A Time of Changes

By Robert Silverberg

With a new introduction by author Robert Silverberg, and the first-ever map of Borthan, this Nebula Award-winning classic sci-fi novel A Time of Changes, out of print since 1992, will delight fans of dystopian fiction

In the far future, Earth is a worn-out backwater and humanity is spread across the galaxy on worlds that began as colonies, but now feel like home, each with its own long history of a thousand years or more, and each with its own unique culture. One of the strangest is on Borthan, where the founding settlers established the Covenant, which teaches that the self is to be despised, and forbids anyone to reveal his innermost thoughts or feelings to another. On Borthan, the filthiest obscenities imaginable are the words "I" and "me."

For the heinous crime of "self-baring," apostates have always paid with exile or death, but after his eyes are opened by a visitor from Earth, Kinnall Darival, prince of Salla, risks everything to teach his people the real meaning of being human.

At the Publisher's request, this title is being sold without Digital Rights Management Software (DRM) applied.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Macmillan Publishers
• Release date: Apr 27, 2009
• ISBN: 9781429967914

Robert Silverberg

<p>Robert Silverberg has won five Nebula Awards, four Hugo Awards, and the prestigious <em>Prix Apollo.</em> He is the author of more than one hundred science fiction and fantasy novels -- including the best-selling Lord Valentine trilogy and the classics <em>Dying Inside</em> and <em>A Time of Changes</em> -- and more than sixty nonfiction works. Among the sixty-plus anthologies he has edited are <em>Legends</em> and <em>Far Horizons,</em> which contain original short stories set in the most popular universe of Robert Jordan, Stephen King, Ursula K. Le Guin, Gregory Benford, Greg Bear, Orson Scott Card, and virtually every other bestselling fantasy and SF writer today. Mr. Silverberg's Majipoor Cycle, set on perhaps the grandest and greatest world ever imagined, is considered one of the jewels in the crown of speculative fiction.</p>

Book preview

ONE

I AM KINNALL DARIVAL and I mean to tell you all about myself.

That statement is so strange to me that it screams in my eyes. I look at it on the page, and I recognize the hand as my own—narrow upright red letters on the coarse gray sheet—and I see my name, and I hear in my mind the echoes of the brain-impulse that hatched those words. I am Kinnall Darival and I mean to tell you all about myself. Incredible.

This is to be what the Earthman Schweiz would call an autobiography. Which means an account of one’s self and deeds, written by one’s self. It is not a literary form that we understand on our world—I must invent my own method of narrative, for I have no precedents to guide me. But this is as it should be. On this my planet I stand alone, now. In a sense, I have invented a new way of life; I can surely invent a new sort of literature. They have always told me I have a gift for words.

So I find myself in a clapboard shack in the Burnt Lowlands, writing obscenities as I wait for death, and praising myself for my literary gifts.

I am Kinnall Darival.

Obscene! Obscene! Already on this one sheet I have used the pronoun I close to twenty times, it seems. While also casually dropping such words as my, me, myself, more often than I care to count. A torrent of shamelessness. I I I I I. If I exposed my manhood in the Stone Chapel of Manneran on Naming Day, I would be doing nothing so foul as I am doing here. I could almost laugh. Kinnall Darival practicing a solitary vice. In this miserable lonely place he massages his stinking ego and shrieks offensive pronouns into the hot wind, hoping they will sail on the gusts and soil his fellow men. He sets down sentence after sentence in the naked syntax of madness. He would, if he could, seize you by the wrist and pour cascades of filth into your unwilling ear. And why? Is proud Darival in fact insane? Has his sturdy spirit entirely collapsed under the gnawing of mindsnakes? Is nothing left but the shell of him, sitting in this dreary hut, obsessively titillating himself with disreputable language, muttering I and me and my and myself, blearily threatening to reveal the intimacies of his soul?

No. It is Darival who is sane and all of you who are sick, and though I know how mad that sounds, I will let it stand. I am no lunatic muttering filth to wring a feeble pleasure from a chilly universe. I have passed through a time of changes, and I have been healed of the sickness that affects those who inhabit my world, and in writing what I intend to write I hope to heal you as well, though I know you are on your way into the Burnt Lowlands to slay me for my hopes.

So be it.

I am Kinnall Darival and I mean to tell you all about myself.

TWO

LINGERING VESTIGES OF THE customs against which I rebel still plague me. Perhaps you can begin to comprehend what an effort it is for me to frame my sentences in this style, to twist my verbs around in order to fit the first-person construction. I have been writing ten minutes and my body is covered with sweat, not the hot sweat of the burning air about me but the dank, clammy sweat of mental struggle. I know the style I must use, but the muscles of my arm rebel against me, and fight to put down the words in the old fashion, saying, One has been writing for ten minutes and one’s body is covered with sweat, saying, One has passed through a time of changes, and he has been healed of the sickness that affects those who inhabit his world. I suppose that much of what I have written could have been phrased in the old way, and no harm done; but I do battle against the self-effacing grammar of my world, and if I must, I will joust with my own muscles for the right to arrange my words according to my present manner of philosophy.

In any case, however my former habits trick me into mis-constructing my sentences, my meaning will blaze through the screen of words. I may say, I am Kinnall Darival and I mean to tell you all about myself, or I may say, One’s name is Kinnall Darival and he means to tell you all about himself, but there is no real difference. Either way, the content of Kinnall Darival’s statement is—by your standards, by the standards I would destroy—disgusting, contemptible, obscene.

THREE

ALSO I AM TROUBLED, at least in these early pages, by the identity of my audience. I assume, because I must, that I will have readers. But who are they? Who are you? Men and women of my native planet, perhaps, furtively turning my pages by torchlight, dreading the knock at the door. Or maybe other-worlders, reading for amusement, scanning my book for the insight it may give into an alien and repellent society. I have no idea. I can establish no easy relationship with you, my unknown reader. When I first conceived my plan of setting down my soul on paper, I thought it would be simple, a mere confessional, nothing but an extended session with an imaginary drainer who would listen endlessly and at last give me absolution. But now I realize I must take another approach. If you are not of my world, or if you are of my world but not of my time, you may find much here that is incomprehensible.

Therefore I must explain. Possibly I will explain too much, and drive you off by pounding you with the obvious. Forgive me if I instruct you in what you already know. Forgive me if my tone and mode of attack show lapses of consistency and I seem to be addressing myself to someone else. For you will not hold still for me, my unknown reader. You wear many faces for me. Now I see the crooked nose of Jidd the drainer, and now the suave smile of my bondbrother Noim Condorit, and now the silkiness of my bondsister Halum, and now you become the tempter Schweiz of pitiful Earth, and now you are my son’s son’s son’s son’s son, not to be born for a cluster of years and eager to know what manner of man your ancestor was, and now you are some stranger of a different planet, to whom we of Borthan are grotesque, mysterious, and baffling. I do not know you, and so I will be clumsy in my attempts to talk to you.

But, by Salla’s Gate, before I am done you will know me, as no man of Borthan has ever been known by others before!

FOUR

I AM A MAN of middle years. Thirty times since the day of my birth has Borthan traveled around our golden-green sun, and on our world a man is considered old if he has lived through fifty such circuits, while the most ancient man of whom I ever heard died just short of his eightieth. From this you may be able to calculate our spans in terms of yours, if otherworlder you happen to be. The Earthman Schweiz claimed an age of forty-three years by his planet’s reckoning, yet he seemed no older than I.

My body is strong. Here I shall commit a double sin, for not only shall I speak of myself without shame, but I shall show pride and pleasure in my physical self. I am tall: a woman of normal height reaches barely to the lower vault of my chest. My hair is dark and long, falling to my shoulders. Lately streaks of gray have appeared in it, and likewise in my beard, which is full and thick, covering much of my face. My nose is prominent and straight, with a wide bridge and large nostrils; my lips are fleshy and give me, so it is said, a look of sensuality; my eyes are deep brown and are set somewhat far apart in my skull. They have, I am given to understand, the appearance of the eyes of one that has been accustomed all his life to commanding other men.

My back is broad and my chest is deep. A dense mat of coarse dark hair grows nearly everywhere on me. My arms are long. My hands are large. My muscles are well developed and stand out prominently beneath my skin. I move gracefully for a man my size, with smooth coordination; I excel in sports, and when I was younger I hurled the feathered shaft the entire length of Manneran Stadium, a feat that had never been achieved until then.

Most women find me attractive—all but those who prefer a flimsier, more scholarly looking sort of man and are frightened of strength and size and virility. Certainly the political power I have held in my time has helped to bring many partners to my couch, but no doubt they were drawn to me as much by the look of my body as by anything more subtle. Most of them have been disappointed in me. Bulging muscles and a hairy hide do not a skilled lover make, nor is a massive genital member such as mine any guarantee of ecstasy. I am no champion of copulation. See: I hide nothing from you. There is in me a certain constitutional impatience that expresses itself outwardly only during the carnal act; when I enter a woman I find myself swiftly swept away, and rarely can I sustain the deed until her pleasure comes. To no one, not even a drainer, have I confessed this failing before, nor did I ever expect that I would. But a good many women of Borthan have learned of this my great flaw in the most immediate possible way, to their cost, and doubtless some of them, embittered, have circulated the news in order that they might enjoy a scratchy joke at my expense. So I place it on the record here, for perspective’s sake. I would not have you think of me as a hairy mighty giant without also your knowing how often my flesh has betrayed my lusts. Possibly this failing of mine was among the forces that shaped my destinies toward this day in the Burnt Lowlands, and you should know of that.

FIVE

MY FATHER WAS HEREDITARY septarch of the province of Salla on our eastern coast. My mother was daughter of a septarch of Glin; he met her on a diplomatic mission, and their mating was, it was said, ordained from the moment they beheld one another. The first child born to them was my brother Stirron, now septarch in Salla in our father’s place. I followed two years later; there were three more after me, all of them girls. Two of these still live. My youngest sister was slain by raiders from Glin some twenty moontimes ago.

I knew my father poorly. On Borthan everyone is a stranger to everyone, but one’s father is customarily less remote from one than others; not so with the old septarch. Between us lay an impenetrable wall of formality. In addressing him we used the same formulas of respect that subjects employed. His smiles were so infrequent that I think I can recall each one. Once, and it was unforgettable, he took me up beside him on his rough-hewn blackwood throne, and let me touch the ancient yellow cushion, and called me fondly by my child-name; it was the day my mother died. Otherwise he ignored me. I feared and loved him, and crouched trembling behind pillars in his court to watch him dispense justice, thinking that if he saw me there he would have me destroyed, and yet unable to deprive myself of the sight of my father in his

Reviews for A Time of Changes

[fredjryder1946 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

In the far future, Earth is a worn-out backwater and humanity is spread across the galaxy on worlds that began as colonies, but now feel like home, each with its own long history of a thousand years or more, and each with its own unique culture. One of the strangest is on Borthan, where the founding settlers established the Covenant, which teaches that the self is to be despised, and forbids anyone to reveal his innermost thoughts or feelings to another. On Borthan, the filthiest obscenities imaginable are the words "I" and "me." For the heinous crime of "self-baring," apostates have always paid with exile or death, but after his eyes are opened by a visitor from Earth, Kinnall Darival, prince of Salla, risks everything to teach his people the real meaning of being human.

[port22_1 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Borthan is a planet populated by people who refer themselves as "one" instead of "I". The self is despised as a weakness and one never reveals his innermost feelings and thoughts. "Self-baring" is a crime.The book is about the story of Darival, written in first person, it tells how he encounters a way out of the imposed confines of the mind.It is an absorbing read, but is the story of only one single person, it would've been an interesting mental project to develop it on a grander scale and work out how that puritanical society might evolve. Regardless, as a thought experiment this is an example of excellent science-fiction writing.

[Tim Booth · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

good science fiction. better social critique? how far we seem to have come since Silverberg wrote this book. Today it seems all one hears is I I I and me and my and mine.

[samsungapps · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

ggfffdss

[karlstar_1 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

This book is more of a cultural and philosophical study than anything else, true 'speculative fiction'. On the planet of Borthan, settled by humans a long time ago, people are extremely self-sufficient. So much so, that 'self-baring' or 'self-sharing' between people is forbidden and verbal references to self are taboo. 'I' and 'me' are obscenities. Because of the lack of openness, almost all interpersonal transactions are handled with contracts. There is a strange sort of religion that makes use of 'drainers', basically confessors. in this setting we meet Darival Kinnall, second son of a ruler of one of the countries. Darival becomes obsessed with this situation and we follow him through the rest of the book. I thought this was quite interesting and well written, but by it's nature it is not full of action and I thought there was a bit too much of Darival's sex life.

[altheaann · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

now 84% done with the Nebulas...

[vladmihaisima · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

Book focused mostly on an idea and its impact - what if a society would try to avoid human sharing of feelings to each other. Tells the life of one member of such a society that discovers that other possibilities exist. Does not make a very in-depth analysis of the impact of the idea on the world, just hints at people being more unhappy and unable to understand each other. Well written and a believable character, with an interesting world description, but lacks some depth into influences and mechanisms of the analysed idea. While the action happens on a different planet, could have been as well a different country with different traditions.

[dbsovereign · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

A young prince in exile takes a drug that allows one to join one’s mind with another in a land where even saying “I” or “me” is offensive. Harkening back to the saying that “to walk in another man’s shoes” would open one’s mind to their humanity and preclude passing judgment on them, our narrator takes a giant leap of faith. Suffering as an outcast he tells us his tale in the hope that we too can find enlightenment some day in the future. Silverberg has written a story of redemption – a call that would remind us that love is all.

[bookmarque · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

My first Silverberg. This isn’t science fiction proper, Silverberg only uses an alien planet to illustrate an extreme societal concept – that of denial of self. Given how we’ve gone through the ‘me decade’ and morphed into a ‘me society’, it’s challenging to grasp why a society would choose to mandate a dissolution of the individual. This has both benefits and detriments and Silverberg illustrates that pretty well.The main character tries to become a force of change in his society. Cast out of his role as 2nd son, he's never quite fit in anywhere, even in the heavily proscribed friendships assigned to him from birth. His whole life is uncomfortable to him and he's on the run a lot. Finally he ends up in a position of some power, but it is an illusion. Mentally and emotionally he is unstable, but has no outlet for his anguish. No wonder he turns to the drug that can psychically link him to another human. The disconected nature of his society has made him a beaten, desperate man. He longs for change, but has not the vision or the fortitude to be the catalyst and it is pretty sad to watch him spiral into failure and ignominy.One thing that is sort of off-putting to me is the fact that supposedly we’ve got this future society with access to technology not using it at all (there are archaic references to ground machines, air machines and telephones still). It’s funny that a lot of future societies are set up as monarchies with agrarian civilizations and old-world politics and rules. I think it’s a two-fold symptom; the information age hadn’t yet occurred when this was written and Silverberg did not have the vision to see how society would change on a dime. Also, I think the agrarian, monarchical society is innately romantic and lends itself to extreme behavior much better than a republican or democratic society, so that’s why it works better as a vehicle for philosophy and symbology driven stories. It does ruin things for me in a sense though.