Dying Inside

Despite his credentials championing hard, rational science fiction, John W. Campbell was a fervent believer in psi powers. Perhaps because of that, whenever telepathy appeared in science fiction, as in Alfred Bester's The Demolished Man, it was almost invariably presented as a talent, a power, usually a good thing. But what if it isn't, what if it is of little real value and perhaps even harmful? That is the premise of one of Robert Silverberg's most powerful novels.David Selig is a telepath, but it hasn't really done him much good. He makes a precarious living hanging around colleges writing essays for students, and using his telepathy to check the details, to get it right. But the power is waning, and since so much of his sense of identity is tied up in his telepathy (useless as it may be), so this loss of power is equated with losing his grip on reality. One critic complained that Silverberg had made the science fiction elements of the novel pedestrian, but that is precisely the point. The waning powers represent a loss of joy, a loss of creativity, it really is life becoming pedestrian. And the novel is beautifully and movingly written to convey exactly that point. For a period between the mid-60s and mid-70s, Silverberg produced work of the highest quality, and this was undoubtedly the best of the bunch, a novel that combines an intriguing sf idea with psychological insight and brilliant writing: how could it fail!