Short Fiction by Robert Sheckley (interesting novels in english txt) 📕
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Robert Sheckley was one of science fiction’s most prolific short story writers. Though less known today than he was in his heyday, he was a giant of his time and was nominated for the Hugo and Nebula awards.
Even though many of his stories deal with serious topics, they are most widely remembered for their comedic wit. His writing was compared to that of Douglas Adams, who held Sheckley in high regard: “He’s a very, very funny writer. He’s also a stylist. Very few science fiction writers write English well. Robert Sheckley can.” Sheckley was also well-respected by Kingsley Amis who, in his book New Maps of Hell: A Survey of Science Fiction, included Sheckley in a list with Frederik Pohl and Arthur C. Clarke, and said their volumes should “be reviewed as general fiction, not tucked away, as one writer has put it, in something called ‘Spaceman’s Realm’ between the kiddy section and dog stories.”
Sheckley wrote about and pioneered many science fiction concepts, such as in his story “Watchbird,” where he explores the ability to detect murder before it happens—three years before Philip K. Dick’s “The Minority Report.” Or in “Ask a Foolish Question,” a story about an all-knowing Answerer to whom people pose the ultimate question of life—twenty-six years before Douglas Adams’ The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy. Alongside these two stories, this collection includes all of his public domain short fiction ordered by date of first publication.
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- Author: Robert Sheckley
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She looked at the inscription on the wall. “What’s that?”
“I thought I’d leave a sort of monument—”
“Who’s going to read it?” she asked practically.
“No one, probably. It was just a foolish idea.” He concentrated on it. In a few moments the granite wall was bare. “I still don’t understand how you could be alive now,” he said puzzled.
“But I am. I don’t see how you do that—” she gestured at the chair and wall—“But I’ll accept the fact that you can. Why don’t you accept the fact that I’m alive?”
“Don’t get me wrong,” the man said. “I want company very much, especially female company. It’s just—Turn your back.”
She complied, with a questioning look. Quickly he destroyed the stubble on his face and created a clean pair of pressed pants and a shirt. Stepping out of his tattered uniform, he put on the new clothes, destroyed the rags, and, on an afterthought, created a comb and straightened his tangled brown hair.
“All right,” he said. “You can turn back now.”
“Not bad,” she smiled, looking him over. “Let me use that comb—and would you please make me a dress? Size twelve, but see that the weight goes in the right places.”
On the third attempt he had the thing right—he had never realized how deceptive the shapes of women could be—and then he made a pair of gold sandals with high heels for her.
“A little tight,” she said, putting them on, “and not too practical without sidewalks. But thanks much. This trick of yours really solves the Christmas present problem, doesn’t it?” Her dark hair was shiny in the noon sun, and she looked very lovely and warm and human.
“See if you can create,” he urged, anxious to share his startling new ability with her.
“I’ve already tried,” she said. “No go. Still a man’s world.”
He frowned. “How can I be absolutely sure you’re real?”
“That again? Do you remember creating me, Master?” she asked mockingly, bending to loosen the strap on one shoe.
“I had been thinking—about women,” he said grimly. “I might have created you while I was asleep. Why shouldn’t my subconscious mind have as much power as my conscious mind? I would have equipped you with a memory, given you a background. You would have been extremely plausible. And if my subconscious mind did create you, then it would make certain that my conscious mind would never know.”
“You’re ridiculous!”
“Because if my conscious mind knew,” he went on relentlessly, “it would reject your existence. Your entire function, as a creation of my subconscious, would be to keep me from knowing. To prove, by any means in your power, by any logic, that you were—”
“Let’s see you make a woman, then, if your mind is so good!” She crossed her arms and leaned back in the chair, giving a single sharp nod.
“All right.” He stared at the cave wall and a woman started to appear. It took shape sloppily, one arm too short, legs too long. Concentrating harder, he was able to make its proportions fairly true. But its eyes were set at an odd angle; its shoulders and back were sloped and twisted. He had created a shell without brains or internal organs, an automaton. He commanded it to speak, but only gulps came from the shapeless mouth; he hadn’t given it any vocal apparatus. Shuddering, he destroyed the nightmare figure.
“I’m not a sculptor,” he said. “Nor am I God.”
“I’m glad you finally realize that.”
“That still doesn’t prove,” he continued stubbornly, “that you’re real. I don’t know what my subconscious mind is capable of.”
“Make something for me,” she said abruptly. “I’m tired of listening to this nonsense.”
I’ve hurt her feelings, he thought. The only other human on Earth and I’ve hurt her. He nodded, took her by the hand and led her out of the cave. On the flat plain below he created a city. He had experimented with it a few days back, and it was much easier this time. Patterned after pictures and childhood dreams of the Thousand and One Nights, it towered black and white and rose. The walls were gleaming ruby, and the gates were of silver-stained ebony. The towers were red gold, and sapphires glittered in them. A great staircase of milky ivory climbed to the highest opal spire, set with thousands of steps of veined marble. There were lagoons of blue water, and little birds fluttered above them, and silver and gold fish darted through the still depths.
They walked through the city, and he created roses for her, white and yellow and red, and gardens of strange blossoms. Between two domed and spired buildings he created a vast pool of water; on it he put a purple-canopied pleasure barge, loading it with every kind of food and drink he could remember.
They floated across the lagoon, fanned by the soft breeze he had created.
“And all this is false,” he reminded her after a little while.
She smiled. “No it’s not. You can touch it. It’s real.”
“Will it be here after I die?”
“Who cares? Besides, if you can do all this, you can cure any sickness. Perhaps you can even cure old age and death.” She plucked a blossom from an overhanging bough and sniffed its fragrance. “You could keep this from fading and dying. You could probably do the same for us, so where’s the problem?”
“Would you like to go away?” he said, puffing on a newly created cigarette. “Would you like to find a new planet, untouched by war? Would you like to start over?”
“Start over? You mean. … Later perhaps. Now I don’t even want to go near the ship. It reminds me of the war.”
They floated on a little way.
“Are you sure now that I’m real?” she asked.
“If you want me to be honest, no,” he replied. “But I want very much to believe it.”
“Then listen to me,” she said, leaning toward him. “I’m real.” She slipped her arms
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