Passengers

I just reread this masterpiece for the umpteenth time. Wow - it really doesn't get much better than this. Agberg (as Silverberg has so scientifically and cleverly christened himself) has crafted a truly wonderful story.

In his introduction to the story (in the collection "The Best of Robert Silverberg", 1976, Pocket Books) he notes that editor Damon Knight kept sending the draft back to him, requesting a seemingly endless series of minor revisions. The final result is extraordinary. It won the Nebula Award for short story, and placed second for the Hugo (although, to be honest - I have not been able to verify that it placed second).

Incidentally, my version of this collection has an introduction by Barry Malzberg. The prose is quite bizarre, but I haven't read anything else by him, so I couldn't say whether it is typical of him. On the website "Bookpilled" (very highly recommended), Matt raves endlessly about how wonderful and under-appreciated Malzberg is. I do have "Beyond Apollo" on my shelf - and it is very highly rated by many critics, but I am a SLOW reader and it is nowhere near the top of my reading list.

A very nice feature of this collection is that RS gives a significant introduction to each story. So far, I haven't encountered any spoilers, so you can confidently enjoy the intro. before you dive into the narrative.

At one point, RS was noteworthy for having been nominated the most times for major awards (Hugo, Nebula, etc.) and having actually won (relatively) the fewest times. Perhaps we are suffering from a shortage of voters with sufficiently elevated opinions? Of course, such a diagnosis might also apply to certain election victories in formerly democratic countries within the past six months or so - so I should probably cease and desist with this analysis of a dystopia and post-apocalyptic alternate present.

To get back to "Passengers" - just read it. It is a tragedy that only 11 other people here say they've read it - and only 5 have rated it. Your homework assignment is to read this story, and come back here to the centre of the universe and let everyone know what you thought!