Freud's Last Session

Matthew Brown, dir. Freud's Last Session (2024)

When there are so many we shall have to mourn,
when grief has been made so public, and exposed
to the critique of a whole epoch
the frailty of our conscience and anguish,

of whom shall we speak? For every day they die
among us, those who were doing us some good,
who knew it was never enough but
hoped to improve a little by living. ...

- W. H. Auden, "In Memory of Sigmund Freud" (1940)

It's not, perhaps, the view of Freud we tend to get nowadays: one of "those who were doing us some good" and hoped to improve things a little "by living." Instead, we hear about his patriarchal attitudes; his misogyny; his suppression of this, that or the other aspect of human psychology ...

W. H. Auden was, it would appear, of a somewhat different opinion. His great elegy continues as follows:

He wasn't clever at all: he merely told
the unhappy Present to recite the Past
like a poetry lesson till sooner
or later it faltered at the line where

long ago the accusations had begun,
and suddenly knew by whom it had been judged,
how rich life had been and how silly,
and was life-forgiven and more humble,

able to approach the Future as a friend
without a wardrobe of excuses, without
a set mask of rectitude or an
embarrassing over-familiar gesture.

Is it just the nature of Anthony Hopkins' performance (his Freud virtually is his Abraham van Helsing from Bram Stoker's Dracula), or do I also detect some lightening of contemporary attitudes towards the so-called "sex doctor" in Matthew Brown's new film?

For a start, it's very static (as befits its nature as an adaptation of Mark St. Germain's successful stage play). Both of the protagonists get to talk - a lot. Both are allowed to give at least some vague intimation of their views on various weighty subjects (not that either of them is permitted any particular subtlety in the exposition, mind you).

C. S. Lewis (1898-1963)

Did Freud and Lewis ever meet? Almost certainly not. Lewis was (at the time) a comparative nobody, not the "Oxford Professor" he's described as by Freud and his daughter Anna. He didn't in fact become a full professor until 1954, many years after the war, and that was at Cambridge, not Oxford. Nor had he yet, in 1939, published any of the works of Christian apologetics for which he was later to be so renowned.

Sigmund Freud (1856-1939)

Professor Freud (described as "Doctor" Freud throughout the film, though he had earned a full professorship in 1902) is therefore reduced to waving a copy of Lewis's early allegorical fiction The Pilgrim's Regress (1933) as an explanation of his invitation to this young Oxford Don to come and debate the nature of God and religion. He also (incidentally) refers to his interlocutor as "Dr. Lewis", though Lewis never in fact obtained a graduate degree, let alone a Doctorate.

This is, in other words, a thoroughly imaginary conversation, a genre popularised in English by the nineteenth-century poet Walter Savage Landor - though it has classical roots in the work of the second-century Greek satirist Lucian, whose Dialogues of the Dead have had a massive influence on Western fiction and satire.

William Faithorne: Lucian of Samosata (c.125-180 CE)

•

Michael Ignatieff: Dialogue in the Dark (1989)

Another interesting parallel with Freud's Last Session can be found in Dialogue in the Dark, Michael Ignatieff's television adaptation of the famous conversation between Scottish diarist James Boswell and the philosopher David Hume, on the latter's deathbed.

Like Freud and Lewis, Boswell and Hume move swiftly to the nub of the matter: the question of the existence of God, and the possibility of a future state after bodily dissolution. Here are a few extracts from Boswell's own account of the interview:

George Willison: James Boswell (1940-1795)

He [Hume] seemed to be placid and even cheerful. He said he was just approaching to his end. ... I know not how I contrived to get the subject of immortality introduced. He said he never had entertained any belief in religion since he began to read Locke and Clarke. ... He then said flatly that the morality of every religion was bad, and, I really thought, was not jocular when he said that when he heard a man was religious, he concluded he was a rascal, though he had known some instances of very good men being religious.

... I had a strong curiosity to be satisfied if he persisted in disbelieving a future state even when he had death before his eyes. I was persuaded from what he now said, and from his manner of saying it, that he did persist. I asked him if it was not possible that there might be a future state. He answered it was possible that a piece of coal put upon the fire would not burn; and he added that it was a most unreasonable fancy that we should exist for ever. That immorality, if it were at all, must be general; that a great proportion of the human race has hardly any intellectual qualities; that a great proportion dies in infancy before being possessed of reason; yet all these must be immortal; that a porter who gets drunk by ten o'clock with gin must be immortal; that the trash of every age must be preserved, and that new universes must be created to contain such infinite numbers. This appeared to me an unphilosophical objection, and I said, 'Mr. Hume, you know spirit does not take up space'.

... I asked him if the thought of annihilation never gave him any uneasiness. He said not the least; no more than the thought that he had not been ... He had once said to me, on a forenoon while the sun was shining bright, that he did not wish to be immortal. This was a most wonderful thought. The reason he gave was that he was very well in this state of being, and that the chances were very much against his being so well in another state; and he would rather not be more than be worse. I answered that it was reasonable to hope he would be better; that there would be a progressive improvement. I tried him at this interview with that topic, saying that a future state was surely a pleasing idea. He said no, for that it was always seen through a gloomy medium; there was always a Phlegethon or a hell. 'But,' said I, 'would it not be agreeable to have hopes of seeing our friends again?' ... He owned it would be agreeable, but added that none of them entertained such a notion.

... He said he had no pain, but was wasting away. I left him with impressions which disturbed me for some time.

- James Boswell: "An Account of my last interview with David Hume, Esq.
Partly recorded in my Journal, partly enlarged from my memory
(3 March 1777)

Boswell's discomfiture at this proud infidel's dismissal of his most cherished arguments is evident. Hume turns on its head the idea that atheists are ipso facto rascals; instead, it is only with reluctance that he is prepared to concede that there may some religious people who are good.

He also points out the absurdity of having to postulate the creation of new universes to contain "the trash of every age." What's more, Hume disclaims any personal desire for immortality, which even Boswell finds "a most wonderful thought."

Allan Ramsay: David Hume (1711-1776)

This, one should remember, is the Hume who so tellingly dealt with the question of miraculous suspensions of the laws of nature in his Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding (1748):

A miracle is a violation of the laws of nature; and because firm and unalterable experience has established these laws, the case against a miracle is — just because it is a miracle — as complete as any argument from experience can possibly be imagined to be.

This leads Hume to the following maxim:

No testimony is sufficient to establish a miracle unless it is of such a kind that its falsehood would be more miraculous than the fact that it tries to establish.

In other words, if it's possible that the person or people reporting a miracle are lying - or mistaken - then its inherent improbability must lead us to dismiss it. Only if it's less probable that they're wrong than that the laws of nature have been suspended, can its existence be established. And is that ever really the case? Hume would say not.

It's true that some would see as a little perverse his conclusion that "the morality of every religion was bad," simply because lies, greed, intolerance, and self-righteousness are the most obvious characteristics of every religious institution known to him (or me, for that matter). And, before you hasten to assure me that these are simply the exceptions that prove the rule, allow me to quote back at you Matthew 7: 16:

Ye shall know them by their fruits. Do men gather grapes of thorns, or figs of thistles?

William S. Burroughs: Quotes

•

C. S. Lewis: Miracles (1947)

[You may prefer to skip this section if you're not fond of philosophical logic-chopping]

The reason I've reported Hume's reasoning in such detail above is because C. S, Lewis took it upon himself to refute him in his 1947 book Miracles. In it, Lewis expounds the view that "a thorough-going naturalism is self-refuting". His argument, which originally appeared in a series of discrete articles, runs more or less as follows:

All possible [inferred] knowledge … depends on the validity of reason. If the feeling of certainty which we express by words like must be and therefore and since is a real perception of how things are outside our own minds really ‘must’ be, well and good. But if this certainty is merely a feeling in our own minds and not a genuine insight into realities beyond them – if it merely represents the way our minds happen to work – then we can have no knowledge. Unless human reason is valid no science can be true.

- C. S. Lewis, “Religion Without Dogma?” (1946) [NB: All of the direct quotes in this section have been taken from S. Lovell's comprehensive article: "C. S. Lewis’ Case Against Naturalism"]

Lewis seizes ingeniously on the weakness in the case argued by Hume and other, subsequent rationalists such as Bertrand Russell. What exactly are these "laws of nature" they speak of? It isn't enough to say, as Hume does, that "firm and unalterable experience has established these laws."

Lewis then takes his argument one step further:

It follows that no account of the universe can be true unless that account leaves it possible for our thinking to be a real insight. A theory which explained everything else in the whole universe but which made it impossible to believe that our thinking was valid, would be utterly out of court. For that theory would itself have been reached by thinking, and if thinking is not valid that theory would, of course, be itself demolished. It would have destroyed its own credentials. …

Lewis proceeds to draw a vital distinction between rational and irrational thinking:

It would be impossible to accept naturalism itself if we really and consistently believed naturalism. For naturalism is a system of thought. But for naturalism all thoughts are mere events with [non-rational, physical] causes. It is, to me at any rate, impossible to regard the thoughts which make up naturalism that way and, at the same time, to regard them as a real insight into external reality. …

Every particular thought … is always and by all men discounted the moment they believe that it can be explained, without remainder, as the result of irrational causes. Whenever you know what the other man is saying is wholly due to his complexes or to a bit of bone pressing on his brain, you cease to attach any importance to it. But if naturalism were true, then all thoughts whatever would be wholly the result of irrational causes. Therefore, all thought would be equally worthless. Therefore, naturalism is worthless.

It must have been a lovely moment for Lewis when he finally came up with this knock-down argument which proved that his opponents were wrong: that they were, in fact, refuted out of their own mouths!

Elizabeth Anscombe (1919-2001)

Alas, the same (to an outsider, at least) verbal gymnastics and resolute hair-splitting rose up to smite him. At a famous meeting of the Oxford Socratic Society on February 2, 1948, a young philosopher - and (as it happens) devout Catholic - named Elizabeth Anscombe set out to refute him. The content of her counter-argument is perhaps best represented in a subsequent article by Antony Flew in The Rationalist Annual (1955):

Lewis is too carefree in his talk of “rational” and “irrational.” Why must atoms, or systems of neurons, or whatever may be the terms of the scientific explanation of my mental processes, be either rational or irrational? Can they not be just non-rational – things to which the rational/irrational distinction does not apply? Lewis would surely not say that atoms were immoral. But then, must they be moral? Of course not. Lewis would say that the distinction does not apply to the sort of things in terms of which “naturalists” would give their causal explanations of mental processes. But since atoms are neither rational nor irrational, the argument breaks down, for the causes by which the “naturalist” explains his own thinking are no longer irrational and the “naturalist” thesis no longer refutes itself.

Hoist with his own petard! Just as the word "Nature" is such a problem for naturalists, so the words "rational" and "irrational" turned out to be equally problematic for supernaturalists such as Lewis. Flew continues as follows:

Lewis and others who produce similar arguments are snared by the chronic ambiguities of words like “cause,” “reason,” “because.” If asked “What is the reason why you think this is true?” I may reasonably answer either “It was thrashed into me at school,” or “It follows from such and such true premises.” Both these answers simultaneously may be sound, for they are answers to what are really quite different questions. I shall call the senses of “reason,” “cause,” etc., which ask for the first type of answer the historical senses … , and shall call the senses which ask for the second type of answer the logical senses … If the reason (historical) why I think my mental processes are determined by neurone changes is itself something to do with neurone changes, this has no necessary bearing on the questions whether there are, or whether I have, any logical reasons, any good arguments, for thinking this thought about the causation of my mental processes.

Nothing daunted, Lewis went back to Miracles and revised the wording of his argument for a second edition, published in 1960. These changes can be best summed up in this quote from a later essay, “De Futilitate” (1967):

When logic says a thing must be so, Nature always agrees. No one can suppose that this can be due to a happy coincidence. A great many people think that it is due to the fact that Nature produced the mind. But on the assumption that Nature is herself mindless this provides no explanation. To be the result of a series of mindless events is one thing: to be a kind of plan or true account of the laws according to which those mindless events arose is quite another ... The laws whereby logic obliges us to think turn out to be the laws according to which every event in space and time must happen. The man who thinks this an ordinary or probable result does not really understand.

It is ... as if, when I knocked out my pipe, the ashes arranged themselves into letters which read: ‘We are the ashes of a knocked-out pipe.’ But if the validity of knowledge cannot be explained that way, and if perpetual happy coincidence throughout the whole of recorded time is out of the question, then surely we must seek the real explanation elsewhere.

René Magritte: La Trahison des Images [The Treason of Images] (1928-29)

Nature and logic always agree, according to Lewis. But if Nature is mindless, this is surely an unbelievable coincidence.

Once again, however, Lewis's opponents were not prepared to let him have the last word on the matter. Here's Antony Flew:

[A]ll other things being equal and in the long run and with many dramatic exceptions, true beliefs about our environment tend to have some survival value. So it looks as if evolutionary biology and human history could provide some reasons for saying that it need no be a mere coincidence if a significant proportion of men’s beliefs about their environment are in face true. Simply because if that were not so they could not have survived long in that environment. As an analysis of the meaning of ‘truth’ the pragmatist idea that a true belief is one which is somehow advantageous to have will not do at all. Yet there is at least some contingent and non-coincidental connection between true beliefs, on the one hand, and the advantage, if it be an advantage, of survival, on the other.

If you feel that this argument from 'evolutionary advantage' sounds a bit shaky (as I fear I do), you may prefer a later version invoking the then new notion of the computer, which is expounded as follows by S. Lovell:

There is a popular illustration associated with the last objection from Anscombe and Flew. The illustration is that of the computer. The operations of computers, it is suggested, are fully explicable in naturalistic terms, and yet a computer is more than capable of performing calculations and inferences according to the rules of mathematics and logic. This, it is claimed, shows that the two systems of relation can both apply to the same series of events … they are not incompatible. And if the two systems are not incompatible, then Lewis’ argument fails.

And so on and so forth ...

I suppose that I've allowed myself to go into so much detail on this matter

1. because I can: it's my blog, and I'll blah if I want to.
2. because I want to demonstrate that Lewis was no mere Christian populariser. He had a good backgound in philosophy, and his arguments have to be taken seriously
3. because, although I want Lewis to be wrong and Hume to be right, laying out the arguments presented by the two sides has forced me to acknowledge that it's not nearly as simple as that. The anti-naturalists do (alas) have quite a strong case.

In the end, though, there's a definite odour of what Wittgenstein would call "language games" about the whole debate:

Ludwig Wittgenstein: Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus (1921)

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Matthew Brown, dir. Freud's Last Session (2024)

But to return to the subject of Freud's Last Session. This is how they attempted to market the movie on the website I visited when we were trying to decide whether or not to go and see it:

Academy Award winner Anthony Hopkins (The Father) and Emmy nominee Matthew Goode (The Crown, Downton Abbey) deliver "sterling performances" (Deadline) as these two titans of the 20th century. The film also stars Liv Lisa Fries (Babylon Berlin), Jodi Balfour (For All Mankind), Stephen Campbell Moore (The History Boys), Jeremy Northam (The Crown) and Orla Brady (Star Trek: Picard).

You'll note that it's star power rather than the inherent interest of the situation they're relying on to sell it. And it is certainly a most dazzling cast!

Orla Brady (1961- )

Some bold choices have been made: for instance, in the choice of Jean-Luc Picard's love interest Orla Brady to play Mrs. Moore, the mother of one of Lewis's wartime comrades, with whom he very probably had a sexual relationship in the early 1920s.

Liv Lisa Fries (1990- )

The film is also quite outspoken about the nature of Anna Freud's sexuality, particularly her relationship with American heiress Dorothy Burlingham. It's hard to imagine a better choice of actress to play her than the alternately slinky and gritty Liv Lisa Fries, fresh from her triumph in the German TV sensation Babylon Berlin (2017- ).

David Cohen: The Escape of Sigmund Freud (2010)

At first I found the jolly, chuckly way Anthony Hopkins plays Freud a trifle incongruous by comparison with the grim old buzzard we see in the photographs. But the fact that Freud was in constant, at times almost insupportable pain from his throat cancer during the last 16 years of his life - not to mention the prosthesis he was forced to wear in order to be able to speak at all (the inconveniences of which are, if anything, underplayed in the film) - might explain a certain stiffness of demeanour when he was forced to pose.

David Cohen's rather discursive account of The Escape of Sigmund Freud (pictured above), which I've also been reading recently, reveals a different side of Freud. He quotes a description of the "delighted little crinkles at the corners of his eyes" when "he put his head back and laughed like a child," by American journalist Max Eastman, who interviewed him for his 1936 book Heroes I have Known. Eastman added that Freud:

waggled his head and hands about all the time looking up at the ceiling and closing his eyes or making funny little pouts and wry faces when he was trying to think of a word or an idea.

That's a spot-on description of how Hopkins portrays him. Eastman continues:

I never ceased feeling that underneath it all was an obdurate hard cranky streak but I also never ceased feeling his great charm.

Again, Papa Freud's controlling attitude towards his grown-up daughter, whom he keeps summoning back to deal with his problems during her exceptionally busy day at the office, represents the obverse side of Hopkins's Freud's undoubted charm.

There are, of course, still certain problems with this movie. I've mentioned the incongruity of Lewis's actual lack of fame or substantive academic rank at the time, obstacles which would have virtually guaranteed that Freud would never have heard of him. I also feel that a bit more of a Northern Irish accent might have been more appropriate to the Lewis who was described by his friends as resembling "a prosperous Ulster butcher".

Putting such quibbles to one side, though, it's remarkable just how much detail the film-makers do manage to cram in. The "death capsule" passed from Freud to his daughter on her arrest by the Gestapo, then handed back to him in time for his own suicide a few weeks after the events portrayed, is historically verifiable. So is Freud's obsession with his brilliant daughter, whose impressive achievements as an analyst were constantly undercut by his demands on her.

Edmund Engelman: Freud's Consulting Room (Vienna, 1938)

If Freud's Last Session does scant justice to the great "God-or-no-God" debate - well, what more could reasonably be expected of it? The wartime setting is wonderfully convincing, and I can attest that for me at least this opportunity to immerse myself in the atmosphere of Freud's fabled study, full of the votive objects he rejoiced in, is worth the price of admission on its own.

Freud Museum London: Sigmund Freud's Study (2019)

So, for what it's worth, it's two thumbs up from me. I can imagine watching and rewatching it with great pleasure as soon it hits a streaming service near me!

Mark St. Germain: Freud's Last Session (TheaterWorks Hartford, 2014)

•

Freud Museum: Sigmund Freud (1885)

Sigismund Schlomo [Sigmund] Freud
(1856-1939)

Books I own are marked in bold:

Books:


1. On Aphasia (1891)
2. [with Josef Breuer] Studies on Hysteria (1895)
   • Included in: The Pelican Freud Library. Ed. Angela Richards. Trans. James Strachey et al. 15 vols. Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1973-1986.
3. The Interpretation of Dreams (1899)
   • The Interpretation of Dreams. 1900. Trans. James Strachey. 1953. London: George Allen & Unwin, 1954.
   • The Interpretation of Dreams: Illustrated Edition. 1900. Trans. A. A. Brill. 1913. Ed. Jeffrey Moussaieff Masson. New York: Sterling Publishing Co. Inc., 2010.
   • Included in: Sigmund Freud: The Major Works. Great Books of the Western World, 54. Ed. Robert Maynard Hutchins. Chicago: William Benton, Publisher / Encyclopaedia Britannica, Inc., 1952.
4. On Dreams (1901)
5. The Psychopathology of Everyday Life (1904)
   • Psychopathology of Everyday Life. 1914. Trans. A. A. Brill. A Pelican Book. Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1938.
   • Included in: The Pelican Freud Library. Ed. Angela Richards. Trans. James Strachey et al. 15 vols. Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1973-1986.
6. Jokes and Their Relation to the Unconscious (1905)
   • Included in: The Pelican Freud Library. Ed. Angela Richards. Trans. James Strachey et al. 15 vols. Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1973-1986.
7. Three Essays on the Theory of Sexuality (1891)
   • Included in: The Pelican Freud Library. Ed. Angela Richards. Trans. James Strachey et al. 15 vols. Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1973-1986.
8. Delusion and Dream in Jensen's Gradiva (1907)
   • Included in: The Pelican Freud Library. Ed. Angela Richards. Trans. James Strachey et al. 15 vols. Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1973-1986.
9. Five Lectures on Psycho-Analysis (1910)
10. Leonardo da Vinci, A Memory of His Childhood (1910)
    • Included in: The Pelican Freud Library. Ed. Angela Richards. Trans. James Strachey et al. 15 vols. Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1973-1986.
11. Totem and Taboo: Resemblances between the Psychic Lives of Savages and Neurotics (1913)
    • Totem and Taboo: Resemblances between the Psychic Lives of Savages and Neurotics. 1919. Trans. A. A. Brill. A Pelican Book. Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1938.
    • Included in: The Pelican Freud Library. Ed. Angela Richards. Trans. James Strachey et al. 15 vols. Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1973-1986.
12. Introductory Lectures on Psycho-Analysis (1915-17)
    • Included in: Sigmund Freud: The Major Works. Great Books of the Western World, 54. Ed. Robert Maynard Hutchins. Chicago: William Benton, Publisher / Encyclopaedia Britannica, Inc., 1952.
    • Included in: The Pelican Freud Library. Ed. Angela Richards. Trans. James Strachey et al. 15 vols. Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1973-1986.
13. Beyond the Pleasure Principle (1920)
    • Included in: Sigmund Freud: The Major Works. Great Books of the Western World, 54. Ed. Robert Maynard Hutchins. Chicago: William Benton, Publisher / Encyclopaedia Britannica, Inc., 1952.
    • Included in: The Pelican Freud Library. Ed. Angela Richards. Trans. James Strachey et al. 15 vols. Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1973-1986.
14. Group Psychology and the Analysis of the Ego (1921)
    • Included in: Sigmund Freud: The Major Works. Great Books of the Western World, 54. Ed. Robert Maynard Hutchins. Chicago: William Benton, Publisher / Encyclopaedia Britannica, Inc., 1952.
15. The Ego and the Id (1923)
    • Included in: Sigmund Freud: The Major Works. Great Books of the Western World, 54. Ed. Robert Maynard Hutchins. Chicago: William Benton, Publisher / Encyclopaedia Britannica, Inc., 1952.
16. Inhibitions, Symptoms and Anxiety (1926)
    • Included in: Sigmund Freud: The Major Works. Great Books of the Western World, 54. Ed. Robert Maynard Hutchins. Chicago: William Benton, Publisher / Encyclopaedia Britannica, Inc., 1952.
    • Included in: The Pelican Freud Library. Ed. Angela Richards. Trans. James Strachey et al. 15 vols. Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1973-1986.
17. The Question of Lay Analysis (1926)
18. The Future of an Illusion (1927)
19. Civilization and Its Discontents (1930)
    • Civilisation and Its Discontents. 1930. Trans. James Strachey. New York: W. W. Norton, 1961.
    • Included in: Sigmund Freud: The Major Works. Great Books of the Western World, 54. Ed. Robert Maynard Hutchins. Chicago: William Benton, Publisher / Encyclopaedia Britannica, Inc., 1952.
    • Included in: The Pelican Freud Library. Ed. Angela Richards. Trans. James Strachey et al. 15 vols. Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1973-1986.
20. New Introductory Lectures on Psycho-Analysis (1933)
    • Included in: Sigmund Freud: The Major Works. Great Books of the Western World, 54. Ed. Robert Maynard Hutchins. Chicago: William Benton, Publisher / Encyclopaedia Britannica, Inc., 1952.
    • Included in: The Pelican Freud Library. Ed. Angela Richards. Trans. James Strachey et al. 15 vols. Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1973-1986.
21. Moses and Monotheism (1939)
    • Included in: The Pelican Freud Library. Ed. Angela Richards. Trans. James Strachey et al. 15 vols. Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1973-1986.
22. An Outline of Psychoanalysis (1940)
    • Included in: The Pelican Freud Library. Ed. Angela Richards. Trans. James Strachey et al. 15 vols. Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1973-1986.
23. [with William C. Bullit] Thomas Woodrow Wilson: A Psychological Study (1967)

Case histories:


24. Fragment of an Analysis of a Case of Hysteria [the Dora case history] (1905)
    • Included in: The Pelican Freud Library. Ed. Angela Richards. Trans. James Strachey et al. 15 vols. Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1973-1986.
25. Analysis of a Phobia in a Five-Year-Old Boy [the Little Hans case history] (1909)
    • Included in: The Pelican Freud Library. Ed. Angela Richards. Trans. James Strachey et al. 15 vols. Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1973-1986.
26. Notes upon a Case of Obsessional Neurosis [the Rat Man case history] (1909)
    • Included in: The Pelican Freud Library. Ed. Angela Richards. Trans. James Strachey et al. 15 vols. Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1973-1986.
27. Psycho-Analytic Notes on an Autobiographical Account of a Case of Paranoia [the Schreber case] (1911)
    • Included in: The Pelican Freud Library. Ed. Angela Richards. Trans. James Strachey et al. 15 vols. Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1973-1986.
28. From the History of an Infantile Neurosis [the Wolfman case history] (1918)
    • Included in: The Pelican Freud Library. Ed. Angela Richards. Trans. James Strachey et al. 15 vols. Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1973-1986.
29. The Psychogenesis of a Case of Homosexuality in a Woman (1920)
    • Included in: The Pelican Freud Library. Ed. Angela Richards. Trans. James Strachey et al. 15 vols. Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1973-1986.
30. A Seventeenth-Century Demonological Neurosis [the Haizmann case] (1923)

Autobiographical papers:


31. An Autobiographical Note (1899)
    • Included in: The Pelican Freud Library. Ed. Angela Richards. Trans. James Strachey et al. 15 vols. Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1973-1986.
32. On the History of the Psychoanalytic Movement (1914)
    • Included in: The Pelican Freud Library. Ed. Angela Richards. Trans. James Strachey et al. 15 vols. Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1973-1986.
33. An Autobiographical Study (1925 / 1935)
    • Included in: The Pelican Freud Library. Ed. Angela Richards. Trans. James Strachey et al. 15 vols. Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1973-1986.

Collected Editions:


34. The Standard Edition of the Complete Psychological Works of Sigmund Freud. Trans. & ed. James Strachey, with Anna Freud, Alix Strachey, Alan Tyson, & Angela Richards. 24 vols. London: Hogarth Press and the Institute of Psycho-Analysis, 1953–1974.
    1. Pre-Psycho-Analytic Publications and Unpublished Drafts (1886–1899)
    2. [with Josef Breuer] Studies in Hysteria (1893–1895)
    3. Early Psycho-Analytic Publications (1893–1899)
    4. The Interpretation of Dreams (I) (1900)
    5. The Interpretation of Dreams (II) & On Dreams (1900–1901)
    6. The Psychopathology of Everyday Life (1901)
    7. A Case of Hysteria, Three Essays on Sexuality and Other Works (1901–1905)
    8. Jokes and their Relation to the Unconscious (1905)
    9. Jensen's 'Gradiva,' and Other Works (1906–1909)
    10. The Cases of 'Little Hans' and the Rat Man' (1909)
    11. Five Lectures on Psycho-Analysis, Leonardo and Other Works (1910)
    12. The Case of Schreber, Papers on Technique and Other Works (1911–1913)
    13. Totem and Taboo and Other Works (1913–1914)
    14. On the History of the Psycho-Analytic Movement, Papers on Meta-psychology and Other Works (1914–1916)
    15. Introductory Lectures on Psycho-Analysis (Parts I and II) (1915–1916)
    16. Introductory Lectures on Psycho-Analysis (Part III) (1916–1917)
    17. An Infantile Neurosis and Other Works (1917–1919)
    18. Beyond the Pleasure Principle, Group Psychology and Other Works (1920–1922)
    19. The Ego and the Id and Other Works (1923–1925)
    20. An Autobiographical Study, Inhibitions, Symptoms and Anxiety, Lay Analysis and Other Works (1925–1926)
    21. The Future of an Illusion, Civilization and its Discontents and Other Works (1927–1931)
    22. New Introductory Lectures on Psycho-Analysis and Other Works (1932–1936)
    23. Moses and Monotheism, An Outline of Psycho-Analysis and Other Works (1937–1939)
    24. Indexes and Bibliographies. Compiled by Angela Richards (1974)


35. Sigmund Freud: The Major Works. Great Books of the Western World, 54. Ed. Robert Maynard Hutchins. Chicago: William Benton, Publisher / Encyclopaedia Britannica, Inc., 1952.
    1. The Origin and Development of Psycho-Analysis. Trans. Harry W. Chase (1910)
    2. Selected Papers on Hysteria. Trans. A. A. Brill (1893-1908)
    3. The Sexual Enlightenment of Children. Trans. E. B. M. Herford (1907)
    4. The Future Prospects of Psycho-Analytic Therapy. Trans. Joan Riviere (1910)
    5. Observations on "Wild" Psycho-Analysis. Trans. Joan Riviere (1910)
    6. The Interpretation of Dreams. Trans. A. A. Brill (1900)
    7. On Narcissism. Trans. Cecil M. Baines (1914)
    8. Instincts and Their Vicissitudes. Trans. Cecil M. Baines (1915)
    9. Repression. Trans. Cecil M. Baines (1915)
    10. The Unconscious. Trans. Cecil M. Baines (1915)
    11. A General Introduction to Psycho-Analysis. Trans. Joan Riviere (1915-17)
    12. Beyond the Pleasure Principle. Trans. C. J. M. Hubback (1920)
    13. Group Psychology and the Analysis of the Ego. Trans. James Strachey (1921)
    14. The Ego and the Id. Trans. Joan Riviere (1923)
    15. Inhibitions, Symptoms, and Anxiety. Trans. Alix Strachey (1926)
    16. Thoughts for the Times on War and Death. Trans. E. Colburn Mayne (1915)
    17. Civilization and Its Discontents. Trans. Joan Riviere (1929)
    18. New Introductory Lectures on Psycho-Analysis. Trans. W. H. J. Sprott (1932)


36. The Pelican Freud Library. Ed. Angela Richards. Trans. James Strachey et al. 15 vols. Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1973-1986.
    1. Introductory Lectures on Psychoanalysis. 1915-1917. Trans. James Strachey. 1963. Ed. James Strachey & Angela Richards (1973)
       • Introductory Lectures on Psychoanalysis. 1915-1917. The Pelican Freud Library, 1. Trans. James Strachey. 1963. Ed. James Strachey & Angela Richards. 1973. Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1978.
    2. New Introductory Lectures on Psychoanalysis. 1932-33. Trans. James Strachey. 1964. Ed. James Strachey & Angela Richards (1973)
       • New Introductory Lectures on Psychoanalysis. 1932-33. The Pelican Freud Library, 2. Trans. James Strachey. 1964. Ed. James Strachey & Angela Richards. 1973. Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1979.
    3. [with Joseph Breuer] Studies on Hysteria. 1893 & 1895. Trans. James & Alix Strachey. 1955 (1980)
       • [with Joseph Breuer] Studies on Hysteria. 1893 & 1895. The Pelican Freud Library, 3. Trans. James & Alix Strachey. 1955. Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1980.
    4. The Interpretation of Dreams. 1899. Trans. James Strachey. 1953 (1974)
    5. The Psychopathology of Everyday Life. 1901. Trans. Alan Tyson. 1960. Ed. James Strachey, with Angela Richards & Alan Tyson (1975)
       • The Psychopathology of Everyday Life. 1901. The Pelican Freud Library, 5. Trans. Alan Tyson. 1960. Ed. James Strachey, with Angela Richards & Alan Tyson. Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1975.
    6. Jokes and Their Relation to the Unconscious. 1905. Trans. James Strachey. 1960. Ed. James Strachey & Angela Richards (1976)
       • Jokes and Their Relation to the Unconscious. 1905. The Pelican Freud Library, 6. Trans. James Strachey. 1960. Ed. James Strachey & Angela Richards. Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1976.
    7. On Sexuality: Three Essays on the Theory of Sexuality and Other Works. 1905. Trans. James Strachey. 1953. Ed. Angela Richards (1977)
       • On Sexuality: Three Essays on the Theory of Sexuality and Other Works. 1905. The Pelican Freud Library, 7. Trans. James Strachey. 1953. Ed. Angela Richards. 1977. Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1981.
    8. Case Histories I: ‘Dora’ and Little Hans. 1905 & 1909. Trans. Alix & James Strachey. 1925. Ed. James Strachey, with Angela Richards & Alan Tyson (1977)
       • Case Histories I: ‘Dora’ and Little Hans. 1905 & 1909. The Pelican Freud Library, 8. Trans. Alix & James Strachey. 1925. Ed. James Strachey, with Angela Richards & Alan Tyson. Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1977.
    9. Case Histories II: The ‘Rat Man’, Schreber, The ‘Wolf Man’, A case of Female Homosexuality. 1909, 1911, 1918 & 1920. Trans. James Strachey. 1955 & 1958. Ed. Angela Richards (1979)
       • Case Histories II: The ‘Rat Man’, Schreber, The ‘Wolf Man’, A case of Female Homosexuality. 1909, 1911, 1918 & 1920. The Pelican Freud Library, 9. Trans. James Strachey. 1955 & 1958. Ed. Angela Richards. 1979. Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1981.
    10. On Psychopathology: Inhibitions, Symptoms and Anxiety and Other Works. 1895-1926. Trans. James Strachey. 1953-62. Ed. Angela Richards (1979)
        • On Psychopathology: Inhibitions, Symptoms and Anxiety and Other Works. 1895-1926. The Pelican Freud Library, 10. Trans. James Strachey. 1953-62. Ed. Angela Richards. Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1979.
    11. On Metapsychology: The Theory of Psychoanalysis. Beyond the Pleasure Principle, The Ego and the Id and Other Works. 1911-40. Trans. James Strachey. 1955-64. Ed. Angela Richards (1984)
        • On Metapsychology: The Theory of Psychoanalysis. Beyond the Pleasure Principle, The Ego and the Id and Other Works. 1911-40. The Pelican Freud Library, 11. Trans. James Strachey. 1955-64. Ed. Angela Richards. Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1984.
    12. Civilisation, Society & Religion: Group Psychology, Civilisation and Its Discontents, and Other Works. 1908-33. Trans. James Strachey. 1955-64. Ed. Albert Dickson (1985)
        • Civilisation, Society & Religion: Group Psychology, Civilisation and Its Discontents, and Other Works. 1908-33. The Pelican Freud Library, 12. Trans. James Strachey. 1955-64. Ed. Albert Dickson. Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1985.
    13. The Origins of Religion: Totem and Taboo, Moses and Monotheism, and Other Works. 1907-39. Trans. James Strachey. 1955-64. Ed. Albert Dickson (1985)
        • The Origins of Religion: Totem and Taboo, Moses and Monotheism, and Other Works. 1907-39. The Pelican Freud Library, 13. Trans. James Strachey. 1955-64. Ed. Albert Dickson. Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1985.
    14. Art and Literature: Jensen’s Gradiva, Leonardo da Vinci, and Other Works. 1907-30. Trans. James Strachey. 1953-61. Ed. Albert Dickson (1985)
        • Art and Literature: Jensen’s Gradiva, Leonardo da Vinci, and Other Works. 1907-30. The Pelican Freud Library, 14. Trans. James Strachey. 1953-61. Ed. Albert Dickson. Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1985.
    15. Historical and Expository Works on Psychoanalysis: History of the Psychoanalytic Movement, An Autobiographical Study, Outline of Psychoanalysis, and Other Works. 1913-40. Trans. James Strachey. 1955-64. Ed. Albert Dickson (1986)
        • Historical and Expository Works on Psychoanalysis: History of the Psychoanalytic Movement, An Autobiographical Study, Outline of Psychoanalysis, and Other Works. 1913-40. The Pelican Freud Library, 15. Trans. James Strachey. 1955-64. Ed. Albert Dickson. Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1986.

Correspondence:


37. Letters of Sigmund Freud, 1873-1939. Ed. Ernst L. Freud. Trans. Tania & James Stern. London: The Hogarth Press, 1961.
38. The Origins of Psychoanalysis: Letters to Wilhelm Fliess, Drafts and Notes: 1887-1902. Ed. Marie Bonaparte, Anna Freud & Ernst Kris. Trans. Eric Mosbacher & James Strachey. New York: Basic Books Inc., Publishers, 1954.
39. The Freud / Jung Letters: the Correspondence between Sigmund Freud and C. G. Jung. Ed. William McGuire. Trans. Ralph Manheim & R. F. C. Hull. 1974. London: The Hogarth Press & Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1977.
40. The Complete Letters of Sigmund Freud to Wilhelm Fliess: 1887-1904. Ed. Jeffrey Moussaieff Masson. Cambridge, Mass & London: The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 1985.

Secondary:


41. Brown, J. A. C. Freud and the Post-Freudians. 1961. A Pelican Book. Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1962.
42. Clark, Ronald W. Freud: The Man and the Cause. 1980. London: Granada, 1982.
43. Cohen, David. The Escape of Sigmund Freud. London: JR Books, 2009.
44. Dimen, Muriel, & Adrienne Harris, ed. Storms in Her Head: Freud and the Construction of Hysteria. New York: Other Press, 2001.
45. Freud, Ernst, Lucie Freud, & Ilse Grubich-Simitis, ed. Sigmund Freud: His Life in Pictures and Words. With a Biographical Sketch by K. R. Eissler. 1976. Trans. Christine Trollope. 1978. Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1985.
46. Gardiner, Muriel, ed. The Wolf-Man and Sigmund Freud. 1972. A Pelican Book. Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1973.
47. Gay, Peter. Freud: A Life for Our Time. New York & London: W. W. Norton, 1988.
48. Gay, Peter. Reading Freud: Explorations & Entertainments. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1990.
49. Jones, Ernest. Sigmund Freud: Life and Work. London: The Hogarth Press, 1953-57.
    1. The Young Freud, 1856-1900 (1953)
    2. Years of Maturity, 1901-1919 (1955)
    3. The Last Phase, 1919-1939 (1957)
50. Jones, Ernest. The Life and Work of Sigmund Freud. 1953-57. Ed. Lionel Trilling & Steven Marcus. 1961. A Pelican Book. Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1964.
51. Malcolm, Janet. In the Freud Archives. 1984. London: Flamingo, 1986.
52. Masson, J. M. The Assault on Truth: Freud’s Suppression of the Seduction Theory. 1984. Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1985.
53. Roazen, Paul. Brother Animal: the Story of Freud and Tausk. 1969. A Pelican Book. Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1973.

•

Memories of Gilbert & Sullivan

Gilbert & Sullivan: Iolanthe (1882)

Between 1976 and 1978, I was in the cast - that is to say, the chorus - of three Gilbert & Sullivan productions at my old High School, Rangitoto College. They were, in chronological order, Iolanthe, H.M.S. Pinafore, and The Gondoliers. I had a (very) small speaking part in the last of them.

H.M.S. Pinafore (1878)

To be honest, I was no great shakes as an actor or a singer, but I could hold a note and follow directions, and I turned up to all the rehearsals (including the weekend "Opera Camps" held for each production). The picture above should give you some idea of the kind of thing they were: a big stage, crowded with figures, with a few vague props and a backdrop.

Gilbert & Sullivan: The Gondoliers (1882)

Mrs. Zigliani was in charge of the music, and Mr. Carter (was it?) in charge of the acting and stagecraft. Both were inspirational figures - particularly the latter, who had a little group of (so-called) "drama sucks" who hung on his every word.

Gilbert & Sullivan: The Pirates of Penzance (1879)

Years later, watching Tennessee Williams' The Glass Menagerie in yet another school production, I was very struck by the strange coincidences with my own family: the introverted Laura seemed a close fit with my sister Anne, the "gentleman caller" Jim O'Connor's past school triumphs as the Pirate King in The Pirates of Penzance matched up with my own brother Jim's success in the same role ...

Tennessee Williams: The Glass Menagerie (1944)

What did it all mean? I'd never actually read Williams' play, so there was a strange, dislocating moment where I wondered if the director had rewritten it slightly for a local audience, as he was wont to do with the Gilbert & Sullivan operas. It soon became clear to me that that was not the case, but I still find that play bafflingly personal and - dare I say it? - prophetic of some of the stresses and strains, and future disappointments, in my own family.

That's probably the main flavour of these reminiscences, in fact. I remember mooning hopelessly, helplessly over the desperately glamorous girls from higher forms who took the main parts in the operas. And yet, when one of them spoke kindly to me when she found a copy of Marvell's poems I'd brought with me to rehearsal, I found myself quite unable to reply. I still writhe with embarassment every time my mind insists on re-enacting that scene, in fact.

Gilbert & Sullivan: Chorus of Peers in Iolanthe

What else has it left me? A few snatches of verse and tunes to hum in moments of stress:

He who shies
at such a prize
is not worth a maravedi! ...

I don't recall the rest of that one, but I seem to remember it ending up with the ingenious rhyme "House of Peers for House of Peri" - the male chorus of Iolanthe consisted of members of the House of Lords while the female chorus were all fairies (or "Peri", in Persian folklore).

There was also a splendid ballad halfway through the Opera where one of the principals described the vital necessity of retaining the Upper House of Parliament:

When Wellington beat Bonaparte
as every schoolboy knows
the House of Lords
all through the war
did nothing in particular
and did it very well ...

Gilbert & Sullivan: Little Buttercup & the Sailors in Pinafore

H.M.S. Pinafore left me quite a bit more in the way of memories: for example, the following beautiful sample of Sullivan's more lyrical vein, sung by the unfortunate Captain Corcoran, who is (you'll recall) "never, never sick at sea":

Fair Moon, to thee I sing,
Bright regent of the heavens ...

And then there's this piece of crosstalk between Sir Joseph ("The ruler of the Queen's Navee"), the captain, the crew, and the redoubtable Little Buttercup:

Sir Joseph:My pain and my surprise
you may guess from the expression of my eyes!

Chorus:How terrible the aspect of his eyes!

Buttercup:Ere upon this loss you lay much stress
a long forgotten crime I would confess:

A many years ago
when I was young and charming
as some of you may know
I practised baby-farming

Chorus:

Oh this is most alarming
when she was young and charming
she practised baby-farming
a many years ago

Two tender babes I nussed
one was of low condition
the other upper-crust
a regular patrician

Chorus:

So this is the position
one was of low condition
the other upper-crust
a regular patrician ... etc. etc.

I find, on consulting an online version of the text, that my recollections are pretty hazy and inaccurate. Never mind, I leave them as they stand, in the interests of adding verisimilitude to an otherwise bald and unconvincing narrative, to quote Pooh-Bah in The Mikado.

Li'l Abner (1956)

The Gilbert & Sullivan team had had enough of pushing water uphill by the end of The Gondoliers, however, so another member of staff, Mr. Baumgart, offered to take up the baton. The musical he selected was Li'l Abner, however, and even though I was offered quite a meaty role in it, I somehow took it against this choice of entertainment.

Pure snobbery, no doubt - and I blush for it now, but the one thing I'll say for this rather peevish decision of mine is that it meant that I was finally able to sit in the audience for one of these productions. I have to say that it hugely amused and entertained - and the guy who ended up playing my role did a wonderful job, far better (probably) than I would have done myself.

Mike Leigh, dir. Topsy-Turvy (1999)

I certainly don't regret spending so much time compulsorily immersing myself in W. S. Gilbert's famous "world of topsy-turvydom." It's one of those rare, incommunicable experiences - a little like being in a Shakespeare play, I suppose. The audience hopefully enjoys the end product more than the cast (it's not much of a production if they don't), but they can never really know the play in as much depth without having rehearsed and recited and stumbled over every line and bit of business.

Certainly being in some kind of a school dramatic production is seems like a necessary rite of passage. There was no way I would ever have had the skills to be in the chorus of West Side Story - another one of the plays they put on while I was there. For me, Gilbert & Sullivan was just the ticket.

You can find an (almost) complete list of Gilbert's plays here, at the Gilbert and Sullivan archive, along with a list of what Sullivan considered his more major works. I've listed below the books and editions by and about the pair which I myself have collected.

Rangitoto College, East Coast Bays, Auckland

•

'Spy': W. S. Gilbert (1881)

Sir William Schwenck Gilbert
(1836–1911)

1. The Bab Ballads, with which are included Songs of a Savoyard. Illustrated by the Author. 1904. London: Macmillan & Co. Ltd. / New York: St. Martin’s Press, Inc., 1964.
2. Original Plays. In Four Series. 4 vols. London: Chatto & Windus, 1911 & 1917.
   • First Series: The Wicked World (1873); Pygmalion and Galatea (1871); Charity (1874); The Princess (1870); The Palace of Truth (1870); Trial by Jury (1875); Iolanthe (1882)
   • Second Series: Broken Hearts (1875); Engaged (1877); Sweethearts (1874); Dan'l Druce, Blacksmith (1876); Gretchen (1879); Tom Cobb (1875); The Sorcerer (1877); H.M.S. Pinafore (1878); The Pirates of Penzance (1879)
   • Third Series: Comedy and Tragedy (1884); Foggerty's Fairy (1881); Rosencrantz and Guildenstern (1874); Patience (1881); Princess Ida (1884); The Mikado (1885); Ruddigore (1887); The Yeomen of the Guard (1888); The Gondoliers (1889); Utopia, Limited (1893)
   • Fourth Series: The Fairy's Dilemma (1904); The Grand Duke (1896); His Excellency (1894); "Haste to the Wedding" (1892); Fallen Fairies (1909); The Gentleman in Black (1870); Brantinghame Hall (1888); Creatures of Impulse (1871); Randall's Thumb (1871); The Fortune-Hunter (1897); Thespis (1871)
3. The Plays & Poems of W. S. Gilbert: Including the Complete Text of the Fourteen Gilbert and Sullivan Operas, Three Other Gilbert Plays, and All the Bab Ballads. With Illustrations by the Author. [Thespis (1871); Trial by Jury (1875); The Sorcerer (1877); H.M.S. Pinafore (1878); The Pirates of Penzance (1879); Patience (1881); Iolanthe (1882); Princess Ida (1884); The Mikado (1885); Ruddigore (1887); The Yeomen of the Guard (1888); The Gondoliers (1889); Utopia Limited (1893); The Grand Duke (1896); with The Palace of Truth (1870); The Mountebanks (1892); His Excellency (1894)]. Preface by Deems Taylor. New York: Random House, 1932.
4. Haining, Peter, ed. The Lost Stories of W. S. Gilbert. Illustrated by ‘Bab’. 1973. London: Robson Books Ltd., 1982.



Carlo Pellegrini: Arthur Sullivan (1874)

Sir Arthur Seymour Sullivan
(1842–1900)



5. The Savoy Operas: Being the Complete Text of the Gilbert and Sullivan Operas as Originally Produced in the Years 1875-1896. 1926. London: Macmillan & Co., Limited, 1927.
6. Bradley, Ian, ed. The Complete Annotated Gilbert and Sullivan [Trial by Jury (1875); The Sorcerer (1877); H.M.S. Pinafore (1878); The Pirates of Penzance (1879); Patience (1881); Iolanthe (1882); Princess Ida (1884); The Mikado (1885); Ruddigore (1887); The Yeomen of the Guard (1888); The Gondoliers (1889); Utopia Limited (1893); The Grand Duke (1896)]. 1982, 1984, 1996. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2001.



Leslie Baily: The Gilbert & Sullivan Book (1952)


Secondary:


7. Pearson, Hesketh. Gilbert and Sullivan: A Biography. 1935. Penguin Books, 791. Harmondsworth: Penguin / London: Hamish Hamilton Ltd., 1950.
8. Baily, Leslie. The Gilbert & Sullivan Book: Revised Edition. 1952. London: Cassell & Company Ltd., 1956.
9. Baily, Leslie. Gilbert & Sullivan and Their World. 1973. London: Book Club Associates / Thames and Hudson Ltd., 1974.

Ian Bradley, ed.: The Complete Annotated Gilbert and Sullivan (2016)

•

SF Luminaries: Robert Silverberg

Robert Silverberg (2005)

My PhD supervisor at the University of Edinburgh, Colin Manlove, a noted authority on Fantasy and SF, once told me that Robert Silverberg was his favourite writer in the genre, referring to him as 'the perfect Science Fiction machine.'

Robert Silverberg: Lord Valentine's Castle (1980)

Of course, that was back in the 1980s, shortly after Silverberg had staged a spectacular come-back, after a five year hiatus from fiction-writing, with Lord Valentine's Castle. But it was probably not such later works as the Majipoor series Colin had in mind so much as Silverberg's immense output as a Jack-of-all-trades pulp writer from the mid-1950s to roughly the mid-1970s.

The Collected Stories of Robert Silverberg: Pluto in the Morning Light (1: 1992)

The Collected Stories of Robert Silverberg: The Secret Sharer (2: 1993)

The Collected Stories of Robert Silverberg (3-6: 1994-2000)

Recently I've been rereading all six volumes of The Collected Stories of Robert Silverberg issued by the HarperCollins UK imprint Voyager between 1992 and 2000. There's a couple of thousand pages of material in there, 106 stories in all - to which should be added another 16 collected in its immediate predecessor, The Conglomeroid Cocktail Party (1984). It ranges from a selection of his earliest magazine publications in the early 50s to his later work from the 80s and 90s.

Robert Silverberg: Collected Stories (9 vols: 2006-14)

Characteristically, though, Silverberg ultimately repudiated this series - which does, admittedly, range somewhat arbitrarily over time and space - in favour of an even more comprehensive assemblage, the 9-volume Collected Stories pictured above (you'll find further details in my somewhat SF-weighted attempt at a Silverberg bibliography below).

Robert Silverberg: In the Beginning: Tales from the Pulp Era (2006)

Even this 9-volume, 151-story version (supplemented by another couple of volumes - 33 stories - of "Tales from the Pulp Era") is a mere selection from his actual production over this period, though.

Robert Silverberg: Early Days: More Tales from the Pulp Era (2016)

So is "Robert Silverberg" just another version of Kurt Vonnegut's imaginary Kilgore Trout, a pulp-sci-fi-churning prodigy renowned for the quantity rather than the quality of his output? Readers who confined themselves solely to his early work might be forgiven for thinking so.

Reddit: Kilgore Trout Memorial (1907-1981)

I think what interested Colin Manlove most, though, were the insistent themes and motifs which recur throughout Silverberg's work, but particularly after the late 1960s: themes comparatively unusual for SF at the time, such as:

1. the strong desire of so many of his protagonists to be subsumed in some sort of a cosmic all;
2. a fascination with doubles and alternate selves;
3. & a far greater preoccupation with sex (and gender politics generally) than previous SF writers had been allowed - or had allowed themselves - to explore.

One could easily protract the list, but each of the three above could easily generate enough material for a critical monograph or (shudder) a Doctoral thesis ...

•

Robert Silverberg: Gilgamesh the King (1984)

There is, however, another side to Robert Silverberg. From the early 1960s until roughly the mid-1970s he wrote an immense amount of non-fictional prose, focussing - for the most part - on subjects from archaeology and ancient history.

Many of these works remain worthwhile in themselves, but they also had the added advantage of opening up a new set of settings and ideas for his fictional work. His biographical novel Gilgamesh the King, for example, led directly to the afterlife story "Gilgamesh in the Outback", eventually collected in the novel-in-linked stories To the Land of the living (1990).

Roma Eterna, Sailing to Byzantium, Thebes of the Thousand Gates, and a number of his other novels and novellas are set either in ancient, or recreated alternative worlds of antiquity. His best-known and most popular series, the Majipoor books, are also heavily influenced by this atmosphere of antique immensity and imperial intrigue.

Robert Silverberg: Great Adventures in Archaeology (1964)

How, then, can we even start to sum up this most protean and prolific of SF writers? It's perhaps not so much that the sheer extent of his work defies categorisation and definition, as that that may not the most interesting way to read it.

These endless tallies of words published in a given year, fees earned from short-lived pulp magazines, emphases on his immense profligacy of invention are very much Silverberg's way of talking about himself.

It's better, then, to focus on the details: particular stories, particular visions - to give up trying to see him as a whole, but instead as a series of fractured parts. He is, after all, no Philip K. Dick. Unlike Dick, it's not in his overall themes he prevails but in the individual facets of his Balzacian overview of the human condition: past, present, and to come.

To start off with, you might try a couple of his later novels, the ones he published alongside the ongoing Majipoor Series about Lord Valentine and his successors (and predecessors). The Face of the Waters (1991) and Kingdoms of the Wall (1992) are two of my favourites: fascinating pieces of pure SF. However, if eco-fiction is more your thing, his 1994 novel Hot Sky at Midnight may seem startlingly prescient of our everyday climate woes right now.

One or other of his various assemblages of short stories is also a must-read. Only there can you get some sense of the prodigious energy and technical mastery which made him a legend among his peers - and, now, his successors.

Robert Silverberg (1971)

•

Internet Fiction Spéculative Base de Données: Robert Silverberg

Robert Silverberg
(1935- )

Books I own are marked in bold:

Novels:


1. Revolt on Alpha C (1955)
2. The 13th Immortal (1956)
3. Master of Life and Death (1957)
4. [with Randall Garrett, as Robert Randall] The Shrouded Planet (1957)
5. Invaders from Earth (1958)
6. [as Calvin M. Knox] Lest We Forget Thee, Earth (1958)
7. Stepsons of Terra (1958)
   • Stepsons of Terra. 1958. An Ace Science Fiction Book. New York: Ace Books, Inc., 1983.
8. [as David Osborne] Aliens from Space (1958)
9. [as David Osborne] Invisible Barriers (1958)
10. [as Ivar Jorgenson] Starhaven (1958)
11. Starman's Quest (1958)
12. [as Calvin M. Knox] The Plot Against Earth (1959)
13. [with Randall Garrett, as Robert Randall] The Dawning Light (1959)
14. The Planet Killers (1959)
15. Lost Race of Mars (1960)
16. Collision Course (1961)
17. The Seed of Earth (1962)
18. Recalled to Life (1962) [Rev. ed. 1972]
19. Blood on the Mink [aka 'Too Much Blood on the Mink'] (1962)
20. The Silent Invaders (1963)
21. Time of the Great Freeze (1964)
22. Regan's Planet (1964)
23. [as Calvin M. Knox] One of Our Asteroids is Missing (1964)
24. Conquerors from the Darkness (1965)
25. The Gate of Worlds (1967)
26. Planet of Death (1967)
27. Thorns (1967)
    • Thorns. 1967. An Orbit Book. London: Futura Publications, 1987.
28. Those Who Watch (1967)
29. The Time Hoppers (1967)
30. To Open the Sky (1967)
    • To Open the Sky. 1967. Sphere Science Fiction. London: Sphere Books Ltd., 1977.
31. The Man in the Maze (1968)
    • The Man in the Maze. 1968. A Tandem Book. London: Tandem Publishing Ltd., 1977.
32. Hawksbill Station (1968) [Best]
    • Hawksbill Station. 1968. A Star Book. London: W. H. Allen & Co., Ltd., 1982.
33. The Masks of Time (1968)
34. Nightwings (1969) [Best]
    • Nightwings. 1969. Sphere Science Fiction. London: Sphere Books Ltd., 1974.
35. Across a Billion Years (1969)
36. Three Survived (1969)
37. To Live Again (1969)
    • To Live Again. 1969. Fontana Science Fiction. London: Fontana/Collins, 1977.
38. Up the Line (1969)
39. Downward to the Earth (1970)
    • Downward to the Earth. 1970. Pan Science Fiction. London: Pan Books, 1978.
40. Tower of Glass (1970)
    • Tower of Glass. 1970. Panther Science Fiction. Frogmore, St Albans, Herts: Granada Publishing Limited, 1976.
41. World's Fair 1992 (1970)
42. Son of Man (1971)
    • Son of Man. 1971. Panther Science Fiction. Frogmore, St Albans, Herts: Granada Publishing Limited, 1979.
43. The Second Trip (1971)
44. The World Inside (1971)
45. A Time of Changes (1971)
    • A Time of Changes. 1971. Gollancz Classic SF, 3. London: Victor Gollancz Ltd, 1986.
46. The Book of Skulls (1971)
    • The Book of Skulls. 1972. Coronet Books. London: Hodder & Stoughton Paperbacks, 1981.
47. Dying Inside (1972)
    • Dying Inside. 1972. VGSF Classics, 31. London: Victor Gollancz Ltd., 1989.
48. The Stochastic Man (1975)
49. Shadrach in the Furnace (1976)
50. Homefaring (1982) [1: Pluto]
51. Lord of Darkness (1983)
52. Gilgamesh the King (1984)
    • Gilgamesh the King. New York: Arbor House, 1984.
53. Sailing to Byzantium (1985) [1: Pluto]
54. Tom O'Bedlam (1985)
    • Tom O'Bedlam. 1985. An Orbit Book. London: Futura Publications, 1987.
55. Star of Gypsies (1986)
    • Star of Gypsies. 1986. An Orbit Book. London: Futura Publications, 1988.
56. At Winter's End (1988)
    • At Winter's End. 1988. A Legend Book. London: Arrow Books limited, 1990.
57. Project Pendulum (1989)
58. Letters From Atlantis (1990)
59. The New Springtime [aka 'The Queen of Springtime'] (1990)
    • The Queen of Springtime. 1989. A Legend Book. London: Arrow Books limited, 1991.
60. To the Land of the Living (1990) [Living]
    • To the Land of the Living. 1990. VGSF. London: Victor Gollancz Ltd., 1990.
61. [with Isaac Asimov, based on his 1941 story] Nightfall (1990)
62. Thebes of the Hundred Gates (1991) [Thebes]
    • Thebes of the Hundred Gates. 1991. HarperCollins Science Fiction and Fantasy. London: HarperCollins Publishers Ltd., 1994.
63. The Face of the Waters (1991)
    • The Face of the Waters. 1991. A Bantam Spectra Book. New York: Bantam Books, 1992.
64. [with Isaac Asimov, based on his story 'Lastborn' (1958)] Child of Time [aka 'The Ugly Little Boy'] (1991)
65. Kingdoms of the Wall (1992)
    • Kingdoms of the Wall. 1992. Grafton. London: HarperCollins Publishers, 1993.
66. [with Isaac Asimov, based on his story 'The Bicentennial Man' (1976)] The Positronic Man (1992)
67. Hot Sky at Midnight (1994)
    • Hot Sky at Midnight. 1994. A Bantam Spectra Book. New York: Bantam Books, 1995.
68. Starborne (1996)
    • Starborne. 1996. Voyager. London: HarperCollins Publishers, 1997.
69. The Alien Years (1998)
70. The Longest Way Home (2002)
    • The Longest Way Home. Gollancz. London: Orion Publishing Group, 2002.
71. Roma Eterna (2003)
    1. Prologue (AD 450)
    2. With Caesar in the Underworld (529)
    3. A Hero of the Empire (612)
    4. The Second Wave (1108)
    5. Waiting for the End (1198)
    6. An Outpost of the Realm (1453)
    7. Getting to know the Dragon (1790)
    8. The Reign of Terror (1815)
    9. Via Roma (1850)
    10. Tales from the Venia Woods (1897)
    11. To the Promised Land (1970)
    • Roma Eterna. Gollancz. London: Orion Publishing Group, 2003.
72. The Last Song of Orpheus (2010)

Majipoor:


73. Lord Valentine's Castle (1980)
    • Lord Valentine's Castle. 1980. London: Pan Books, 1981.
74. Majipoor Chronicles (1982) [Majipoor]
    Prologue
    1. Thesme and the Ghayrog (1982)
    2. The Time of the Burning (1982)
    3. In the Fifth Year of the Voyage (1981)
    4. Calintane Explains (1982)
    5. The Desert of Stolen Dreams (1981)
    6. The Soul-Painter and the Shapeshifter (1981)
    7. Crime and Punishment (1982)
    8. Among the Dream Speakers (1982)
    9. A Thief in Ni-moya (1981)
    10. Voriax and Valentine (1982)
    Epilogue
    • Majipoor Chronicles. 1982. London: Pan Books, 1983.
75. Valentine Pontifex (1983)
    • Valentine Pontifex. 1983. London: Pan Books, 1985.
76. The Mountains of Majipoor (1995)
    • The Mountains of Majipoor. London: Pan Books, 1995.
77. Sorcerers of Majipoor (1997)
    • Sorcerers of Majipoor. London: Pan Books, 1997.
78. Lord Prestimion (1999)
    • Lord Prestimion. Voyager. London: HarperCollins Publishers, 1999.
79. King of Dreams (2001)
    • The King of Dreams. 2001. Voyager. London: HarperCollins Publishers, 2002.
80. Tales of Majipoor (2013)
    1. The End of the Line (2011)
    2. The Book of Changes (2003)
    3. The Tomb of the Pontifex Dvorn (2011)
    4. The Sorcerer's Apprentice (2004)
    5. Dark Times at the Midnight Market (2010)
    6. The Way They Wove the Spells in Sippulgar (2009)
    7. The Seventh Shrine (1998)
    • Tales of Majipoor. Gollancz. London: Orion Publishing Group, 2013.

Short Stories:


81. Next Stop, the Stars (1962)
82. Godling, Go Home (1964)
83. Needle in a Timestack (1966)
84. The Calibrated Alligator (1969)
85. Dimension Thirteen (1969)
86. The Cube Root of Uncertainty (1970)
87. Parsecs and Parables (1973)
88. Moonferns & Starsongs (1971)
89. The Reality Trip and Other Implausibilities (1972)
90. Valley Beyond Time (1973)
91. Earth's Other Shadow (1973)
92. Unfamiliar Territory (1973) [Unfamiliar]
    1. Caught in the Organ Draft (1972)
    2. {Now + n, Now - n} (1972)
    3. Some Notes on the Pre-Dynastic Epoch (1973)
    4. In the Group (1973)
    5. Caliban (1972)
    6. Many Mansions (1973)
    7. Good News from the Vatican (1971)
    8. Push No More (1972)
    9. The Mutant Season (1973)
    10. When We Went to See the End of the World (1972)
    11. What We Learned from This Morning's Newspaper (1972)
    12. In Entropy's Jaws (1971)
    13. The Wind and the Rain (1973)
    • Unfamiliar Territory. 1973. Coronet Books. London: Hodder & Stoughton Paperbacks, 1981.
93. The Feast of St. Dionysus: Five Science Fiction Stories (1975)
94. Sunrise on Mercury (1975)
95. Capricorn Games (1976)
96. The Best of Robert Silverberg (1976) [Best]
    Barry N. Malzberg: Thinking About Silverberg (1976)
    Robert Silverberg: Introduction (1976)
    1. Road to Nightfall (1958)
    2. Warm Man (1957)
    3. To See the Invisible Man (1963)
    4. The Sixth Palace (1965)
    5. Flies (1967)
    6. Hawksbill Station (1967)
    7. Passengers (1968)
    8. Nightwings (1968)
    9. Sundance (1969)
    10. Good News from the Vatican (1971)
    • The Best of Robert Silverberg. 1976. An Orbit Book. London: Futura Publications, 1978.
97. The Shores of Tomorrow (1976)
98. World of a Thousand Colors (1982)
99. The Conglomeroid Cocktail Party (1984) [Conglomeroid]
    Robert Silverberg: Introduction (1984)
    1. The Far Side of the Bell-Shaped Curve (1982)
    2. The Pope of the Chimps (1982)
    3. The Changeling (1982)
    4. The Man Who Floated in Time (1982)
    5. The Palace at Midnight (1981)
    6. A Thousand Paces Along the Via Dolorosa (1981)
    7. At the Conglomeroid Cocktail Party (1982)
    8. Our Lady of the Sauropods (1980)
    9. Gianni (1982)
    10. The Trouble with Sempoanga (1982)
    11. How They Pass the Time in Pelpel (1981)
    12. Waiting for the Earthquake (1981)
    13. Not Our Brother (1982)
    14. The Regulars (1981)
    15. Jennifer's Lover (1982)
    16. Needle in a Timestack (1983)
    • The Conglomeroid Cocktail Party. 1984. VGSF. London: Victor Gollancz Ltd., 1989.
100. Beyond the Safe Zone (1986)
101. The Collected Stories of Robert Silverberg. 6 vols (1992-2000):
     1. Pluto in the Morning Light (1992) [1: Pluto]
        Robert Silverberg: Introduction (1992)
        1. Homefaring (1983)
        2. Basileus (1983)
        3. Dancers in the Time-Flux (1983)
        4. Gate of Horn, Gate of Ivory (1984)
        5. Amanda and the Alien (1983)
        6. Snake and Ocean, Ocean and Snake [aka 'The Affair'] (1984)
        7. Tourist Trade (1984)
        8. Multiples (1983)
        9. Against Babylon (1986)
        10. Symbiont (1985)
        11. Sailing to Byzantium (1985)
        12. Sunrise on Pluto (1985)
        13. Hardware (1987)
        14. Hannibal's Elephants (1988)
        15. Blindsight (1986)
        • The Collected Stories of Robert Silverberg. Volume 1: Pluto in the Morning Light. Grafton. London: HarperCollins Publishers, 1992.
     2. The Secret Sharer (1993) [2: Secret]
        Robert Silverberg: Introduction (1993)
        1. The Pardoner's Tale (1987)
        2. The Iron Star (1987)
        3. The Secret Sharer (1987)
        4. House of Bones (1988)
        5. The Dead Man's Eyes (1988)
        6. Chip Runner (1989)
        7. To the Promised Land (1989)
        8. The Asenion Solution (1989)
        9. A Sleep and a Forgetting (1989)
        10. Enter a Soldier. Later: Enter Another (1989)
        11. We Are for the Dark (1988)
        • The Collected Stories of Robert Silverberg. Volume 2: The Secret Sharer. Grafton. London: HarperCollins Publishers, 1993.
     3. Beyond the Safe Zone (1994) [3: Beyond]
        Robert Silverberg: Introduction (1994)
        1. Capricorn Games (1974)
        2. The Dybbuk of Mazel Tov IV (1974)
        3. Trips (1974)
        4. Schwartz Between the Galaxies (1974)
        5. Many Mansions (1973)
        6. Good News from the Vatican (1971)
        7. In the Group (1973)
        8. The Feast of St. Dionysus (1973)
        9. Caught in the Organ Draft (1972)
        10. {Now + n, Now - n} (1972)
        11. Caliban (1972)
        12. Getting Across (1973)
        13. Breckenridge and the Continuum (1973)
        14. In the House of Double Minds (1974)
        15. The Science Fiction Hall of Fame (1973)
        16. The Wind and the Rain (1973)
        17. A Sea of Faces (1974)
        18. What We Learned from This Morning's Newspaper (1972)
        19. Ship-Sister, Star-Sister (1973)
        20. When We Went to See the End of the World (1972)
        21. Push No More (1972)
        22. Some Notes on the Pre-Dynastic Epoch (1973)
        23. In Entropy's Jaws (1971)
        24. Ms. Found in an Abandoned Time Machine (1973)
        25. The Mutant Season (1973)
        26. This Is the Road (1973)
        • The Collected Stories of Robert Silverberg. Volume 3: Beyond the Safe Zone. Science Fiction & Fantasy. London: HarperCollins Publishers, 1994.
     4. The Road to Nightfall (1996) [4: Nightfall]
        Robert Silverberg: Introduction (1996)
        1. Road to Nightfall (1958)
        2. Gorgon Planet (1954)
        3. The Silent Colony (1954)
        4. Absolutely Inflexible (1956)
        5. The Macauley Circuit (1956)
        6. The Songs of Summer (1956)
        7. Alaree (1958)
        8. The Artifact Business (1957)
        9. Collecting Team (1956)
        10. A Man of Talent (1966)
        11. One-Way Journey (1957)
        12. Sunrise on Mercury (1957)
        13. World of a Thousand Colours (1957)
        14. Warm Man (1957)
        15. Blaze of Glory (1957)
        16. Why? (1957)
        17. The Outbreeders (1959)
        18. The Man Who Never Forgot (1958)
        19. There Was an Old Woman (1958)
        20. The Iron Chancellor (1958)
        21. Ozymandias (1958)
        • The Collected Stories of Robert Silverberg. Volume 4: The Road to Nightfall. Voyager. London: HarperCollins Publishers, 1996.
     5. Ringing the Changes (1997) [5: Ringing]
        Robert Silverberg: Introduction (1997)
        1. To See the Invisible Man (1963)
        2. The Pain Peddlers (1963)
        3. Neighbor (1964)
        4. The Sixth Palace (1965)
        5. Flies (1967)
        6. Halfway House (1966)
        7. To the Dark Star (1968)
        8. Passengers (1968)
        9. Bride 91 [aka 'Bride Ninety-One'] (1967)
        10. Going Down Smooth (1968)
        11. Fangs of the Trees (1968)
        12. Ishmael in Love (1970)
        13. Ringing the Changes (1970)
        14. Sundance (1969)
        15. How It Was When the Past Went Away (1969)
        16. After the Myths Went Home (1969)
        17. The Pleasure of Their Company (1970)
        18. We Know Who We Are (1970)
        19. Something Wild Is Loose (1971)
        20. The Reality Trip (1970)
        • The Collected Stories of Robert Silverberg. Volume 5: Ringing the Changes. Voyager. London: HarperCollins Publishers, 1997.
     6. Lion Time in Timbuctoo (2000) [6: Lion]
        Robert Silverberg: Introduction (2000)
        1. Lion Time in Timbuctoo (1990)
        2. A Tip on a Turtle (1991)
        3. In the Clone Zone (1991)
        4. Hunters in the Forest (1991)
        5. A Long Night's Vigil at the Temple (1992)
        6. It Comes and Goes (1992)
        7. Looking for the Fountain (1992)
        8. The Way to Spook City (1992)
        9. The Red Blaze Is the Morning (1995)
        10. Death Do Us Part (1996)
        11. The Martian Invasion Journals of Henry James (1996)
        12. Crossing Into the Empire (1996)
        13. The Second Shield (1995)
        • The Collected Stories of Robert Silverberg. Volume 6: Lion Time in Timbuctoo. Voyager. London: HarperCollins Publishers, 2000.
102. Phases of the Moon (2004)
103. Tales from the Pulp Era. 2 vols (2006-2016):
     1. In the Beginning: Tales from the Pulp Era (2006)
        Robert Silverberg: Introduction (2006)
        1. Yokel with Portfolio (1955)
        2. Long Live the Kejwa (1956)
        3. Guardian of the Crystal Gate (1956)
        4. Choke Chain (1956)
        5. Citadel of Darkness (1957)
        6. Cosmic Kill (1957)
        7. New Year's Eve — 2000 A.D.? (1957)
        8. The Android Kill (1957)
        9. The Hunters of Cutwold (1957)
        10. Come Into My Brain! (1958)
        11. Castaways of Space (1958)
        12. Exiled From Earth (1958)
        13. Second Start (1959)
        14. Mournful Monster (1959)
        15. Vampires from Outer Space (1959)
        16. The Insidious Invaders (1959)
     2. Early Days: More Tales from the Pulp Era (2016)
        Robert Silverberg: Introduction (2016)
        1. The Inquisitor (1956)
        2. The Ultimate Weapon (1957)
        3. Harwood's Vortex (1957)
        4. Quick Freeze (1957)
        5. Six Frightened Men (1957)
        6. Puppets Without Strings [aka 'Call Me Zombie!'] (1957)
        7. A Time for Revenge (1957)
        8. Housemaid No. 103 (1957)
        9. Rescue Mission (1957)
        10. Planet of Parasites (1958)
        11. Slaves of the Tree (1958)
        12. Frontier Planet (1958)
        13. The Aliens Were Haters (1958)
        14. The Traders [aka 'The Unique and Terrible Compulsion'] (1958)
        15. Waters of Forgetfulness (1959)
        16. You Do Something to Me (1959)
        17. There's No Place Like Space! (1959)
104. The Collected Stories. 9 vols (2006-2014):
     1. To Be Continued: 1954-59. The Collected Stories, 1 (2006)
        Robert Silverberg: Introduction (2006)
        1. Gorgon Planet (1954) [4: Nightfall]
        2. The Road to Nightfall (1958) [Best] [4: Nightfall]
        3. The Silent Colony (1954) [4: Nightfall]
        4. Absolutely Inflexible (1956) [4: Nightfall]
        5. The Macauley Circuit (1956) [4: Nightfall]
        6. The Songs of Summer (1956) [4: Nightfall]
        7. To Be Continued (1956)
        8. Alaree (1958) [4: Nightfall]
        9. The Artifact Business (1957) [4: Nightfall]
        10. Collecting Team (1956) [4: Nightfall]
        11. A Man of Talent (1956/66) [4: Nightfall]
        12. One-Way Journey (1957) [4: Nightfall]
        13. Sunrise on Mercury (1957) [4: Nightfall]
        14. World of a Thousand Colors (1957) [4: Nightfall]
        15. Warm Man (1957) [Best] [4: Nightfall]
        16. Blaze of Glory (1957) [4: Nightfall]
        17. Why? (1957) [4: Nightfall]
        18. The Outbreeders (1959) [4: Nightfall]
        19. The Man Who Never Forgot (1958) [4: Nightfall]
        20. There Was an Old Woman (1958) [4: Nightfall]
        21. The Iron Chancellor (1958) [4: Nightfall]
        22. Ozymandias (1958) [4: Nightfall]
        23. Counterpart (1959)
        24. Delivery Guaranteed (1959)
     2. To the Dark Star: 1962-69. The Collected Stories, 2 (2007)
        Robert Silverberg: Introduction (2007)
        1. To See the Invisible Man (1963) [Best] [5: Ringing]
        2. The Pain Peddlers (1963) [5: Ringing]
        3. Neighbor (1964) [5: Ringing]
        4. The Sixth Palace (1965) [Best] [5: Ringing]
        5. Flies (1967) [Best] [5: Ringing]
        6. Halfway House (1966) [5: Ringing]
        7. To the Dark Star (1968) [5: Ringing]
        8. Hawksbill Station (1967) [Best]
        9. Passengers (1968) [Best] [5: Ringing]
        10. Bride 91 (1967) [5: Ringing]
        11. Going Down Smooth (1968) [5: Ringing]
        12. The Fangs of the Trees (1968) [5: Ringing]
        13. Ishmael in Love (1970) [5: Ringing]
        14. Ringing the Changes (1970) [5: Ringing]
        15. Sundance (1969) [Best] [5: Ringing]
        16. How It Was When the Past Went Away (1969) [5: Ringing]
        17. A Happy Day in 2381 (1970)
        18. (Now + n, Now - n) (1972) [Unfamiliar] [3: Beyond]
        19. After the Myths Went Home (1969) [5: Ringing]
        20. The Pleasure of Their Company (1970) [5: Ringing]
        21. We Know Who We Are (1970) [5: Ringing]
     3. Something Wild Is Loose: 1969-72. The Collected Stories, 3 (2008)
        Robert Silverberg: Introduction (2008)
        1. Something Wild Is Loose (1971) [5: Ringing]
        2. In Entropy's Jaws (1971) [Unfamiliar] [3: Beyond]
        3. The Reality Trip (1970) [5: Ringing]
        4. Going (1971)
        5. Caliban (1972) [Unfamiliar] [3: Beyond]
        6. Good News from the Vatican (1971) [Unfamiliar] [Best] [3: Beyond]
        7. Thomas the Proclaimer (1972)
        8. When We Went to See the End of the World (1972) [Unfamiliar] [3: Beyond]
        9. Push No More (1972) [Unfamiliar] [3: Beyond]
        10. The Wind and the Rain (1973) [Unfamiliar] [3: Beyond]
        11. Some Notes on the Pre-Dynastic Epoch (1973) [Unfamiliar] [3: Beyond]
        12. The Feast of St. Dionysus (1973) [3: Beyond]
        13. What We Learned from This Morning's Newspaper (1972) [Unfamiliar] [3: Beyond]
        14. The Mutant Season (1973) [Unfamiliar] [3: Beyond]
        15. Caught in the Organ Draft (1972) [Unfamiliar] [3: Beyond]
        16. Many Mansions (1973) [Unfamiliar] [3: Beyond]
     4. Trips: 1972-73. The Collected Stories, 4 (2009)
        Robert Silverberg: Introduction (2009)
        1. In the Group (1973) [Unfamiliar] [3: Beyond]
        2. Getting Across (1973) [3: Beyond]
        3. Ms. Found in an Abandoned Time Machine (1973) [3: Beyond]
        4. The Science Fiction Hall of Fame (1973) [3: Beyond]
        5. A Sea of Faces (1974) [3: Beyond]
        6. The Dybbuk of Mazel Tov IV (1974) [3: Beyond]
        7. Breckenridge and the Continuum (1973) [3: Beyond]
        8. Capricorn Games (1974) [3: Beyond]
        9. Ship-Sister, Star-Sister (1973) [3: Beyond]
        10. This Is the Road (1973) [3: Beyond]
        11. Trips (1974) [3: Beyond]
        12. Born with the Dead (1974)
        13. Schwartz Between the Galaxies (1974) [3: Beyond]
        14. In the House of Double Minds (1974) [3: Beyond]
     5. The Palace at Midnight: 1980-82. The Collected Stories, 5 (2010)
        Robert Silverberg: Introduction (2010)
        1. Our Lady of the Sauropods (1980) [Conglomeroid]
        2. Waiting for the Earthquake (1981) [Conglomeroid]
        3. The Regulars (1981) [Conglomeroid]
        4. The Far Side of the Bell-Shaped Curve (1982) [Conglomeroid]
        5. A Thousand Paces Along the Via Dolorosa (1981) [Conglomeroid]
        6. How They Pass the Time in Pelpel (1981) [Conglomeroid]
        7. The Palace at Midnight (1981) [Conglomeroid]
        8. The Man Who Floated in Time (1982) [Conglomeroid]
        9. Gianni (1982) [Conglomeroid]
        10. The Pope of the Chimps (1982) [Conglomeroid]
        11. Thesme and the Ghayrog (1982) [Majipoor]
        12. At the Conglomeroid Cocktail Party (1982) [Conglomeroid]
        13. The Trouble with Sempoanga (1982) [Conglomeroid]
        14. Jennifer's Lover (1982) [Conglomeroid]
        15. Not Our Brother (1982) [Conglomeroid]
        16. Gate of Horn, Gate of Ivory (1984) [1: Pluto]
        17. Dancers in the Time-Flux (1983) [1: Pluto]
        18. Needle in a Timestack (1983) [Conglomeroid]
        19. Amanda and the Alien (1983) [1: Pluto]
        20. Snake and Ocean, Ocean and Snake (1984) [1: Pluto]
        21. The Changeling (1982) [Conglomeroid]
        22. Basileus (1983) [1: Pluto]
        23. Homefaring (1983) [1: Pluto]
     6. Multiples: 1983-87. The Collected Stories, 6 (2011)
        Robert Silverberg: Introduction (2011)
        1. Tourist Trade (1984) [1: Pluto]
        2. Multiples (1983) [1: Pluto]
        3. Against Babylon (1986) [1: Pluto]
        4. Symbiont (1985) [1: Pluto]
        5. Sailing to Byzantium (1985) [1: Pluto]
        6. Sunrise on Pluto (1985) [1: Pluto]
        7. Hardware (1987) [1: Pluto]
        8. Hannibal's Elephants (1988) [1: Pluto]
        9. Blindsight (1986) [1: Pluto]
        10. Gilgamesh in the Outback (1986) [Living]
        11. The Pardoner's Tale (1987) [2: Secret]
        12. The Iron Star (1987) [2: Secret]
        13. The Secret Sharer (1987) [2: Secret]
        14. House of Bones (1988) [2: Secret]
     7. We Are for the Dark: 1987-90. The Collected Stories, 7 (2012)
        Robert Silverberg: Introduction (2012)
        1. The Dead Man's Eyes (1988) [2: Secret]
        2. Enter a Soldier. Later: Enter Another (1989) [2: Secret]
        3. To the Promised Land (1989) [2: Secret]
        4. Chip Runner (1989) [2: Secret]
        5. A Sleep and a Forgetting (1989) [2: Secret]
        6. In Another Country (1989)
        7. The Asenion Solution (1989) [2: Secret]
        8. We Are for the Dark (1988) [2: Secret]
        9. Lion Time in Timbuctoo (1990) [6: Lion]
        10. A Tip on a Turtle (1991) [6: Lion]
     8. Hot Times in Magma City: 1990-95. The Collected Stories, 8 (2013)
        Robert Silverberg: Introduction (2013)
        1. In the Clone Zone (1991) [6: Lion]
        2. Hunters in the Forest (1991) [6: Lion]
        3. A Long Night's Vigil at the Temple (1992) [6: Lion]
        4. Thebes of the Hundred Gates (1992) [Thebes]
        5. It Comes and Goes (1992) [6: Lion]
        6. Looking for the Fountain (1992) [6: Lion]
        7. The Way to Spook City (1992) [6: Lion]
        8. The Red Blaze Is the Morning (1995) [6: Lion]
        9. Death Do Us Part (1996) [6: Lion]
        10. The Martian Invasion Journals of Henry James (1996) [6: Lion]
        11. Crossing Into the Empire (1996) [6: Lion]
        12. The Second Shield (1995) [6: Lion]
        13. Hot Times in Magma City (1995)
     9. The Millennium Express: 1995-2009. The Collected Stories, 9 (2014)
        Robert Silverberg: Introduction (2014)
        1. Diana of the Hundred Breasts (1996)
        2. Beauty in the Night (1997)
        3. Call Me Titan (1997)
        4. The Tree That Grew from the Sky (1996)
        5. The Church at Monte Saturno (1997)
        6. Hanosz Prime Goes to Old Earth (2006)
        7. The Millennium Express (2000)
        8. Travelers (1999)
        9. The Colonel Returns to the Stars (2004)
        10. The Eater of Dreams (2007)
        11. A Piece of the Great World (2005)
        12. Against the Current (2007)
        13. The True Vintage of Erzuine Thale (2009)
        14. Defenders of the Frontier (2010)
        15. The Prisoner (2010)
        16. Smithers and the Ghosts of the Thar (2011)
        • The Millennium Express: 1995-2009. The Collected Stories, 9. 2014. Burton, MI: Subterranean Press, 2015.
     10. [with Randall Garrett] A Little Intelligence (2009)

Non-fiction:


105. Treasures Beneath the Sea. Illustrated by Norman Kenyon (1960)
106. [as Edgar Black] Sir Winston Churchill: The Compelling Life Story of one of the Towering Figures of the 20th Century (1961)
107. First American into Space (1961)
108. Lost Cities and Vanished Civilizations (1962)
109. [as Walter Drummond] Philosopher of Evil (1962)
110. The Fabulous Rockefellers (1963)
111. Sunken History: The Story of Underwater Archaeology (1963)
112. [as Walter Drummond] How to Spend Money (1963)
113. Fifteen Battles that Changed the World (1963)
114. Empires in the Dust: Ancient Civilizations Brought to Light (1963)
115. Home of the Red Man: Indian North America before Columbus (1963)
116. [as L. T. Woodward] The History of Surgery (1963)
117. The Great Doctors (1964)
118. Man Before Adam: The Story of Man in Search of His Origins (1964)
119. Akhnaten: The Rebel Pharaoh (1964)
120. [as Franklin Hamilton] 1066 (1964)
121. [as Walker Chapman] The Loneliest Continent: The Story of Antarctic Discovery (1964)
122. The Man Who Found Nineveh: The Story of Austen Henry Layard (1964)
123. Great Adventures in Archaeology: From Belzoni to Woolley. 1964. Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1985.
124. Socrates (1965)
125. Scientists And Scoundrels: A Book of Hoaxes (1965)
126. Men Who Mastered the Atom (1965)
127. Niels Bohr: The Man Who Mapped the Atom (1965)
128. The Old Ones: Indians of the American Southwest (1965)
129. The Great Wall of China (1965)
130. The World of Coral (1965)
131. [as Franklin Hamilton] The Crusades (1965, )
132. [as Walker Chapman] Antarctic Conquest: The Great Explorers in Their Own Words (1966)
133. The Long Rampart: The Story of the Great Wall of China (1966)
134. [as Lee Sebastian] Rivers: A Book to Begin On (1966)
135. Forgotten by Time: A Book of Living Fossils (1966)
136. Frontiers in Archeology (1966)
137. [as Walker Chapman] Kublai Khan: Lord of Xanadu (1966)
138. [as Roy Cook] Leaders Of Labor (1966)
139. Bridges (1966)
140. To the Rock of Darius: The Story of Henry Rawlinson (1966)
141. [as Lloyd Robinson] The Hopefuls: Ten Presidential Campaigns (1966)
142. The Morning of Mankind: Prehistoric Man in Europe (1967)
143. [as Walker Chapman] The Golden Dream: Seekers of El Dorado (1967)
144. The Auk, the Dodo and the Oryx (1967)
145. The World of the Rain Forests (1967)
146. The Dawn of Medicine (1967)
147. The Adventures of Nat Palmer (1967)
148. [as Franklin Hamilton] Challenge for a Throne: The Wars of the Roses (1967)
149. Men Against Time: Salvage Archeology in the United States (1967)
150. Light for the World: Edison and the Power Industry (1967)
151. [as Walker Chapman] The Search for Eldorado (1967)
152. [as L. T. Woodward] Sophisticated Sex Techniques in Marriage (1967)
153. Mound Builders of Ancient America: The Archeology of a Myth (1968)
154. The World of the Ocean Depths (1968)
155. [as Lloyd Robinson] The Stolen Election: Hayes vs. Tilden, 1876 (1968)
156. Four Men Who Changed the Universe (1968)
157. [as Paul Hollander] Sam Houston (1968)
158. [as Lee Sebastian] The South Pole: A Book to Begin On (1968)
159. Stormy Voyager (1968)
160. Ghost Towns of the American West (1968)
161. Vanishing Giants: The Story of the Sequoias (1969)
162. Wonders of Ancient Chinese Science (1969)
163. The Challenge of Climate: Man and His Environment (1969)
164. Bruce of the Blue Nile (1969)
165. The World of Space (1969)
166. If I Forget Thee, O Jerusalem (1970)
167. The Seven Wonders of the Ancient World (1970)
168. Mammoths, Mastodons and Man (1970)
169. The Mound Builders (1970)
170. The Pueblo Revolt (1970)
171. Clocks for the Ages: How Scientists Date the Past (1971)
172. To The Western Shore: Growth of the United States 1776-1853 (1971)
173. Before The Sphinx: Early Egypt (1971)
174. [with Arthur C. Clarke] Into Space: A Young Person's Guide to Space (1971)
175. The Realm of Prester John (1972)
176. The Longest Voyage: Circumnavigation in the Age Of Discovery (1972)
177. John Muir, Prophet Among the Glaciers (1972)
178. The World Within the Ocean Wave (1972)
179. The World Within the Tide Pool (1972)
180. Drug Themes in Science Fiction (1974)
181. Reflections and Refractions: Thoughts on Science Fiction, Science and Other Matters (1997) [Rev. ed. 2016]
182. Musings and Meditations (2011)

Edited:


183. Earthmen & Strangers (1966)
184. Voyagers in Time (1967)
185. Alpha
     1. Alpha 1 (1970)
     2. Alpha 2 (1971)
     3. Alpha 3 (1972)
     4. Alpha 4 (1973)
     5. Alpha 5 (1974)
     6. Alpha 6 (1976)
     7. Alpha 7 (1977)
     8. Alpha 8 (1977)
     9. Alpha 9 (1978)
186. The Science Fiction Hall of Fame
     1. Volume One, 1929–1964 (1970)
     2. Volume Two (1973)
187. [with Roger Zelazny & James Blish] Three For Tomorrow. Foreword by Arthur C. Clarke (1970)
188. New Dimensions
     1. New Dimensions 1 (1971)
     2. New Dimensions II (1972)
     3. New Dimensions 3 (1973)
     4. New Dimensions IV (1974)
     5. New Dimensions Science Fiction 5 (1975)
     6. New Dimensions Science Fiction 6 (1976)
     7. New Dimensions Science Fiction 7 (1977)
     8. New Dimensions Science Fiction 8 (1978)
     9. New Dimensions Science Fiction 9 (1979)
     10. New Dimensions Science Fiction 10 (1980)
     11. [with Marta Randall] New Dimensions 11 (1980)
     12. [with Marta Randall] New Dimensions 12 (1981)
189. Deep Space: Eight Stories of Science Fiction (1973)
190. Infinite Jests: The Lighter Side of Science Fiction (1974)
191. Mutants (1974)
192. [with Roger Elwood] Epoch (1975)
193. Strange Gifts (1975)
194. [with Martin H. Greenberg & Joseph Olander] Dawn of Time (1979)
195. The Edge of Space (1979)
196. The Best of Randall Garrett (1982)
197. The Fantasy Hall of Fame
     1. [with Martin H. Greenberg] The Fantasy Hall of Fame (1983)
     2. The Fantasy Hall of Fame (1998)
198. Nebula Award anthologies
     1. The Nebula Awards #18 (1983)
     2. Nebula Awards Showcase 2001 (2001)
199. [with Karen Haber] Universe Anthologies
     1. Universe 1 (1990)
     2. Universe 2 (1992)
     3. Universe 3 (1994)
200. Murasaki: A Novel in Six Parts. By Poul Anderson, Greg Bear, Gregory Benford, David Brin, Nancy Kress, & Frederick Pohl. 1992. Grafton. London: HarperCollins Publishers, 1993.
201. Legends
     1. Legends. Voyager. London: HarperCollins Publishers, 1998.
     2. Legends II: New Short Novels by the Masters of Modern Fantasy. A Del Rey Book. New York: Ballantine Books, 2004.
202. Far Horizons: All New Tales from the Greatest Worlds of Science Fiction. An Orbit Book. London: Little, Brown & Company (UK), 1999.
203. [with Martin H. Greenberg] Robert Silverberg Presents the Great SF Stories: 1964 (2001)
204. Tales from Super-Science Fiction (2011)
205. Times Three (2011)

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Robert Silverberg: The Last Song of Orpheus (2010)

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