Customer Reviews

The Norton Book of Science Fiction: North American Science Fiction, 1960-1990

5 star:		(2)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(2)
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This is a fine and thoughtful anthology of serious science fiction, compiled mainly by Ursula Le Guin, one of science fiction's finest and most thoughtful voices. As a Brit, I was slightly disappointed by the North American bias -- but the canvas of science fiction is vast, and there must be limitations. That having been said, the book contains more than sixty cracking stories -- and the bulk of science fiction, good and bad, comes from the United States anyway. However, the anthology is flawed by a hang-up about political correctness, which leads to a certain lack of humor. To be sure, it's nice to see a good representation of female authors here, but the emphasis should be on good SF, irrespective of the gender of the author. Happily, the anthology remains just this side of feminist hectoring: after all, I suspect that the publishers would not want to alienate what is probably an overwhelmingly male readership.

While there are some excellent stories in this volume, the editors excluded authors and stories because they didn't meet their politically correct feminist viewpoints. Accordingly, this book doesn't represent a true cross section of the SF field which greatly diminishes it's usefulness as a reference.

This anthology is certainly that: an "anthology", a collection of stories. What it is NOT, however, is a "representative anthology". As an introduction to SF it is terrible. As an intro to "mature" SF it is also terrible. By excluding everything written before 1960-in other words before LeGuin and her associates became active-an enormous number of the genres masterpieces were disqualified. By limiting the collection to American stories-and LeGuin is certainly American- the entire, and seminal, British and Continental contribution to SF goes unrepresented. This is historical revisionism of the worst, most destructive sort. And deeply manipulative.

There is also something fishy going on in the word count. Avowedly feminist -and female- authors put far more words into this volume than the male authors. This, in spite of the fact that most of the SF written today and yesterday is and was written by men. The feminists' (and I have always considered myself one) strongest and longest stories have been included while the shorter, less substantial stories of men are offered. This is suspiciously ideological.

I realize that LeGuin has a vast reputation, and it is certainly as deserved as anybody's. Her fiction and her non-fiction both have an important place in my heart and on my bookshelf. But... the publishers and co-editors have let that reputation blind them to the ideological distortions of this book. And I am here to tell you that the emperor has no clothes.

In this anthology, the wide-ranging editors dared to choose the stories they personally thought were important, rather than accepting consensus reality of everyone else's favorites. I like what they chose. Every story is worth reading.

This anthology is a great collection of short stories from some of the greatest Science Fiction writers of from 1960-1990. This collection was gathered by one of the premier Science Fiction writers of our lifetime, Ursula K. Le Guin. Each story takes you places you have never dreamed of, and truly makes you think about the world around you.