Nightwings

By Robert Silverberg

Winner of the Hugo Award: This classic is an “evocative look at a crumbling Earth of the far future and a human race struggling to survive” (George R. R. Martin).
“Roum is a city built on seven hills. They say it was a capital of man in one of the earlier cycles. I knew nothing of that, for my guild was Watching, not Remembering.” For a thousand years, mankind has lived under the threat of invasion from an alien race. After the oceans rose and the continents were reshaped, people divided into guilds—Musicians, Scribes, Merchants, Clowns, and more. The Watchers wander the earth, scouring the skies for signs of enemies from the stars. But during one Watcher’s journey to the ancient city of Roum with his companion, a Flier named Avluela, a moment of distraction allows the invaders to advance. When the Watcher finally sounds the alarm, it’s too late; the star people are poised to conquer all. And so, with the world in turmoil, the Watcher sets out alone for the Hall of the Rememberers, keepers of the past, where humanity’s last hope for survival might be hidden . . .  

Perfect for readers of Greg Bear and Ursula K. Le Guin, renowned, award-winning author Robert Silverberg’s science fiction novel represents the best of the genre and beyond. This ebook features an illustrated biography of Robert Silverberg including rare images and never-before-seen documents from the author’s personal collection.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Open Road Media
• Release date: May 14, 2013
• ISBN: 9781480418059

Robert Silverberg

Robert Silverberg has written more than 160 science fiction novels and nonfiction books. In his spare time he has edited over 60 anthologies. He began submitting stories to science fiction magazines when he was just 13. His first published story, entitled "Gorgon Planet," appeared in 1954 when he was a sophomore at Columbia University. In 1956 he won his first Hugo Award, for Most Promising New Author, and he hasn't stopped writing since. Among his standouts: the bestselling Lord Valentine trilogy, set on the planet of Majipoor, and the timeless classics Dying Inside and A Time of Changes. Silverberg has won the prestigious Nebula Award an astonishing five times, and Hugo Awards on four separate occasions; he has been nominated for both awards more times that any other writer. In 2004, the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America gave him their Grand Master award for career achievement, making him the only SF writer to win a major award in each of six consecutive decades.

Book preview

PRAISE FOR THE WRITING OF ROBERT SILVERBERG

"Nightwings is Robert Silverberg at the top of his form, and when Silverberg is at the top of his form, no one is better. A haunting, evocative look at a crumbling Earth of the far future and a human race struggling to survive amidst the ruins, full of memorable characters and images that will long linger in your memory, this is one of the enduring classics of science fiction." —George R. R. Martin

No matter if Silverberg is dealing with material that is practically straight fiction, or going way into the future … his is the hand of a master of his craft and imagination. —Los Angeles Times

The John Updike of science fiction. —The New York Times Book Review

What wonders and adventures he has to tell us. —Ursula K. Le Guin

He is a master. —Robert Jordan

One of the very best. —Publishers Weekly

In the field of science fiction, Silverberg occupies a place in the highest echelon. His work is distinguished by elegance of style, intellectual precision, and far-reaching imagination. —Jack Vance

When one contemplates Robert Silverberg it can only be with awe. In terms of excellence he has few peers, if any. —Locus

Robert Silverberg is our best … Time and time again he has expanded the parameters of science fiction. —The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction

Nightwings

Robert Silverberg

For Harlan,

to remind him of open windows,

the currents of the Delaware River,

quarters with two heads,

and other pitfalls.

Contents

Introduction

Part I : Nightwings

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

8

Part II : Among the Rememberers

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

8

Part III : The Road to Jorslem

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

8

9

10

11

12

A Biography of Robert Silverberg

INTRODUCTION

The messy, chaotic, and ultimately well-nigh apocalyptic year of 1968—the year of the Tet Offensive and other dismal military events in Vietnam, the year Robert F. Kennedy and Martin Luther King Jr. were assassinated, the year when student protesters turned universities all over the world into armed camps, when Soviet troops marched into Prague to snuff out Czech liberty, when the Democratic Party’s national convention produced open warfare in the streets of Chicago—gave me a private foretaste of the turmoil it was destined to bring nearly everyone when, on a bitterly cold February night, I awakened at half past three in the morning to discover that my house was on fire.

By dawn I knew the worst. The roof was gone; the attic, where I kept a reference library, had been gutted; my third-floor office was partially destroyed; the lower floors of the house had suffered such extensive water damage that the entire structure would have to be rebuilt from within. And so, amidst the worldwide lunacy and nightmarish frenzy of that strange year, I would find myself living in exile from the splendid New York City house for the next nine months—nine months of exhaustion, depression, improvised quarters, cartons and packing crates, and limited access to the reference materials I needed for my work, to my own files and notes, to everything that was part of an inordinately active literary career. While the rest of the world was exuberantly taking leave of its sanity that year, I was struggling to hang on to mine.

Though the impact of the fire on every aspect of my life had left me drained of energy, my post-fire expenses were inordinate, and I had no choice but to get back to work as soon as I could. The first thing I wrote after the fire—I began it about ten days later, and completed it, groggy as I was, in something like five days—was a 19,000-word novella called Nightwings.

I had no idea that I was beginning a novel then. I was too weary to think about anything that required such a long-term commitment. A quick story for one of the top-level science-fiction magazines would bring me about $500—something like $5,000 in modern purchasing power—and that would get me through the basic living expenses of the first few weeks. The story came to me, as so many of mine do, with the title first. Nightwings, I said to myself. What could that possibly refer to? And then a group of images: a winged girl, a sky full of invading alien ships, a blinded prince. Within moments, a story had come together in my mind, by a process I have never dared to try to understand. I knew I would set it in the very far future and try for a certain romantic, incantatory tone. Even the first sentence arrived in that early wonderful rush: Roum is a city built on seven hills.

I wrote it in a wild, dizzy rush and, early in March of 1968, sent it to Frederik Pohl, who was then the editor of Galaxy, the leading science-fiction magazine of that period. Fred bought it immediately. He had once had a house fire of his own and knew precisely what I was going through, and he sent me a check by return mail. I hadn’t expected him to reject it; accepting it was the sort of favor that one professional would automatically grant another in a time of crisis. But what he didn’t manage to tell me was just how much he actually liked the story. As he explained in some chagrin a couple of months later, I just discovered that I dictated a letter to you on ‘Nightwings’ when I got it, and it was never typed up. This is a serious oversight, because what I said in the letter was that I thought it was a great story and admired you enormously for having written it.

That was a good thing to hear, because Fred and I had had some pretty heated correspondence in the interim about the two sequels to the original story, and I welcomed the pacifying gesture. But at the time I wrote the original novella, I had no time to worry about whether it was a great story, or even a good one, or whether Fred Pohl really and truly loved it. What mattered was the check for $513 that the story produced, which would pay several weeks’ rent at my current temporary quarters.

I went on quickly to write some other things that I had promised to other editors. But, the week Fred’s check arrived, it occurred to me that the Nightwings novella was, in fact, the opening section of a three-part novel that would carry my protagonist deeper and deeper into the strange world I had created, until he, and the entire conquered Earth, attained rebirth and redemption.

So, a couple of days after I had delivered Nightwings the novella, I told Fred Pohl—who tended to like series stories anyway—that I was going to write two sequels of about the same length as the first story. Go ahead, he told me, and I went to Avon Books, one of several publishers who were doing my science-fiction novels then, and arranged to have the completed work published by them in book form. As soon as I was free of my other commitments of the moment, I set about writing the second novella, which I called Among the Rememberers.

It was completed by mid-April, while in the outside world the Martin Luther King assassination was taking place and wild riots in the black neighborhoods of many American cities would follow. I sent the second installment to Fred and, of course, he bought it, because as an editor he was committed to publishing the whole series, and because as my friend he wanted to help me financially in this difficult time.

The only problem was that he didn’t much like it.

The middle story of any series, be it three novellas or three huge segments of a trilogy of novels, always presents certain difficulties. By its very nature it is a transitional entity, extending the narrative content of the first part by introducing new material that is resolved internally by the time the story ends, but not bringing the overall plot to a resolution, because that must be saved for the final installment. Fred understood this point as well as I did; but he was editing a magazine, and everything he published that was not billed as a serial novel needed to seem reasonably complete in itself, and he did not feel that Among the Rememberers achieved that goal—nor, he said, did it add as much new plot material as he had been expecting. He said it pretty roughly. As old friends sometimes do, we sometimes spoke pretty bluntly to each other.

Quite naturally, I disagreed, and we had a brisk little exchange of letters in which I defended myself by saying, I am, in essence, palming a novel off on you here, though that isn’t what I meant to do at the outset; and my ideas of what the middle section of a novel ought to be and do don’t necessarily coincide with your ideas of what a lead novella ought to be and do. I pointed out that we had had the same discussion over the middle story of a previous series I had done for him, the group of five novelettes that became my book To Open the Sky. And I concluded: So I plead not guilty to villainy. I do my best; sometimes my best is not good enough to please either of us; I’m thankful that you’re kind enough to print it anyway, in the hope of seeing better from me some day. I’m also aware that you’re trying to impose higher standards on me than your own readers impose, and I don’t object to that at all, since your critical comments do keep goading and annoying me to higher levels of accomplishment. Believe me, I feel you behind me, clucking your tongue in disapproval, with every page I write.

Despite his reservations about the second story, he bought it. That was in early May of 1968. (He changed my title to Perris Way, which I thought was meaningless, but Fred almost always changed my titles. I was used to it.)

It was a couple of months before I got around to the third Nightwings story. I was still living in rented quarters, working in the most improvised sort of way, but I had all sorts of contracts to fulfill—a book on the redwood trees of California, some articles on archaeological themes for a Minneapolis newspaper, and a young readers’ novel called World’s Fair, 1992. Meanwhile, police stormed five student-occupied buildings at my alma mater, Columbia University, to end a sit-in by war protesters; all of France was paralyzed by a general strike; the U.S. Supreme Court upheld a new law making it illegal to burn draft cards; and Robert F. Kennedy was assassinated while campaigning for the presidency in Los Angeles. Against this background of personal stress and mounting global madness, I sat down to write the third, the redemptive and resolving, segment of the Nightwings stories toward the end of June. I called it The Road to Jorslem —Jorslem being my far-future version of Jerusalem—and the title was intended to evoke some echo of the spiritual experiences of the man who would become St. Paul on the road to Damascus.

Once again Fred Pohl had serious reservations about the story, and let me know about them very straightforwardly indeed. Once again he bought it anyway. And, of course, he told me he was going to change the title for its magazine appearance—perhaps The Road to Jorslem sounded too much like an old Bob Hope and Bing Crosby movie to him—but I didn’t fight him on the point. For me the job was over, the book was done, and, as the turbulent year of 1968 went on and on, I had to get on to my next project, a novel called Across a Billion Years.

Nightwings, the first of the three stories, was published in July, in the edition of Galaxy dated September 1968. It won immediate reader acclaim, and when I showed up at that year’s World Science Fiction Convention in Berkeley, California (where the People’s Park riots were going on practically next door, and whiffs of tear gas drifted through the convention hotel), I heard much in its praise. Story number two, Fred’s Perris Way, appeared in the November 1968 issue. The final story, now titled simply To Jorslem, followed in the February 1969 issue.

At that time, Fred ran a reader poll to determine the favorite stories of the year from Galaxy and its companion If, and in mid-December of 1968—I had moved back into my house by then, though it was only half rebuilt (the week I moved back, three Apollo astronauts had just set out on history’s first voyage around the Moon)—Fred informed me that on the preliminary ballot his readers had nominated both Nightwings and Perris Way, as well as my novel The Man in the Maze from If. In truly saintly fashion I refrained from reminding Fred that he himself hadn’t liked Perris Way very much, and simply suggested that he remove it from the ballot, letting Nightwings run alone, so that two stories of the same series would not be competing with each other.

I could have saved myself the trouble. Man in the Maze was the one that brought me an award from the Pohl-magazine readership. But other honors were waiting for the novella known as Nightwings. In the spring of 1969, it was one of five stories to make the final Nebula Award ballot in the Best Novella category, though it finished second to Anne McCaffrey’s Dragonrider. Then, a few months later, running against the same group of stories, it won me that year’s Hugo Award for Best Novella. As for the novel that I made out of the three magazine stories by dint of slight revisions and the addition of a small amount of new connective tissue, it was published in September 1969 under the collective title of Nightwings, has been translated into many languages and mentioned in various lists of great science-fiction novels, and now appears once more in a new edition—an electronic edition, no less, a medium that existed only in the realm of science fiction when I wrote Nightwings, but which, in this new century, has become a roaring reality. The storms and stresses of 1968 are ancient history to most of us now, though they are still pretty vivid in my mind. But here is Nightwings the novel, an artifact of that horrendous year, although still, I think, a valid vision of Earth’s remote future, brought to a whole generation of new readers in a startlingly post-Gutenbergian way.

—Robert Silverberg

Part I

NIGHTWINGS

ROUM IS A CITY built on seven hills. They say it was a capital of man in one of the earlier cycles. I did not know of that, for my guild was Watching, not Remembering; but yet as I had my first glimpse of Roum, coming upon it from the south at twilight, I could see that in former days it must have been of great significance. Even now it was a mighty city of many thousands of souls.

Its bony towers stood out sharply against the dusk. Lights glimmered appealingly. On my left hand the sky was ablaze with splendor as the sun relinquished possession; streaming bands of azure and violet and crimson folded and writhed about one another in the nightly dance that brings the darkness. To my right, blackness had already come. I attempted to find the seven hills, and failed, and still I knew that this was that Roum of majesty toward which all roads are bent, and I felt awe and deep respect for the works of our bygone fathers.

We rested by the long straight road, looking up at Roum. I said, It is a goodly city. We will find employment there.

Beside me, Avluela fluttered her lacy wings. And food? she asked in her high, fluty voice. And shelter? And wine?

Those too, I said. All of those.

How long have we been walking, Watcher? she asked.

Two days. Three nights.

If I had been flying, it would have been more swift.

For you, I said. You would have left us far behind and never seen us again. Is that your desire?

She came close to me and rubbed the rough fabric of my sleeve, and then she pressed herself at me the way a flirting cat might do. Her wings unfolded into two broad sheets of gossamer through which I could still see the sunset and the evening lights, blurred, distorted, magical I sensed the fragrance of her midnight hair. I put my arms to her and embraced her slender, boyish body.

She said, You know it is my desire to remain with you always, Watcher. Always!

Yes, Avluela.

Will we be happy in Roum?

We will be happy, I said, and released her.

Shall we go into Roum now?

I think we should wait for Gormon, I said, shaking my head. He’ll be back soon from his explorations. I did not want to tell her of my weariness. She was only a child, seventeen summers old; what did she know of weariness or of age? And I was old. Not as old as Roum, but old enough.

While we wait, she said, may I fly?

Fly, yes.

I squatted beside our cart and warmed my hands at the throbbing generator while Avluela prepared to fly. First she removed her garments, for her wings have little strength and she cannot lift such extra baggage. Lithely, deftly, she peeled the glassy bubbles from her tiny feet and wriggled free of her crimson jacket and of her soft, furry leggings. The vanishing light in the west sparkled over her slim form. Like all Fliers, she carried no surplus body tissue: her breasts were mere bumps, her buttocks flat, her thighs so spindly that there was a span of inches between them when she stood. Could she have weighed more than a quintal? I doubt it. Looking at her, I felt, as always, gross and earthbound, a thing of loathsome flesh, and yet I am not a heavy man.

By the roadside she genuflected, knuckles to the ground, head bowed to knees, as she said whatever ritual it is that the Fliers say. Her back was to me. Her delicate wings fluttered, filled with life, rose about her like a cloak whipped up by the breeze. I could not comprehend how such wings could possibly lift even so slight a form as Avluela’s. They were not hawk-wings but butterfly-wings, veined and transparent, marked here and there with blotches of pigment, ebony and turquoise and scarlet. A sturdy ligament joined them to the two flat pads of muscle beneath her sharp shoulderblades; but what she did not have was the massive breastbone of a flying creature, the bands of corded muscle needed for flight. Oh, I know that the Fliers use more than muscle to get aloft, that there are mystical disciplines in their mystery. Even so, I, who was of the Watchers, remained skeptical of the more fantastic guilds.

Avluela finished her words. She rose; she caught the breeze with her wings; she ascended several feet. There she remained, suspended between earth and sky, while her wings beat frantically. It

Reviews for Nightwings

[ikeman100 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

Interesting story. I'll read more by Silverberg

[altheaann · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Have you ever noticed the weird psychological effect where, if you're reading a new edition of a work, it just doesn't "feel" old (but if you're reading an old paperback with yellowed pages and a half-naked chick on the cover, it will undoubtedly feel dated?) Well, this copy of 'Nightwings,' which was written in 1968, does, admittedly, have the unclad female (tho' such a pretty, tasteful one!), but it's all new and shiny, and I didn't feel the story seemed dated at all. Interesting.
Anyway.
Silverberg gives us, in his Hugo-award winning 'Nightwings' an Earth approximately 35,000 years in the future. Humanity has risen, and (through hubris, bad political moves, and the unfortunate effects of trying to change the planet's climate) subequently fallen.
Society is strictly governed by membership in guilds, some of which fill expected places in society... politics, mercantilism, historians, service industries... and some groups which are odder, such as the beautiful butterfly-winged fliers, created by genetic engineering in the Second Age, or the guildless Changelings, monstrous-looking outcasts, mistakes engendered by that same tinkering.
Our lead character is a Watcher, his life devoted to using a cart of instruments which allow him to monitor space for unknown alien invaders. It is barely remembered why the Watchers were set up - they seem practically useless... but little known to humanity, the invasion is nearly upon Earth...
Through three linked novellas, we follow the elderly Watcher on a journey through three ancient cities... first Roum, where he loves the lovely flier Avluela, but she loves the grotesque changeling(?) Gorman... Invaders set him on the path to Perris, along with a prince in disguise, where he becomes an historian, and later, a traitor(?)... and then to fabled Jorslem, where Pilgrims may have their bodies renewed and their sins cast aside...
At different times, the book reminded me slightly of Tanith Lee's books of Paradys, of Arthur C. Clarke's The City & The Stars, of China Mieville's New Crobuzon.... and also, of Silverberg's own 'Valentine' series... but overall, it was itself... with a beautiful dreamlike quality... very nice.

[staticblaq-1 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

To say this book was interesting is a back-handed compliment. The initial premise had me hooked - a far future Earth, technology declined, plumbing the achievements of the past and awaiting conquerors from the stars. The story touches on the philosophy of conquest, and that gives the story some depth. But very little actually happens, with most of the interesting events occurring offstage.In the end, we are left with a wandering daze of a story.
An interesting premise, an interesting idea, but very little is delivered.

[vinbert-2 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

I really loved this story.

[dulac3_1 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

A short and elegaic SF novel in the 'dying earth' tradition that follows the wanderings of a member of the Watcher's Guild as he looks to the stars in anticipation of a foretold alien invasion of Earth. His companions include a beautiful young 'Flyer' (the "Nightwings" of the title) and an enigmatic Changeling.

As the story unfolds we see great changes come over both the main character and the earth itself. I enjoyed this story for the tone it conveyed as well as the world & characters that were presented. Well worth picking up if you can find a copy.

[unclebob53703 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

**Spoilers** I thought this was a good story, the main character was interesting and sympathetic, and Silverberg does a good job creating an earth that is at once recognizable and very much different. It didn't seem like much happened, although the entire planet gets taken over by aliens--there's almost a sleepwalking quality to the action, as if it's happening all around the narrator but not to him. The other conflicts were muted also, and I think the ending it the weakest part of the book--everything gets resolved and fixed more by a different point of view than any action, and it's all a little too neat and complete for my taste. His novel Dying Inside is one of my all-time favorites, so I'm using the availability of discounted ebooks to read more of his stuff.

[clark7hallman · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Nightwings is another great Robert Silverberg science fiction novel. This edition contains an introduction written by Silverberg in 2002, which provides a very interesting discussion of how he came to write the three novellas that make up Nightwings and what his life was like when he was writing them. His friend, Frederick Pohl, was editor of Galaxy, the leading science fiction magazine at the time, paid Silverberg $500 each to publish them. The first novella, Nightwings, was published in the September 1968 issue of Galaxy and won the Hugo award for best novella in 1969. The second installment and third installments were published in Galaxy in November 1968 and February 1969 respectively. Silverberg later combined the three and first published them as a novel in September 1969. The novel takes place thousands of years in the future on Earth. In it, Silverberg creates a fascinating history of Earth’s civilization. The First Cycle includes the years before earthlings had contact with intelligent beings from other worlds. The Second Cycle began when hamans first encountered intelligent beings from distant worlds. Much technological advancement and trade with other worlds made the Second Cycle very prosperous for Earthlings. However, greed and other human emotions caused much exploitation of the planet and of out-world civilizations. Thus, during the Third Cycle Earthlings came to be viewed by inhabitants from other worlds with contempt. “In many parts of the universe humans were denounced as marauders, kidnapers, and pirates…” The population of at least one planet, who lacked the capability of space travel at the time, vowed to someday invade and conquer Earth as revenge for the cruel treatment of their species by humans. Earth became “a neglected world in a backwater of the universe.” Its economy went bankrupt and resulted in a society or paupers with class and occupational guilds, including Dominators, Masters, Merchants, and many more, to give order to the crumbling society. Silverberg’s engrossing story takes place mostly during the Third Cycle and chronicles the journey and experiences of an aging Watcher, whose purpose is to scan deep space for any signs of impending alien invasion. Carrying his watching equipment on his back, he travels by foot, like most others, stopping several times each day to conduct his watching. He travels with many different companions during his journeys, including beautiful Avluela, a Flier, a member of a re-egineered human species that was created by man for beauty and enjoyment. Her nightwings enable her to fly only at night because they cannot tolerate the sun. His travels take him from Agupt to Roum where he fulfills his responsibilities as a watcher by issuing a warning about an alien invasion. After Earth is conquered he leaves Roum disguised as a Pilgrim with the exiled Prince of Roum and goes to Perris where he becomes an apprentice Rememberer, the guild that researches the past and enables him to learn about Earth’s history. He is later forced from the Remeberer guild and escapes Perris as a member of the Pilgrim guild. He then travels to Jorslem as a pilgrimage and to undergo the renewal procedure. While in Jorslem he reunites with Avluela and plays an important part in the freedom and redemption of earth. Throughout this book Silverberg’s provides a very interesting, enjoyable, satisfying story that is rich in detail. I wish I had read it long ago and I’m certain I will read it again down the road. BTW: As a long-time academic librarian, I was interested that Silverberg included an Indexers guild, and states that they “… record and classify that which they often do not understand…” and that “Without them one scarcely is able to cope with the problems of research.” I wonder why he didn’t call them Librarians. First line: “Roum is a city built on seven hills.” Last line: “And we guided her down through the darkening sky.”