fi, his stories, however extraordinary or implausible they may seem, are written in such a perfectly
logical manner that the implausible becomes plausible and you are completely drawn in. I have thoroughly enjoyed reading this collection of his short stories which spans six decades of his
wonderful writing career. I hope you enjoy It too.
author who writes realistic science fiction. To somebody who does not or has not read sci-fi, his stories, however extraordinary or implausible they may seem, are written in such a perfectly
logical manner that the implausible becomes plausible and you are completely drawn in. I have thoroughly enjoyed reading this collection of his short stories which spans six decades of his
wonderful writing career. I hope you enjoy It too.
April 8, 2018
As with most collections of short stories, some stories are really good and others not so much.
October 28, 2016
Robert Silverberg, one of the notable science fiction authors of the 20th Century, has put together this "best of his best" collection of short stories, spanning the years 1954 through 2001. As with most story collections, the quality varies, but since this book brings together some of his best work, I can't say there is a bad one in the bunch. Among the standouts were: "The Road to Nightfall," a disturbing post-apocalyptic nightmare; "Nightwings," a novella envisioning a bizarre human civilization of the far future; "Schwartz between the Galaxies," a wry story that barely skirts the realm of science fiction; and "The Far Side of the Bell-Shaped Curve," a unique and tragic time traveling tale. But as I wrote, none are bad and you can't go wrong picking one to read at random.
Taking a concentrated shot of Silverberg (whose work I hadn't read prior to this, except for an unrelated hardboiled detective story) allows some of the authors themes--nay, obsessions--to stand out. One is death, clearly. The shadow of death--its reality, its consequences, its inevitability--hangs over virtually every story, even if only by implication. Relatedly, the author seems to enjoy anonymity bordering on nonexistence; the best example I can think of is that in a number of tales, the reader doesn't even know the narrator/protagonist's name until he or she is well into the story, and sometimes not until the end, or even not at all.
Finally, I have to mention the cover art, which is simply gorgeous. The artist, Michael Whelan, was unknown to me but, with a little Wiki-help, I learned that he is a painter of "imaginative realism" and some of his works have even graced the covers of Stephen King novels. I haven't seen his other paintings, but this cover painting for to Phases of the Moon is a haunting, evocative scene that, for me at least, set the tone for the entire book and greatly enriched my reading experience.
Taking a concentrated shot of Silverberg (whose work I hadn't read prior to this, except for an unrelated hardboiled detective story) allows some of the authors themes--nay, obsessions--to stand out. One is death, clearly. The shadow of death--its reality, its consequences, its inevitability--hangs over virtually every story, even if only by implication. Relatedly, the author seems to enjoy anonymity bordering on nonexistence; the best example I can think of is that in a number of tales, the reader doesn't even know the narrator/protagonist's name until he or she is well into the story, and sometimes not until the end, or even not at all.
Finally, I have to mention the cover art, which is simply gorgeous. The artist, Michael Whelan, was unknown to me but, with a little Wiki-help, I learned that he is a painter of "imaginative realism" and some of his works have even graced the covers of Stephen King novels. I haven't seen his other paintings, but this cover painting for to Phases of the Moon is a haunting, evocative scene that, for me at least, set the tone for the entire book and greatly enriched my reading experience.
January 21, 2014
Silverberg is a phenomenon. In many ways he mirrors the SF world as it moved through its permutations of the last 50 years. In the 50s, his stories were mostly pulp-oriented action tales. In the 60s, he reinvented his career with virtuosic and experimental stories of drugs and inner exploration; by the seventies he had moved to a cooler ironic phase; in the 80s he again reinvented his career with the science fantasies set in the world of Majipoor; his later work became more dispersed and fragmentary in style and content, just as the field did itself. Throughout that entire career, Silverberg has maintained and extraordinary quality, though his period of '65-'74 is his zenith, an extraordinary burst of writing both in novel and short-story form. This collection is a wonderful grab-bag from his vast oeuvre, spanning stories from the six decades. For the writer, there is a great deal to learn from here. Silverberg's technique is sharp as a scalpel, though there is always something a bit distancing about his style, just as there's something a little too perfect (mechanical some have said) about it. He's justly proud of his voluminous output (he is one of the most prolific authors ever), though at times I'm a bit put off by his focus on it. There is little here in the introductions about his project as writer: what formal innovations he hoped to achieve, what he thought he was saying. Still, I'll forgive him this because the sheer quality of the work is - to me - breathtaking. I'll no doubt reread these again. Rating books out of five simply doesn't provide one with enough gradations, for I'd give this one four and a half if I could (five is reserved for the greatest works of history).
December 17, 2023
"Phases of the Moon" 2004 publication, 23 stories:
Road to Nightfall (1958)
The Macauley Circuit (1956)
Sunrise on Mercury (1957)
Warm Man (1957)
To See the Invisible Man (1963)
Flies (1967)
Passengers (1968)
Nightwings (1968)
Sundance (1969)
Good News from the Vatican (1971)
Capricorn Games (1974)
Born with the Dead (1974)
Schwartz Between the Galaxies (1974)
The Far Side of the Bell-Shaped Curve (1982)
The Pope of the Chimps (1982)
Needle in a Timestack (1983)
Sailing to Byzantium (1985)
Enter a Soldier. Later: Enter Another (1989)
Hunters in the Forest (1991)
Death Do Us Part (1996)
Beauty in the Night (1997)
The Millennium Express (2000)
With Caesar in the Underworld (2002)
3 stories added to 2012 "Best of..." publication:
Against the Current (2007)
Defenders of the Frontier (2010)
The Prisoner (2010)
Road to Nightfall (1958)
The Macauley Circuit (1956)
Sunrise on Mercury (1957)
Warm Man (1957)
To See the Invisible Man (1963)
Flies (1967)
Passengers (1968)
Nightwings (1968)
Sundance (1969)
Good News from the Vatican (1971)
Capricorn Games (1974)
Born with the Dead (1974)
Schwartz Between the Galaxies (1974)
The Far Side of the Bell-Shaped Curve (1982)
The Pope of the Chimps (1982)
Needle in a Timestack (1983)
Sailing to Byzantium (1985)
Enter a Soldier. Later: Enter Another (1989)
Hunters in the Forest (1991)
Death Do Us Part (1996)
Beauty in the Night (1997)
The Millennium Express (2000)
With Caesar in the Underworld (2002)
3 stories added to 2012 "Best of..." publication:
Against the Current (2007)
Defenders of the Frontier (2010)
The Prisoner (2010)
February 28, 2012
Robert Silverberg is one of my favorite science fiction writers. His career started in the pulp era, but he was an influential figure in the New Age movement and later pioneered soft sci fi. This collection has everything from the 50s to the current millennium. In addition to the 1960s gems that are always anthologized, there are truly great ones from other periods. "Enter a Soldier, then another," from the 1980s, is every bit as good as anything he did in the 60s. Silverberg is a master of prose, a tackler of the shocking/controversial, a creator of touching/interesting/outrageous characters, a spinner of cool plots, a discusser of ideas/poser of questions. If you've never read Silverberg, you are in for a treat. These are his best.
January 28, 2026
"Phases of the Moon: Stories of Six Decades" is a collection of short stories by Robert Silverberg. The collections have stories from six decades starting from the 1950s. Each decade has a brief introduction providing background information regarding the author's life during that time giving the reader the influences for his stories. Each story also has a brief introduction, which is very interesting.
From the 1950's I enjoyed "The Macauley Circuit" and "Sunrise on Mercury." I also thought the story "Schwartz between the Galaxies" from the 1970s was interesting. "Needle in a Timestack" from the 1980s was also good, followed by "The Millennium Express" from the 2000s. Overall, a decent collection.
From the 1950's I enjoyed "The Macauley Circuit" and "Sunrise on Mercury." I also thought the story "Schwartz between the Galaxies" from the 1970s was interesting. "Needle in a Timestack" from the 1980s was also good, followed by "The Millennium Express" from the 2000s. Overall, a decent collection.
July 17, 2007
A collection of short stories, some of course better than others. But overall, they are short, entertaining, and a breeze to read.
April 23, 2008
Fun science fiction story collection with many classics.
February 15, 2009
I remember reading one of these stories in a magazine as a teenager, and was able to track down this book so I could read it again. I wish I had time to read more than one story!
May 15, 2012
Silverberg's best short fiction culled from six decades of publishing. With commentary by the author. Hard to beat if you are a science fiction fan.
December 31, 2020
Representative Silverberg collection - his protagonists are alien or former humans, alien to selves, after mysterious transmogrification. He is humanist.
November 18, 2012
Glad I discovered this sf author, who excels in the novella form, it seems. Very entertaining.
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