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Universe 4
Eight original science fiction stories, by Gordon Eklund & Gregory Benford, Ron Goulart, R.A. Lafferty, Alexei Panshin, Pamela Sargent, Robert Silverberg, Jack Vance, and Howard Waldrop.
179 pages, Hardcover
First published January 1, 1974
About the author
Terry Carr
203 books32 followersCarr was born in Grants Pass, Oregon. He attended the City College of San Francisco and the University of California, Berkeley from 1954 to 1959.
Carr discovered science fiction fandom in 1949, where he became an enthusiastic publisher of fanzines, which later helped open his way into the commercial publishing world. (He was one of the two fans responsible for the hoax fan 'Carl Brandon' after whom the Carl Brandon Society takes its name.) Despite a long career as a science fiction professional, he continued to participate as a fan until his death. He was nominated five times for Hugos for Best Fanzine (1959–1961, 1967–1968), winning in 1959, was nominated three times for Best Fan Writer (1971–1973), winning in 1973, and was Fan Guest of Honor at ConFederation in 1986.
Though he published some fiction in the early 1960s, Carr concentrated on editing. He first worked at Ace Books, establishing the Ace Science Fiction Specials series which published, among other novels, The Left Hand of Darkness by Ursula K. Le Guin and Rite of Passage by Alexei Panshin.
After conflicts with Ace head Donald A. Wollheim, he worked as a freelancer. He edited an original story anthology series called Universe, and a popular series of The Best Science Fiction of the Year anthologies that ran from 1972 until his death in 1987. He also edited numerous one-off anthologies over the same time span. He was nominated for the Hugo for Best Editor thirteen times (1973–1975, 1977–1979, 1981–1987), winning twice (1985 and 1987). His win in 1985 was the first time a freelance editor had won.
Carr taught at the Clarion Workshop at Michigan State University in 1978, where his students included Richard Kadrey and Pat Murphy.
Carr discovered science fiction fandom in 1949, where he became an enthusiastic publisher of fanzines, which later helped open his way into the commercial publishing world. (He was one of the two fans responsible for the hoax fan 'Carl Brandon' after whom the Carl Brandon Society takes its name.) Despite a long career as a science fiction professional, he continued to participate as a fan until his death. He was nominated five times for Hugos for Best Fanzine (1959–1961, 1967–1968), winning in 1959, was nominated three times for Best Fan Writer (1971–1973), winning in 1973, and was Fan Guest of Honor at ConFederation in 1986.
Though he published some fiction in the early 1960s, Carr concentrated on editing. He first worked at Ace Books, establishing the Ace Science Fiction Specials series which published, among other novels, The Left Hand of Darkness by Ursula K. Le Guin and Rite of Passage by Alexei Panshin.
After conflicts with Ace head Donald A. Wollheim, he worked as a freelancer. He edited an original story anthology series called Universe, and a popular series of The Best Science Fiction of the Year anthologies that ran from 1972 until his death in 1987. He also edited numerous one-off anthologies over the same time span. He was nominated for the Hugo for Best Editor thirteen times (1973–1975, 1977–1979, 1981–1987), winning twice (1985 and 1987). His win in 1985 was the first time a freelance editor had won.
Carr taught at the Clarion Workshop at Michigan State University in 1978, where his students included Richard Kadrey and Pat Murphy.
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Displaying 1 - 8 of 8 reviews
May 31, 2020
This fourth volume of Carr's original anthology series isn't as strong as the first three. It's not bad, it's just undistinguished, perhaps on a par with an average issue of a digest-sized sf magazine of the day. There are stories from Robert Silverberg, Pamela Sargent, R.A. Lafferty, Howard Waldrop, and Ron Goulart that are okay, but not among their best. I did not like the Alexei Panshin story, but the Jack Vance story was pretty good. If the Stars Are Gods by Gordon Eklund and Gregory Benford was probably the best of the lot. The cover of the Random House hardback is rather boring, just large type on an astronomical background.
xx-dnf-skim-reference
March 16, 2017I did try to read every story, but even though I pretty much agree with the other reviewer of this collection, I couldn't like them as much as he did. I don't like Silverberg or the 'weird' tales typical of this era, and I really don't like to see this level of sexism, especially in a book this (relatively) modern. Benford & Eklund's tale had an 'old' man as hero, and was interesting, and the female secondary character was treated respectfully. But I requested the book for Pamela Sargent... and her contribution was fairly thoughtful, but definitely not written with feminists in mind.... As a whole, absolutely not recommended.
October 31, 2015
Assault on a City – Jack Vance
At 48 pages this one is a full-blown novella. At its heart, it is a story of class struggles in a future that has taken fashion to an amusing extreme. It’s a solid story and an easy read in an hour.
A Sea of Faces – Robert Silverberg
At under 20 pages this brief foray into the genre is primarily psychological. In it a woman with a mental disorder is treated and we see the situation from inside the mind of the patient. The trip back to consciousness is illustrated as a journey on a mysterious floating island that has to be steered back to the mainland so the patient can rejoin the rest of society.
And Read the Flesh Between the Lines – R. A. Lafferty
In this brief story we have what I would categorize as an alternative history of sorts. Our protagonist, if he can be called such, has an Australopithecus as a servant and lectures his guests that a full third of history has been intentionally wiped from the collective recollection of society. This is a bizarre and rather surreal tale and one would not go amiss in noting that what it lacks in plot it makes up for in setting of the scene.
My Sweet Lady Jo – Howard Waldrop
Weighing in at under 20 pages this one reads like a twilight zone script. I will attempt not to spoil but know merely that it has a wry twist at the end. I cannot claim that it’s a terribly original twist but a twist none the less. In the story, man has bridged the gap between the stars but is still in the early, clumsy phase that requires him to sleep away the decades waiting. One such intrepid group has made the journey to Terra Nova and back again. How will they get on with the people of Earth who have passed decades while they slumbered?
Stungun Slim – Ron Goulart
This is a story of a stark but fairly realistic future. Interestingly, I find that of all the stories in this collection, this one stuck with me the least. The only lasting impressions I have is of public executions and insane personal debt with the most notable item being a $4,000 personal computer from the J.C. Penney catalog.
Desert Places – Pamela Sargent
Like a previous story, this one reads like a Twilight Zone episode. In it, we follow a family as they move from house to house attempting to stay ahead of some destructive force that’s gobbling up their world. At the end we find that the destructive force…. well, now I wouldn’t tell you that, now would I? That would be obvious spoilage. Suffice to say that it’s a keen allegory that has played out a million times on a million worlds including our own
If the Stars Are Gods – Gordon Eklund and Gregory Benford
Of all the stories in this collection, this is probably my favorite. In a nutshell, aliens visit the Earth and they want to talk to the entity in charge. Which, it turns out, they believe to be the sun. The story goes into a fair amount of detail about how the aliens came to believe in the sentient nature of stars and points out effectively how our physical environment shapes our long-term mental framework about how the universe works. At the risk of somewhat of a spoiler I will reveal that the aliens evolved on a planet with an extremely elliptical orbit and large axial tilt so their seasons were acutely variable in temperature. At certain points when proximity to the sun coincided with the proper angle of inclination to the sun entire populations had to pick up and move to the other side of the planet. One wonders how early life could possibly evolve in such conditions but it does make one ponder the ramifications of such an arrangement. At any rate, as has been amply illustrated by my prolonged babbling, this one made an impression.
When the Vertical World Becomes Horizontal – Alexei Panshin
In direct opposition to my feelings about the previous story, this one left me flat. Clearly some huge mental shift is taking place in humanity during the course of the story but it is intentionally kept vague and impenetrable to the point that I cannot muster any emotion from this story at all.
At 48 pages this one is a full-blown novella. At its heart, it is a story of class struggles in a future that has taken fashion to an amusing extreme. It’s a solid story and an easy read in an hour.
A Sea of Faces – Robert Silverberg
At under 20 pages this brief foray into the genre is primarily psychological. In it a woman with a mental disorder is treated and we see the situation from inside the mind of the patient. The trip back to consciousness is illustrated as a journey on a mysterious floating island that has to be steered back to the mainland so the patient can rejoin the rest of society.
And Read the Flesh Between the Lines – R. A. Lafferty
In this brief story we have what I would categorize as an alternative history of sorts. Our protagonist, if he can be called such, has an Australopithecus as a servant and lectures his guests that a full third of history has been intentionally wiped from the collective recollection of society. This is a bizarre and rather surreal tale and one would not go amiss in noting that what it lacks in plot it makes up for in setting of the scene.
My Sweet Lady Jo – Howard Waldrop
Weighing in at under 20 pages this one reads like a twilight zone script. I will attempt not to spoil but know merely that it has a wry twist at the end. I cannot claim that it’s a terribly original twist but a twist none the less. In the story, man has bridged the gap between the stars but is still in the early, clumsy phase that requires him to sleep away the decades waiting. One such intrepid group has made the journey to Terra Nova and back again. How will they get on with the people of Earth who have passed decades while they slumbered?
Stungun Slim – Ron Goulart
This is a story of a stark but fairly realistic future. Interestingly, I find that of all the stories in this collection, this one stuck with me the least. The only lasting impressions I have is of public executions and insane personal debt with the most notable item being a $4,000 personal computer from the J.C. Penney catalog.
Desert Places – Pamela Sargent
Like a previous story, this one reads like a Twilight Zone episode. In it, we follow a family as they move from house to house attempting to stay ahead of some destructive force that’s gobbling up their world. At the end we find that the destructive force…. well, now I wouldn’t tell you that, now would I? That would be obvious spoilage. Suffice to say that it’s a keen allegory that has played out a million times on a million worlds including our own
If the Stars Are Gods – Gordon Eklund and Gregory Benford
Of all the stories in this collection, this is probably my favorite. In a nutshell, aliens visit the Earth and they want to talk to the entity in charge. Which, it turns out, they believe to be the sun. The story goes into a fair amount of detail about how the aliens came to believe in the sentient nature of stars and points out effectively how our physical environment shapes our long-term mental framework about how the universe works. At the risk of somewhat of a spoiler I will reveal that the aliens evolved on a planet with an extremely elliptical orbit and large axial tilt so their seasons were acutely variable in temperature. At certain points when proximity to the sun coincided with the proper angle of inclination to the sun entire populations had to pick up and move to the other side of the planet. One wonders how early life could possibly evolve in such conditions but it does make one ponder the ramifications of such an arrangement. At any rate, as has been amply illustrated by my prolonged babbling, this one made an impression.
When the Vertical World Becomes Horizontal – Alexei Panshin
In direct opposition to my feelings about the previous story, this one left me flat. Clearly some huge mental shift is taking place in humanity during the course of the story but it is intentionally kept vague and impenetrable to the point that I cannot muster any emotion from this story at all.
August 9, 2023
The late Terry Carr was well-known not only as a fan but also as an editor of science fiction, particularly anthologies. This one is the 4th in the UNIVERSE series. Like most anthologies, the reader is given stories that are to the editor's taste. In this volume, the tales run from rather trivial to thought-provoking. In the first category is the opening tale, Jack Vance's "Assault on a City," which nevertheless has some things to say about classes in society. I found Robert Silverberg's "A Sea of Faces" enigmatic t a fault, in that I missed the point somehow. "And Read the Flesh Between the Lines" by R.A. Lafferty was likewise a bit hard to fathom, but overall much more fun to read, as is the case with many of Lafferty's tales. Howard Waldrop's "My Sweet Lady Jo" seems to function more as a parable than a story. The short "Stungun Slim" by Ron Goulart was a fun little satire with a somewhat annoying protagonist. "Desert Places" by Pamela Sargent presents a different sort of end-of-the-world scenario, and seems to have whiffs of Cordwainer Smith in it. The true gem of the anthology, however, is "If the Stars are Gods," By Gordon Ecklund and Gregory Benford, in which alien travelers come to Earth's solar system not to study man, but to ask questions of the sun. It's a remarkable tale, and I'm surprised it hasn't gotten more attention over the years. The book winds up with "When the Vertical World Becomes Horizontal," by the late Alexei Panshin. This story, like a few others before it, partake of New Wave sensibilities, which is to say that after you've read it, you may not be quite sure what you've read.
February 9, 2024
¡Oh, Señor! ¡Jack Vance sí que sabe contar una buena historia! Si bien la premisa es bastante simple, Asalto a una ciudad está narrada con maestría y no se acobarda a la hora de adelantarse a problemas feministas que todavía hoy discutimos.
En cuanto a Silverberg, supongo que esta es una de esas ideas que otro autor dejó olvidada y que él se limitó a recoger y desarrollar de manera poco brillante. Todavía estoy buscando un autor que sepa hacer una buena descripción de la locura.
El de Lafferty, insulso, no me produce ni frío ni calor.
El flaco paralizador, de Goulart, sobre la pena de muerte que se televisa y se convierte en marketing. Ya hemos leído o visto esta historia un millón de veces, pero aquí está narrada de manera más que correcta.
Pamela Sargent se mueve a lo largo de la fina línea entre CF y fantasía para presentrarnos un cuento de lo más desasosegante; simple y efectivo, ejemplo perfecto del "show and do not tell" anglosajón.
Dicen que Eklund y Benford forman un dúo de ensueño y, aunque Si las estrellas son dioses tiene momentos bastante flojos (el final es de lo más anodino), me gustó bastante durante su desarrollo y, más que nada, la caracterización de esos alienígenas capaces de despertarme cierta ternura.
Por último, Panshin nos trae del lado de allá un cuentecillo alegórico de lo más lisérgico. Buen broche final para una antología que te recomiendo leer.
En cuanto a Silverberg, supongo que esta es una de esas ideas que otro autor dejó olvidada y que él se limitó a recoger y desarrollar de manera poco brillante. Todavía estoy buscando un autor que sepa hacer una buena descripción de la locura.
El de Lafferty, insulso, no me produce ni frío ni calor.
El flaco paralizador, de Goulart, sobre la pena de muerte que se televisa y se convierte en marketing. Ya hemos leído o visto esta historia un millón de veces, pero aquí está narrada de manera más que correcta.
Pamela Sargent se mueve a lo largo de la fina línea entre CF y fantasía para presentrarnos un cuento de lo más desasosegante; simple y efectivo, ejemplo perfecto del "show and do not tell" anglosajón.
Dicen que Eklund y Benford forman un dúo de ensueño y, aunque Si las estrellas son dioses tiene momentos bastante flojos (el final es de lo más anodino), me gustó bastante durante su desarrollo y, más que nada, la caracterización de esos alienígenas capaces de despertarme cierta ternura.
Por último, Panshin nos trae del lado de allá un cuentecillo alegórico de lo más lisérgico. Buen broche final para una antología que te recomiendo leer.
December 19, 2022
2/5
A favor: el relat «When the Vertical World Becomes Horizontal» d’Alexei Panshin excel·leix sobre la resta de forma més que evident: és una aventura imaginativa i amb ànima, de les que t’atrapa a base de candidesa i elements estranys, amb ritme i una bona resolució. Els relats de Pamela Sargent («Desert Places ») i Gordon Eklund & Gregory Benford («If the Stars Are Gods ») també destaquen sobre la resta; el primer és evocador i té un final satisfactori; el segon es fa llarg, però el punt de partida és original i assoleix el repte de seduir el lector.
En contra: la resta de relats, que són mediocres i fins i tot oblidables. Ni tan sols Vance (visualment potent, però sense gaire contingut) o Silverberg (massa metàfora i tot massa precipitat) aconsegueixen destacar mínimament.
En definitiva: un compendi més aviat fluixot de relats de ciència-ficció que m'ha costat déu i ajuda acabar. Malgrat alguns autors de renom, el conjunt resulta massa heterogeni i amb certa tendència a la mediocritat, sense idees originals ni una narrativa destacable. En aquest aspecte, l'altra compilació de relats que tinc de Terry Carr —en aquest cas dedicats a la fantasia— és bastant superior.
A favor: el relat «When the Vertical World Becomes Horizontal» d’Alexei Panshin excel·leix sobre la resta de forma més que evident: és una aventura imaginativa i amb ànima, de les que t’atrapa a base de candidesa i elements estranys, amb ritme i una bona resolució. Els relats de Pamela Sargent («Desert Places ») i Gordon Eklund & Gregory Benford («If the Stars Are Gods ») també destaquen sobre la resta; el primer és evocador i té un final satisfactori; el segon es fa llarg, però el punt de partida és original i assoleix el repte de seduir el lector.
En contra: la resta de relats, que són mediocres i fins i tot oblidables. Ni tan sols Vance (visualment potent, però sense gaire contingut) o Silverberg (massa metàfora i tot massa precipitat) aconsegueixen destacar mínimament.
En definitiva: un compendi més aviat fluixot de relats de ciència-ficció que m'ha costat déu i ajuda acabar. Malgrat alguns autors de renom, el conjunt resulta massa heterogeni i amb certa tendència a la mediocritat, sense idees originals ni una narrativa destacable. En aquest aspecte, l'altra compilació de relats que tinc de Terry Carr —en aquest cas dedicats a la fantasia— és bastant superior.
November 9, 2020
Full review: https://sciencefictionruminations.com...
"Terry Carr’s original anthology Universe 4 (1974) contains a cross-section of early 70s SF–from oblique New Wave allegories to first contact stories with unusual aliens.
Despite clocking in last in the installments I’ve read so far– behind Universe 2 (1972), Universe 1 (1971), and Universe 10 (1980)—the best stories, R. A. Lafferty’s rumination on memory and nostalgia, Pamela Sargent’s bleak account of urban erasure, Alexei Panshin’s evocation of conceptual shift, and Gregory Benford and Gordon Eklund’s first contact tale with [...]"
"Terry Carr’s original anthology Universe 4 (1974) contains a cross-section of early 70s SF–from oblique New Wave allegories to first contact stories with unusual aliens.
Despite clocking in last in the installments I’ve read so far– behind Universe 2 (1972), Universe 1 (1971), and Universe 10 (1980)—the best stories, R. A. Lafferty’s rumination on memory and nostalgia, Pamela Sargent’s bleak account of urban erasure, Alexei Panshin’s evocation of conceptual shift, and Gregory Benford and Gordon Eklund’s first contact tale with [...]"
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December 28, 20124/6/12: "My Sweet Lady Jo" by Howard Waldrop
Displaying 1 - 8 of 8 reviews