The Nebulas: 1973

[james_davis_nicoll]

Novels

Isaac Asimov* The Gods Themselves Galaxy Science Fiction
Robert Silverberg The Book of Skulls Charles Scribner's
Robert Silverberg Dying Inside Galaxy Science Fiction
Norman Spinrad The Iron Dream Avon
John Brunner The Sheep Look Up Harper & Row
George Alec Effinger What Entropy Means to Me Doubleday
David Gerrold When HARLIE Was One Ballantine Books

This category draws from a nice diversity of sources, which is not going to be (as) true of the other three.

The Asimov is a collection of three novellas set in a future where the energy crisis has been solved through trade with a universe with different natural laws. Petty self-interest leads various factions to downplay the environmental costs of the new energy source.

Following Sputnik, Asimov devoted most of his writing time to trying to educate the American public (with the result that to this day library shelves have more of his books than books by his contemporaries). This was more or less his return to SF novel writing, which may explain how this unremarkable book won the Nebula. It has a fairly solid reprint but the frequency drops sharply about 1990 (which is roughly when Asimov dies but the "reprints fall off after 1990 is such a recurring theme I wonder if something else is not going on).

I think I missed The Book of Skulls somehow. It was reprinted with fair frequency until about 1990. It's probably good; this was Silverberg's most interesting period.

Dying Inside tells the story of a telepath, living in the USA of about 1970, who discovers his telepathy is slowly dying. Although sections have not aged all that well, this is probably Silverberg's best novel. This was reprinted at a fair clip until 1990ish, after which there's a gap and then a flurry of reprints in the '00s (one of which I had a hand in).

The Iron Dream is the pulp SF novel Hitler would have written had he become an SF writer instead of a politician of some note. It's as heavy-handed as anything by Spinrad, who tends to be as subtle as explosive diarrhea in a small elevator, but some anvils need to be dropped. Although its points are probably as timely now as in the 1970s, the frequency of reprints drops off sharply after the mid-1980s (possibly part of how Norman Spinrad's sales in general tanked around then).

The Sheep Look Up is one of Brunner's extrapolative dystopias; in this one the issue is pollution. It's probably the grimmest of Brunner's dystopias and at least for me well timed; I remember reading the section on acid rain just as acid raid got a lot of column inches in the papers. Looking at the reprint history, its era seems to have been the 1970s whose zeitgeist it reflects so well; not only do reprints become less frequent after 1980 but the publishers become small presses.

I have not read the Effinger. It gets reprinted about once a decade, so I guess we're overdue.

When HARLIE Was One is a story about an AI and the humans responsible for training it. I don't actually remember much about it aside from pot having been legalized; remember when that seemed like a reasonable short-term development in the USA? It was reprinted several times in the 1970s but even a late 1980s second edition could not save it from more recent oblivion.

I fear SFWA allowed itself to be overcome by nostalgia and sentimentality. For me it's a toss-up between the Silverberg or the Brunner.


Novellas

Arthur C. Clarke* "A Meeting with Medusa" Playboy
Phyllis Gotlieb "Son of the Morning" The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction
Ursula K. Le Guin "The Word for World Is Forest" Again, Dangerous Visions
Richard A. Lupoff "With the Bentfin Boomer Boys on Little Old New Alabama" Again, Dangerous Visions
Frederik Pohl "The Gold at the Starbow's End" Analog Science Fact & Fiction
Gene Wolfe "The Fifth Head of Cerberus" Orbit 10

The Clarke is about the crewed exploration of the clouds of Jupiter (and may be in the same universe as Rama). It's stayed in print reasonably well (aside from a drop in frequency in the 1990s - what the heck happened in the 1990s?).

I have not read the Gottlieb. I probably have a lot of company in that because it has only been reprinted once, in an eponymous collection.

The Le Guin is rather heavy-handed and implausible tale attacking colonialism; to be fair, the 1970s were not a era noted for subtle touches and in any case, nothing in this story compares to what has been done in real life. It's never fallen out of print, as far as I can see.

The Lupoff is set in a universe where cheap star-flight and abundant habitable worlds has allowed various subcultures from the Earth to plant colonies and flourish. Sadly, this includes the American South. I've only read the novel version so I am not sure exactly what happens in this one. As a novella, its fate is tied to Again Dangerous Visions, which was mostly a creature of the 1970s. As part of Space War Blues it had a handful of reprints, none after 1980.

[The novel version had three interesting accompanying essays: being in ADV meant the novel was delayed for about ten years: as I recall, Ellison's essay took a very sympathetic, even enthusiastic view of Ellison, Lupoff's agent was somewhat less enthusiastic and Lupoff just wanted the fuss to end]

The Pohl is about the application of SFnal ruthlessness to the problem of creativity. Unfortunately for the statesmen who fund the project, it is entirely too successful. Pohl went all out trying to get the details right in this one, which inspired a rueful essay by him about how much of it he either got wrong or saw become obsolete (the starbow of the title, for example, doesn't exist in the form he envisioned). It was reprinted with some frequency until about 1990, after which I see only a handful of reprints.

I have not read the Wolfe. It's stayed in print.

I am a little surprised SFWA picked such a meat and potatoes story over the Le Guin but in their place I might have done the same. Not really sure any of these deserved to win, to be honest but that could just be because 1970s loudness no longer fits nicely into my brain.


Novelettes

Poul Anderson* "Goat Song" The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction
Alfred Bester "The Animal Fair" The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction
Gardner Dozois "A Kingdom by the Sea" Orbit 10
Harlan Ellison "Basilisk" The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction
David Gerrold "In the Deadlands" With a Finger In My I
William Rotsler "Patron of the Arts" Universe 2
Kate Wilhelm "The Funeral" Again, Dangerous Visions

The Anderson is an SFnal retelling of Orpheus and Eurydice and was for a long time one of my favourite Andersons (I have not reread it recently). It's enjoyed a pretty solid history of reprints.

I have not read or even heard of the Bester as far as I know. This may because it fell out of print almost instantly.

I have read the Dozois (it's in Prime's When the Great Days Come). I am not sure how to sum it up, except "not my favourite". It seems to get reprinted once a decade or so.

The Ellison is about a former POW transformed by his experiences. Its fate is tied to that of the collection Deathbird Stories (I thought it was also in The Essential Ellison but nope; I must have read those two back to back).

I know I've read the Gerrold because I own an anthology and a collection that it is in but I have no memory of it. It's in ADV so has suffered that anthology's fate (the eponymous collection fell out of print almost at once).

I have only read the Rotsler in novel form and I don't remember much about it in any case. A child of the 1970s, neither form has been all that popular.

The Wilhelm is yet another one I have no memory of despite owning it in no less than four anthologies; readers like me are why she's a mystery writer now. It was reprinted with some frequency in the 1970s but then there's a 20 year gap when it seems to have fallen out of favour before being rediscovered.

I remember too few of these to have an opinion.


Short Stories


Joanna Russ* "When It Changed" Again, Dangerous Visions
Harlan Ellison "On the Downhill Side" Universe 2
Frederik Pohl "Shaffery Among the Immortals" The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction
Robert Silverberg "When We Went to See the End of the World" Universe 2
James Tiptree, Jr. "And I Awoke and Found Me Here on the Cold Hill's Side" The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction
Gene Wolfe "Against the Lafayette Escadrille" Again, Dangerous Visions


The Russ shows an all-female world recontacted by main-stream, patriarchal society; the narrator takes a dim view of how well her culture will prosper once the men get a say. It's been reprinted with fair regularity, not always true of Russ stories. It also inspired a number of replies, not least of which is Tiptree's Houston, Houston, Do You Read?

I am belatedly curious if Russ ever reviewed Brin's Glory Season, which also ends with its gynocentric society facing cultural genocide at the hands of the galactics.

I think the Ellison is about love after death. It has been collected in a number of places, including an anthology called Unicorns!.

The Pohl is about a man who finally earns the fame he yearns for, albeit at some personal cost. It was popular in the 1970s and then languished in obscurity.

I don't think I know the Silverberg. It is in print although the frequency with which it is anthologized drops off around 1980.

The Tiptree is about the downside of extreme xenophilia (Tiptree isn't the author to look for for the upside to anything). It is reprinted with fair regularity.

I have read ADV so I've read the Wolfe but I don't remember a blessed thing about it. Its fate almost entirely tied to ADV's.

I don't know that I should have an opinion here but the Russ seems like a reasonable choice. Well, it or the Tiptree but since the Russ has attracted more replies, it's the more significant of the two.

Comments

[gareth-wilson.livejournal.com]

I didn't finish The Book of Skulls, but I do remember it having the silliest treatment of homosexuality that I've ever read.

[(Anonymous)]

That sounds like an area where the competition could be fierce. In Herbert's The Dosadi Experiment homosexuals are the suicide troops of choice because, according to the protagonist, they've already given up on survival of the species and need only a nudge to give up on personal survival too.

-- Paul Clarke

[(Anonymous)]

THE BOOK OF SKULLS was also a Hugo nominee. I've read every Hugo-nominated novel from 1973 through 2012, and THE BOOK OF SKULLS is my favorite of the bunch (though not really SF or fantasy, in my opinion). A great novel.

Alan Heuer