Phases of the Moon
by Robert Silverberg
(iBooks, $15.95, 624 pages, trade paperback; published in October
2004.)
 At
age 21, Robert Silverberg was voted Most Promising New Author at the
1956 Hugo Awards. He went on to contribute more than 400 stories and
80 novels to the science-fiction canon. In 2004, he was named Grandmaster
by the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America.
Phases of the Moon, which celebrates his fiftieth anniversary
as a published writer, chronologically charts the development of Silverberg's
career; its contents include 23 stories spanning the 1950s to the 2000s
interspersed with brief essays by the author that serve not only to
contextualize the stories but also to provide an informal, and often
wry, personal history of science fiction by a figure central to its
development.
As early as the 1950s, Silverberg, emerging from the tradition of pulp
science fiction, embraced all the traditional tropes of the genre --
space exploration, alien contact, time travel, social speculation --
while enriching his tales with uncommon psychological complexity and
emotional intensity.
It was in the following decade that Silverberg's talent fully blossomed.
His 1960s stories boldly challenged conventional genre subject matters,
plunged deeper in the tangled psyches of his protagonists, and successfully
experimented with form and structure. He continued to write such innovative
and finely crafted stories until the mid-1970s, at which point he temporarily
"retired".
He returned in the early 1980s, newly invigorated, with stories that
displayed less youthful urgency but showcased a broader emotional palate
that brought to his work a poignant mythic resonance. Since 1990, Silverberg's
output has dwindled considerably, and these occasional latter tales
are less memorable than the hundreds of outstanding stories he wrote
in his long-lasting prime, from the late 1950s to the late 1980s.
Phases of the Moon documents one of the most significant careers
in the history of science fiction, presenting some of the genre's finest
stories.
Originally published, in slightly different form, in
The Montreal Gazette, Saturday, 26 September 2004.
Claude Lalumière's Fantastic Fiction
is a series of
capsule reviews first published in the Saturday Books
section of The Montreal Gazette.
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