Date: Thu, 31 Mar 2005 11:44:29 -0500
From: "Michael Walsh" <MJW at press.jhu.edu>
To: <WSFAlist at WSFA.org>
Subject: [WSFA] Re: Old School
Reply-To: WSFA members <WSFAlist at WSFA.org>

> sgs at aginc.net 3/30/2005 7:30:39 PM >>>
>Michael Walsh wrote:
>
>>
>> Which brings to mind.... are the books that one should have read
>to be
>> fully informed about the genre?  Sort of, let's say, "The 100
>Essential
>> SF Books You Need To Have Read"?
>>
>> Note: this has nothing to do as to why books are OP, why
>publishing is
>> quite often stupid, or the like.
>
>Hoo boy!  Talk about an  open ended question!
>
>Caveat -- some of these are pretty terrible, but they are important as

>an example of a genre, or were influential on later SF.
>
>Lessee, off the top of my head:
>
>The Time Machine -- H. G. Wells
> From Earth to Moon (or 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea) -- Jules
>Verne
>The King of Elfland's Daughter -- Lord Dunsany
>The House on the Borderland -- William Hope Hodgson
>A Princess of Mars -- Edgar Rice Burroughs
>The Skylark of Space -- E. E. Smith
>I, Robot -- Isaac Asimov
>The Foundation Trilogy -- Isaac Asimov
>The Caves of Steel -- Isaac Asimov
>Slan -- A. E. van Vogt
>The Great Explosion -- Eric Frank Russel

For Russell, I'd pick the NESFA short story collection.  Or his fix-up
novel "Men, Martians, & Machines."

>Retif's War -- Keith Laumer
>Way Station -- Clifford Simak
>Time is the Simplest Thing -- Clifford Simak

And/or City

>Cities in Flight trilogy -- James Blish
>When Worlds Collide & After Worlds Collide -- Philip Wylie
>Conjure Wife -- Fritz Leiber

& as a comparison also: Our Lady of Darkness

>A Canticle for Leibowitz -- Walter M. Miller Jr.
>Brain Wave -- Poul Anderson

Tau Zero

>Lord of the Rings -- J. R. R. Tolkein
>A Wizard of Earthsea -- Usrula K. LeGuin
>The Left Hand of Darkness -- Usrula K. LeGuin
>The Lathe of Heaven -- Usrula K. LeGuin
>The Martian Chronicles -- Ray Bradbury
>Mission of Gravity -- Hal Clement
>Needle -- Hal Clement
>Ophiuchi Hotline -- John Varley

Darn fine first novel, but his reputation is for short fiction.

>The Rolling Stones -- Robert A. Heinlein
>Starship Troopers -- Robert A. Heinlein
>The Moon is a Harsh Mistress -- Robert A. Heinlein
>Stranger in a Strange Land -- Robert A. Heinlein

Rating RAH is opening a can of worms <g>. Caertainly Starship Troopers
is important, but having reread it a few years I was amazed at how,
er... not well written it was.   Too much stoping the story and dragging
out the soap box.

>Childhood's End -- Arthur C. Clarke
>The Towers of Utopia -- Mack Reynolds

Prolific & popular author during his time, but...

>Blood Music -- Greg Bear
>Neuromancer -- William Gibson
>Snow Crash -- Neil Stephenson
>
>And this leaves out the short works by Lovecraft and Tenn and
>Cordwainer
>Smith and Sturgeon and Ellison and Anvil and Schmitz and Brown
>and
>Wellman and ...

All of those writers  - at their best - are well worth reading &
rereading.

>
>Your mileage will almost certainly vary.

Oy vey...  "You like X?  But he/she sucks concentrated swamp water!"

mjw

>
>I'll have to get off my duff and go look through the library.
>
>--
>Steve Smith                                    sgs at aginc dot net
>Agincourt Computing                            http://www.aginc.net
>"Truth is stranger than fiction because fiction has to make sense."