The Squares of the City

Last updated

The Squares of the City
Squares of the city.jpg
Cover art from first edition
Author John Brunner
Cover artistRobert Foster
CountryUnited States
LanguageEnglish
Genre Science fiction
Publisher Ballantine Books
Publication date
1965
Media typePrint (Paperback)
Pages319 pp

The Squares of the City is a science fiction novel by British writer John Brunner, first published in 1965 ( ISBN   0-345-27739-2). It was nominated for the Hugo Award for Best Novel in 1966.

Contents

It is a sociological story of urban class warfare and political intrigue, taking place in the fictional South American capital city of Vados. It explores the idea of subliminal messages as political tools, and it is notable for having the structure of a famous 1892 chess game between Wilhelm Steinitz and Mikhail Chigorin. The structure is not coincidental, and plays an important part in the story.

Reception

Algis Budrys found the novel to be more artifice than fiction, saying "this is a confusing, overpopulated, almost-unidentifiable-with story set in a city which seems to have been created for the sole purpose of having Brunner set a 'human chess game' in motion upon it. . . . There is nothing in particular here to catch and hold the reader's involvement". [1] Judith Merril, however, found Squares "an impressive piece of work" with "complexities [that] add richness rather than spread confusion." She noted, however, that the demands of the novel's "elaborate structure" weakened it by impelling Brunner to sacrifice character development in order to depict "interpersonal exchanges." [2]

Related Research Articles

<i>The Three Stigmata of Palmer Eldritch</i> 1965 science fiction novel by Philip K. Dick

The Three Stigmata of Palmer Eldritch is a 1965 science fiction novel by American writer Philip K. Dick. It was nominated for the Nebula Award for Best Novel in 1965. Like many of Dick's novels, it utilizes an array of science fiction concepts and explores the ambiguous slippage between reality and unreality. It is one of Dick's first works to explore religious themes.

The New Wave was a science fiction (SF) movement in the 1960s and 1970s characterized by a high degree of experimentation in form and content, a "literary" or artistic sensibility, and a focus on "soft" as opposed to hard science. New Wave writers often saw themselves as part of the modernist tradition in fiction, and the New Wave was conceived as a deliberate break from the traditions of pulp science fiction, which many of the writers involved considered irrelevant and unambitious. They thus emphasized stylistic experimentation and literary merit over the scientific accuracy or prediction of hard science fiction writers.

<i>The Moon Is a Harsh Mistress</i> 1966 SF novel by Robert A. Heinlein

The Moon Is a Harsh Mistress is a 1966 science fiction novel by American writer Robert A. Heinlein about a lunar colony's revolt against absentee rule from Earth. The novel illustrates and discusses libertarian ideals. It is respected for its credible presentation of a comprehensively imagined future human society on both the Earth and the Moon.

"Faith of Our Fathers" is a science fiction short story by American writer Philip K. Dick, first published in the anthology Dangerous Visions (1967).

<i>The Dragon in the Sea</i> 1956 novel by Frank Herbert

The Dragon in the Sea (1956), also known as Under Pressure from its serialization, is a novel by Frank Herbert. It was first serialized in Astounding magazine from 1955 to 1956, then reworked and published as a standalone novel in 1956. A 1961 2nd printing of the Avon paperback, catalog # G-1092, was titled 21st Century Sub with the previous title in parentheses, and a short 36 page version of the novel was later collected in Eye. It is usually classified as a psychological novel.

Algis Budrys Lithuanian-American science fiction author, editor, and critic

Algirdas Jonas "Algis" Budrys was a Lithuanian-American science fiction author, editor, and critic. He was also known under the pen names Frank Mason, Alger Rome, John A. Sentry, William Scarff, and Paul Janvier. He is known for the influential 1960 novel Rogue Moon.

Robert Silverberg American speculative fiction writer and editor

Robert Silverberg is an American author and editor, best known for writing science fiction. He is a multiple winner of both Hugo and Nebula Awards, a member of the Science Fiction and Fantasy Hall of Fame, and a Grand Master of SF. He has attended every Hugo Awards ceremony since the inaugural event in 1953.

<i>Stand on Zanzibar</i> 1968 novel by John Brunner

Stand on Zanzibar is a dystopian New Wave science fiction novel written by John Brunner and first published in 1968. The book won a Hugo Award for Best Novel at the 27th World Science Fiction Convention in 1969, as well as the 1969 BSFA Award and the 1973 Prix Tour-Apollo Award.

<i>The Rest of the Robots</i>

The Rest of the Robots is a collection of eight short stories and two full-length novels by American writer Isaac Asimov, published in 1964. The stories, centred on positronic robots, are all part of the Robot series, most of which take place in the Foundation universe. Another collection of short stories about robots, I, Robot, was re-published in the previous year, which is why Asimov chose to title the collection as The Rest of the Robots. None of the short stories in this collection were in I, Robot, however all of them were later included in The Complete Robot, and both novels about Elijah Baley were also published separately.

Mikhail Chigorin Russian chess player

Mikhail Ivanovich Chigorin was a Russian chess player. He played two World Championship matches against Wilhelm Steinitz, losing both times. The last great player of the Romantic chess style, he also served as a major source of inspiration for the "Soviet chess school", which dominated the chess world in the middle and latter parts of the 20th century.

<i>Hawksbill Station</i> 1968 novel by Robert Silverberg

Hawksbill Station is a science fiction novel by American writer Robert Silverberg. The novel is an expanded version of a short story first published in Galaxy Science Fiction in August 1967. The novel was published in 1968 and was released in the United Kingdom under the title The Anvil of Time.

<i>Time and Stars</i>

Time and Stars is a collection of science fiction short stories by Poul Anderson, published in 1964.

Thomas L. Sherred was an American science fiction writer.

<i>World of Ptavvs</i> 1966 novel by Larry Niven

World of Ptavvs is a science fiction novel by American writer Larry Niven, first published in 1966 and set in his Known Space universe. It was Niven's first published novel and is based on a 1965 magazine story of the same name.

<i>Rogue Moon</i> 1960 novel by Algis Budrys

Rogue Moon is a short science fiction novel by American writer Algis Budrys, published in 1960. It was a 1961 Hugo Award nominee. A substantially cut version of the novel was originally published in F&SF; this novella-length story was included in The Science Fiction Hall of Fame, Volume Two, edited by Ben Bova. It was adapted into a radio drama by Yuri Rasovsky in 1979.

"Judas" is a short story by John Brunner from Harlan Ellison's anthology Dangerous Visions. The story examines a modern allegory of the Biblical figure of Judas.

A fix-up is a novel created from several short fiction stories that may or may not have been initially related or previously published. The stories may be edited for consistency, and sometimes new connecting material, such as a frame story or other interstitial narration, is written for the new work. The term was coined by the science fiction writer A. E. van Vogt, who published several fix-ups of his own, including The Voyage of the Space Beagle, but the practice exists outside of science fiction: The use of the term in science fiction criticism was popularised by the first (1979) edition of The Encyclopedia of Science Fiction, edited by Peter Nicholls, which credited van Vogt with the creation of the term. The name “fix-up” comes from the changes that the author needs to make in the original texts, to make them fit together as though they were a novel. Foreshadowing of events from the later stories may be jammed into an early chapter of the fix-up, and character development may be interleaved throughout the book. Contradictions and inconsistencies between episodes are usually worked out.

<i>The Einstein Intersection</i> 1967 novel by Samuel Delany

The Einstein Intersection is a 1967 science fiction novel by Samuel R. Delany. It won the Nebula Award for Best Novel in 1967 and was nominated for the Hugo Award for Best Novel in 1968. The title is a reference to Einstein's Theory of Relativity connecting to Kurt Gödel's Constructible universe, which is an analogy to science meeting philosophy. Delany's intended title for the book was A Fabulous, Formless Darkness.

<i>The Watch Below</i> 1966 science fiction novel by James White

The Watch Below (1966) is a science fiction novel by British writer James White about a colony of humans stranded underwater in a sunken ship, who survive by air pockets, and a water-breathing alien species in search of a new home. The two generation ships encounter each other in the Earth's ocean.

<i>Neutron Star</i> (short story collection) Collection of short stories by Larry Niven

Neutron Star is a collection of science fiction short stories by American writer Larry Niven, published in April 1968. The individual stories were published in If and Galaxy Science Fiction in 1966–1967, under Frederik Pohl as editor.

References

  1. Budrys, Algis (June 1966). "Galaxy Bookshelf". Galaxy Science Fiction. pp. 141–152.
  2. "Books", F&SF , April 1966, p.35

Sources