Customer Reviews

I have no mouth and I must scream

5 star:		(10)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(4)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

This is a great sampling of Ellison's stories, and Ellison's performance of them gives the listener a sense of the fervor which Ellison must have when he sits down to write. Thought provoking, and great entertainment. Favorites included in the collection: I HAVE NO MOUTH AND I MUST SCREAM, GRAIL, and REPENT HARLEQUIN, SAID THE TICKTOCK MAN.

Having never read Ellison, and having a bad first impression of him personally from his conduct at the World Horror Convention 2000, I didn't start listening to this in the best frame of mind. In fact, at first I cringed to hear his voice again--but by the end of the first story, a real tear-your-face-off classic with the same title as this collection, I couldn't stop listening. I have never heard an author--or actor, for that matter--read so well. From the accents to the cadence to the pacing, Ellison seems born for the stage. And then there's the stories themselves, displaying such a virtuosic breadth of style that each seems written by a different author. It spanned from horror to science fiction to humor, to some real classy drama with characters portrayed with great humanity and sensitivity. The endings were twisted nicely, too. So, how can I reconcile the grouchy old man I saw with this unbelievably well-written and well-performed audio collection? Perhaps Ellison is like Mozart; personally off-putting but a genius at his craft. The Horror Writers Association, at the convention, must have felt the same way, because they gave this audio book a Bram Stoker Award.

I first read this paperback back in the late 60s, I was pretty impressed at that time. After giving it a reread recently, I was still impressed but not quite so captivated as when I was much younger. This is a very, very good group of short stories. My favorite was the title story, of people trapped in a computer. This was quite forward looking of the author when you consider when the story was first published. I do have to agree with a couple of the other reviewers in that I am not at all sure if the author had full control of his narrative at all times. On the other hand, this is sort of a part of the charm of the book. I can well see how this book recieved the Hugo and Nebula Awards during those times. If you are a student of the SiFi genre, then this is one you will probably want to read and own. Recommend it highly.

I bought this collection so I would have some entertainment on the Greyhound trip to Columbus and back for my bar exam. It helped time pass and Harlan is very enthralling storyteller. He brings a lot of dimension to all of his characters, from Blood, the telepathic dog in "A Boy and His Dog," to Ted, the paranoid narrator of "I Have No Mouth and I Must Scream." "I Have No Mouth . . ." and "'Repent Harlequin' Said the Ticktockman" are among Harlan's most prolific stories and come first. The rest range from good to mediocre. I probably could have done without "The Time of the Eye" and "The Lingering Smell of Woodsmoke," but "Laugh Track" is quite hilarious and "Paladin of the Last Hour" is perhaps the most poignant story of Harlan's repertoire that I have heard.
Now for the criticisms -- I think the intro where Harlan discusses "Grail" would have been better placed near that particular story. It kinda stinks to be told about how great a story "Grail" is according to Harlan and have to sit through the entire collection to hear it.
The arrangement needs a little touchup, "A Boy and His Dog" is split between two discs, but the division makes little sense. The vast majority of the story is on one disc with the brief wrap-up on the next. This is bad editing.
Harlan's voice goes from clear to very murky throughout the stories. This makes the stories hard to listen to without constant fussing with the volume. This is especially a problem in "I Have No Mouth . . ." with incredibly loud sound effects throughout the story.
Review in Short
The Good: Good story selection overall, 3-dimensional characterization, good narration from the author.
The Bad: Some illogical placement, poor editing and arrangement, uneven volume.

This is a great story and I owned the eponymous collection many years ago, so I was was really pleased to see it in the Kindle store and I bought it right away. Unfortunately, the Kindle version is just the story, not the entire collection. Huge disappointment. Amazon needs to correct this. Five stars because the story deserves it and I don't want to drag down ratings for Ellison's work, but I am not happy.

But Harlan Ellison is really the best possible narrator for this collection of some of his stories that I can imagine. Yes, he invests a lot in each story, and yes, this involves sometimes moving his mouth a little too far away from the mic, but not a word, not a syllable is lost and so much is gained. So much terror, so much suspense, so much authenticity. You'll feel like you're living in a series of demented worlds that could only have sprung from the demoniac mind of Harlan Ellison. I think it's a nice touch that the manufacturers were able to persuade the busiest man in the writing business to drop what he was doing and revisit his classics. Face it, he's not getting any younger and this narration might be the very last he'll ever do. Some fans however would prefer it if he had "no mouth" at all!

On May 13th, 2000, author, Harlan Ellison, was given the Bram Stoker Award by the Horror Writers of America for his audio recordings contained on The Voice from the Edge : I Have No Mouth, and I Must Scream by Dove Audio.

This volume of Mr. Ellisons' imaginative fiction was the one that hooked me on his writings, years ago. He quickly became my most favorite author and has steadfastly remainded so. There are few other authors who can touch and infect your mind with such vivid imagery, and certainly those few others are only his peers and not his betters. If you are reading these reviews to determine if you should buy *this* book, do it. At least check it out from the library. You will not be disappointed, you may wonder why he is not better known or why it is so hard to find his books in the Mall. I know I still wonder. His name as a contributor pops up in the most unusual places, since I am a fan I notice it. Do yourself a favor, read something by this author, you won't be disappointed.

The All-Singing, All Dancing, Extremely Entertaining Audio Ellison#1:
Having recently purchased -- and seriously enjoyed the hell out of -- Vol. 4 & vol. 5 of Ellison's "The Voice From the Edge" series of Audio book/story & essay collections, I was moved to listen to the first three volumes (purchased as each one came out, earlier this century). I have to admit, like most readers, I have been emboldened and tapdanced by the intelligentsia, so I've always taken it for granted that the title story of this collection, "I Have No Mouth & I Must Scream", is (in addition to being an oft-reprinted storie, the latest reprint being in the Library of America's AMERICAN FANTASTIC TALES: 1940s to Now) in the top 10 of best Ellison stories ever. After many decades (in which, one hopes, some wisdom was achieved), I still see it as one of Ellison best, but certainly not one of his top ten best. Even Ellison, in an introduction, says that he feels the last story in this collection ("Grail") is a better-written, better-told, tale (and he's right). That said, "I Have No Mouth..." _does_ remain one of the starkest, bloodiest, most grim post-apocalypse stories ever written (think about that for a minute, and you'll understand how dark this story really is). The first line -- "Limp, the body of Gorrister hung from the pink palette; unsupported --hanging high above us in the computer chamber, and it did not shiver in the chill, oily breeze that blew eternally through the main cavern." -- is the beginning of a relentless barrage of adjectives and images that deluge the reader (or listener) like an nuclear attack. And Ellison's full-on reading of the story holds nothing back. Fortunately, the next offering, "'Repent Harlequin!' Said the Tick Tock Man" (one of the 12-most reprinted stories in the English language) is also one of Ellison's most comic, and whimsical stories (even though it deals with the importance of civil disobedieance). And Ellison lets loose with a wide range of voices and sounds, becoming a one-man radio show as he pulls out all the stops to deliver a showstopper of reading (and this is only the second story in the collection)!
"The Lingering Scent of Woodsmoke" and "The Time of the Eye" (the third and fifth stories, respectively) are what have been referred to (in my other reviews of these Ellison audio books) as "entertainments": nothing earthshattering, but still enjoyable listening, with the first story dealing with justice brought to an aging Nazis (by an unusual source) and the second dealing with madness. "Laugh Track", a story that would make my list of top 50 Ellison stories, is not only one of about...12 absolutely hilarious tales written by Ellison, it is also one of his most hilarious readings (and I include the readings of "'Repent..." and "Prince Myshkin" in that assessment). In a story that skewers the television industry -- and deals with the ghost of the Italian protagonist's aunt (who makes her self known in a most unusual way) -- Ellison-the-closet-comedian pulls out all the stops and manages to fit in anecdotes, puns, whimsical asides, and sound gags, all while spinning one funny-as-all-get-out yarn about a Television writer/producer, the strange doings behind the scenes (in the technichian's booths and in the offices of the producers) and a loveable aunt named, Babe. "The Very Last Day of a Good Woman" is another "entertainment," and probably the least worthy of the stories included here (another instance where I would've chosen some other tale..."Ediolons," "Mom", or a story from MINDFIELDS), but it's short, and doesn't subtract from this powerful first collection. A Hugo award-winning novelette (which was written at the same time Ellison penned his WGA-award-winning teleplay of the same name for "The Twilight Zone"), "Paladin of the Lost Hour" is a classic of Ellison's later years, and one of his most powerful stories about friendship and personal responsibility.
It involves a black Vietnam War veteran, Billy Kinneta, who meets and befriends an old man who is mugged in a cemetery, while visiting the grave of his long-dead wife. Kinneta discovers that the old man is charged with protecting a magical stopwatch, which contains one very special, very powerful hour of time. Ellison's reading is a heartstopper: funny in all the right spots, energized during the action scenes, and touching, at just the right times. Good stuff. The Nebula-award winning "A Boy and His Dog" is fairly well known (it was even made into an independent movie in the '70s), but for those not in the know: it is an apolcalyptic story set after the last World War, when the surface of the earth is populated mostly by savage boys (and one or two men), who rape (when they find a surviving female) and pillage and plunder and survive as best they can. Some of the boys have dogs with whom they have formed a telepathic link. Genetically altered dogs, which are as intelligent as the boys (sometimes much more intelligent than their human partners). The protagonist of the story, Vic, is partnered with Blood, a wise-cracking and very intelligent dog. Below the surface, there are a few, make-shift cities that survived the nuclear holocaust. And when their paths cross with that of a female, Quilla June, who has "come up" to look for a bit of adventure, the very survival of Vic and Blood is soon at stake. Even though it is set in a future where women are treated like chattel (or worse) by surviving, savage young boys, and even though it is a desolate landscape (and the Downunders are, in their own way, much worse), in addition to being action-packed, this story -- in which the humans are savages and the dogs are more civilized and intelligent --is one of Ellison's most compassionate. To wrap it all up, Ellison reads "Grail", the story mentioned in the introduction to "I Have No Mouth...", and (through a heartfelt, well-performed reading) proves that his story of a man in search of True Love (which, in the story, is a tangible thing, like the Holy Grail), who traverses continents and makes pacts with demons, is, indeed, one of his best stories (right up there with "'Repent...", "Jeffty...", "Soft Monkey", "A Boy and His Dog", "The Function of Dreamsleep" and about forty-three others). A powerful ending to an audio book filled with powerful stories and equally powerful readings.

I have said elsewhere that _Ellison Wonderland_ (1962) reveals an original voice emerging from somewhat conventional material and that _Paingod and Other Delusions_ (1965) reveals the emergence of an artist along with the voice. In _I Have No Mouth & I Must Scream_ (1967), we see the artist in full force. That's the good news. The bad news is that you may not like what you read; the artistry is very much on the grim side.

There are seven stories in all: "I Have No Mouth & I Must Scream" (_If_, 1967), "Big Sam Was My Friend" (_Science Fiction Adventures_, 1958), "Eyes of Dust," (_Rogue_, 1959), "World of the Myth," (_Knight_, 1964), "Lonely Ache," (_Knight_, 1964), "Delusion for a Dragon Slayer," (_Knight_, 1966), and "Pretty Maggie Moneyeyes" (_Knight_ 1967). Most of the stories were published in the slicks rather than science fiction magazines, for reasons that Ellison explains in one of his story introductions.

The two best pieces are "I Have No Mouth..." and "Pretty Maggie Moneyeyes". The first is about the godlike and sadistic computer who makes Jehovah seem meek and mild in comparison. The second is about the woman's soul in a Vegas slot machine who exacts a grim price for love. "Mouth" was a Hugo winner in 1967, and Ellison says that the second is one of his personal favorites, based upon a real person. Both have been reprinted a staggering number of times. I think that they may fairly be called classics.

"World of the Myth," "Lonely Ache," and "Delusion for a Dragon Slayer" are almost as good. The first is about a trio of humans who crash on an alien planet where they will (perhaps) confront the truth about themselves. The second is one of the damndest dream stories that I have read in a long time. And the third is about a series of people who come to a number of terrible and senseless ends. It has a strange kind of solidity to it.

"Eyes of Dust" is smooth enough, but it says fairly obvious things about beauty, conformity, and the life of a scapegoat in a fantasy world. "Big Sam Was My Friend" matches the other tales in its downbeat plot. But it is an early story, a bit clumsy and obvious in the telling.

And that is almost all. But not quite. There is the introductory material, which tells much about the origins of the stories. It is true that an Ellison introduction is a performance that may be taken with a grain of salt. But I think that we may safely say that many of the stories come from deep emotional crises in Ellison's life. There is a power to at least several of them.