The View from the Stars

by Walter M. Miller Jr., (cover art by Richard Powers ) (Illustrator)

Ballantine U2212. January 1965. A square, bright and tight copy. Minor wear to top and bottom of spine. Spine has a paper wrinkle. Tanning to pages.

Genres: Science Fiction, Short Stories, Fiction, Speculative Fiction, Collections, Science Fiction Fantasy

Mass Market Paperback

First published January 1, 1965

About the author

From the Wikipedia article, "Walter M. Miller, Jr.":

Miller was born in New Smyrna Beach, Florida. Educated at the University of Tennessee and the University of Texas, he worked as an engineer. During World War II, he served in the Army Air Corps as a radioman and tail gunner, flying more than fifty bombing missions over Italy. He took part in the bombing of the Benedictine Abbey at Monte Cassino, which proved a traumatic experience for him. Joe Haldeman reported that Miller "had Post Traumatic Stress Disorder for 30 years before it had a name".

After the war, Miller converted to Catholicism. He married Anna Louise Becker in 1945, and they had four children. For several months in 1953 he lived with science-fiction writer Judith Merril, ex-wife of Frederik Pohl and a noted science-fiction author in her own right.

Between 1951 and 1957, Miller published over three dozen science fiction short stories, winning a Hugo Award in 1955 for the story "The Darfsteller". He also wrote scripts for the television show Captain Video in 1953. Late in the 1950s, Miller assembled a novel from three closely related novellas he had published in The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction in 1955, 1956, and 1957. The novel, entitled A Canticle for Leibowitz, was published in 1959.

A Canticle for Leibowitz is a post-apocalyptic (post-holocaust) novel revolving around the canonisation of Saint Leibowitz and is considered a masterpiece of the genre. It won the 1961 Hugo Award for Best Novel. The novel is also a powerful meditation on the cycles of world history and Roman Catholicism as a force of stability during history's dark times.

After the success of A Canticle for Leibowitz, Miller never published another new novel or story in his lifetime, although several compilations of Miller's earlier stories were issued in the 1960s and 1970s.

In Miller's later years, he became a recluse, avoiding contact with nearly everyone, including family members; he never allowed his literary agent, Don Congdon, to meet him. According to science fiction writer Terry Bisson, Miller struggled with depression during his later years, but had managed to nearly complete a 600-page manuscript for the sequel to Canticle before taking his own life with a gun in January 1996, shortly after his wife's death. The sequel, titled Saint Leibowitz and the Wild Horse Woman, was completed by Bisson and published in 1997.

Reviews

[Manny · Rating 3 out of 5]

Walter M. Miller is best known for his post-apocalyptic novel A Canticle for Leibowitz. This is a collection of his short stories, some of which are not at all bad.

As one can see from Leibowitz, Miller had an interesting take on religion. The story I liked most was the one where the newly dead guy, apparently arrived in a kind of Purgatory, meets a shadowy figure who tells him that, if he has sufficient moral strength, he can relive his life differently; it's possible to go back in time and reverse the critical decision which led to his becoming an alcoholic, ruining both himself and his family. I didn't manage to work out who the supernatural guide was (it's NOT the obvious choice) and found the ending quite moving. He's skillful at sneaking up on you with an unexpected emotional punch.

[Paul Bryant · Rating 4 out of 5]

I read this astro-donkey's years ago, and I loved nearly every story. I was recently doing a "backwards through time" exercise with science fiction, which is where you read a story from each year going backwards from the present year to see how attitudes and themes have changed, sort of like a core sample in geology. Very interesting - recommended to all sf fans. So I picked one from this book for the year 1952, it's called "Dumb Waiter", and here are my notes :

A deliriously macho and fabulously sexist story in which our hero battles to gain control over the computer which runs an abandoned city. As in Terminator, the computer is still fighting a war although all the ammunition has long since run out. The city is uninhabitable. A vigilante group intends to destroy the computer. But our hero knows that’s defeatism. He wants to get to the computer and fix it. So en route he’s fighting robot policemen, the vigilantes and the traumatised woman he picks up, and of course, he wins! Some great 1952 moments :

Muttering angrily, Mitch stuffed a fifty-round drum of ammunition in his belt, took another between his teeth, and lifted the girl over one shoulder. He turned in time to fire a one-handed burst at another skater [robot].

The moral of this action story is rammed home:

A nontechnologist has no right to take part in a technological civilisation. He’s a bull in a china shop. That’s what happened to our era.

Includes some fine detail, such as this chilling image from the robot-administered city orphanage:

Those cribs! They’re full of little bones. Little bones – all over the floor. Little bones…

There's also "Command Performance" (aka "Anyone Else Like Me?"), one of my favourite all time sf stories, in which a woman is a telepath and believes herself to be the only telepathic person, and is therefore immeasurably lonely. Then eventually she meets another human, similarly gifted, a man, and instead of finding a wonderful companionship she meets only horror - now her mind, her entire life, is perpetually displayed to this other, she can't switch off her powers. What happens next is desolating.

Yes, attitudes of the early 50s are antediluvian and can really set your teeth on edge, but the crackling pace and energetic ideas spinning out of every page make up for everything.

[Julie Capell · Rating 5 out of 5]

Extremely strong short story collection from Walter M Miller, the author of one of my favorite scifi novels of all time (A Canticle for Leibowitz). Which, if you haven't read it, stop reading this review right now and go get that book.

What I liked about this collection is the stories are quite different from one another, but each one does what scifi does best: Set up a premise and just when you think you know what's going on, it turns at the end and knocks the wind out of you. And several stories seemed to be early versions of books and shows that have come out recently. I'm not sure if Miller was the first to come up with these scenarios and concepts, but it is fun to see these very early roots of basic genre tropes.

Yes, the women are mostly depicted as damsels-in-distress, but given when these stories were written (early 1950s) I'm willing to overlook that.

- You Triflin' Skunk - the ending made me laugh
- The Will - Great twist on a time travel story
- Anybody Else Like Me? - Maybe the inspiration for Sens8 by JMS and the Wachowskis (which, if you haven't watched, you should stop reading ...)
- Crucifixus Etiam - Shows Miller's preoccupation with religion - the title means "he was crucified for us" I loved viewing the colonization of another planet from the p-o-v of a laborer, rather than from the people with privilege, very different, extremely moving
- I, Dreamer - Another very moving tale of the downside of the creation of cyborgs. No snappy Murderbot repartee here, just angst and final vindication
- Dumb Waiter - Was this the inspiration for "Service Model" by Adrian Tchaikovsky??
- Blood Bank - Took me until the very end to figure out what was going on, great story
- Big Joe and the Nth Generation - adjacent to "Canticle" and reminds me of our real-world attempts to figure out how to warn future generations of the dangers of places where we have dumped our nuclear waste. What signs/messages will last thousands of years and still be understood??
- The Big Hunger - Like a prose poem version of "Canticle"

Favorite quote:

"You're one of the machine-age's spoiled children. . . . Technologists gave you everything you could possibly want. Push a button, and you get it. Instead of taking part in the machine age, you let it wait on you. You spoiled yourself. When the machine age cracks up, you crack up, too. Because you never made yourself its master; you just let yourself be mechanically pampered."

A warning that seems to speak to our present, where we spend so much time with our phones and Netflix that we don't really seem to care that the world is falling into chaos around us . . .

[Mark Enderle · Rating 4 out of 5]

I love Miller's writing and it's impressive when SF short stories still read well after 60+ years.

[Steve Rainwater · Rating 3 out of 5]

Shorts stories by author of 'A Canticle for Leibowitz'

This short book (under 200 pages) of short stories. Most are standard pulp fare. No better or worse what you'd read if you picked up any random monthly pulp. In fact these were published in some of the most well-known pulps: Galaxy, If, Fantastic Universe, Astounding, Amazing, and Analog. A couple of post-apocalyptic tales stood out for me. I guess writing unusual post-apocalyptic stories was Miller's talent.

The first, "Dumb Waiter", is the tale of a young man crossing the wasteland on a bicycle to reach an abandoned pre-atomic-war city that was fully automated. A central computer controlled robot cops and robot civil workers who kept the city running even though no human remained. But the cops won't let any survivors into the city because they're not recognized as citizens. Our hero plans to break-in and re-program the central computer, turning the city into a refuge from which to rebuild the world.

The second story I found interesting was "Big Joe and Nth Generation", another post-apocalyptic story but one with a very unusual setting: Mars. I don't recall ever reading a story of this genre set on a partially terraformed Mars where the population has reverted to stone age savagery and superstition. The problem is that the terraforming engines aren't running any more and the atmosphere is thinning. No one understands the problem, much less has the knowledge to restart the machines; until a clever local thief stumbles onto the problem and is forced to find a solution.

[Rob · Rating 5 out of 5]

Fantastic set of short stories. Miller is so good.


Some of the themes are consistent with those in Canticle for Leibowitz. He has a few areas he likes to repeat. Man has created the ability to destroy itself, good and evil, etc. But he hits them from different angles.

There is a difference between tragedy and blind brutal calamity. Tragedy has meaning, and there is dignity in it. Tragedy stands with its shoulders stiff and proud. But there is no meaning, no dignity, no fulfillment, in the death of a child.

Some of the stories stuck with me for weeks after. I'd think about when when running, or sitting around. The ideas are deep, and the questions hard.

Anybody Else Like Me? in particular was haunting. I'm still thinking about it, a month later.

The Will and Crucifixus Etiam and Dumb Waiter and Big Joe were uncharacteristically optimistic and excellent to read.

He knew now what Mars was -- not a ten-thousand-a-year job, not a garbage can for surplus production. But and eight-century passion of human faith in the destiny of the race of Man.

[Haumea Geth · Rating 3 out of 5]

The writing is quite good. I found the stories to be rather hit or miss, but the stories that did hit hit quite well, and I found myself thinking about them days later.

However, I found the author's flagrant sexism to be rather distracting. This book is from the 60s, so while I'm not too surprised, it was still frustrating and tedious to sit through. In a majority of the stories, the female characters do nothing to serve the plot in any way and only exist as frequently-fainting accessories to make the male hero seem extra 'cool'. I don't get the impression that the author particularly disliked women, but it's very obvious that he didn't interact with them much in nature, instead mostly hearing descriptions of them told to him by other old white men.

[Joachim Boaz · Rating 4 out of 5]

Full review: https://sciencefictionruminations.com...

"Almost all SF fans have read Walter M. Miller, Jr.’s masterpiece A Canticle for Leibowitz (1959) but few indulge in his shorter works. By 1957 Miller had virtually quit publishing new SF (A Canticle is comprised of novellas published between 1955-1957). His only later work published later was Saint Leibowitz and the Wild Horse Woman (1997) completed by Terry Bisson and released posthumously.

The View From the Stars (1965) — containing five short stories, two novelettes, and one novella — is a cross section [...]"

[Dirk Wickenden · Rating 1 out of 5]

What a tedious book. I know when a book's no good for me, as it takes me ages, putting it aside for days. If it's a good book, I'll whip through it quickly, whether a novel or, like this book, a short story collection. The stories are very lacklustre, not much happens. One could compare some of these stories with Ray Bradbury but Bradbury holds one's attention with very almost poetic writing. Miller here, though, is just turgid.

[Terry Mulcahy · Rating 4 out of 5]

These are wonderful stories. There was a vastly intelligent, complicated man behind some of them. Some stories had interesting twists, and some stories were a bit pleasant. But a few stories set my mind reeling, making me think about many things our human race has done or might do. I do recommend this read.

[Robin Banks · Rating 3 out of 5]

A mix of short stories, some good, some meh. There is a religious element to several -- something I rather like -- and some sociology. It's not Canticle for Liebowitz.

[Cheryl · Rating 3 out of 5]

You Triflin' Skunk! 4* Never underestimate the courage of a protective mother. Would be a great Twilight Zone but would have required a mature content warning, very talented actors & creative special effects.

The Will *3 Sentimental time travel (find the cure in the future), would have been a decent TZ.

Anybody Else Like Me? *4 Very well written exploration of the What If? of telepathy... a horrifying way it could be. Not suitable for TZ, in part because it's too smart.

Crucifixus Etiam *4 "What man ever made his own salvation?" Philosophical. Too epic in scope for TZ.

I, Dreamer *3 Compare & contrast to The Ship Who Sang. This more harsh/bleak. Wouldn't be film-able.

Dumb Waiter *2 How to be smarter and braver than Central and its automatons. And have a chance to spank a 'girl' while you're at it.

Blood Bank *2 Sorry, just a mess. Interesting premise/ gimmick, but too much clutter weighing it down. (Why did the guy want to go to Sol III anyway?) Still, there's this: "Life first tries to climb a tree to get to the stars. When it fails, it comes down and invents the high-C drive."

Big Joe and the Nth Generation *3 What happens when the Mars colonists lose their understandings of science and technology? Maybe, eventually, when all there is to believe in is myth and unreliable magic, one young man will start to wonder if there's something more going on than the priests know.

The Big Hunger *2 Sorry, though epic in scope, insufficiently imaginative. Like Asimov's Foundation, it's a remotely far future that resembles the present implausibly closely.

Note that the star ratings are vague and subjective, with assorted ones that are barely a three, almost worth rounding up to four, etc. The other thing is that most of these explore concepts explored similarly elsewhere... not very original or fresh (even given the dates)... but Miller is usually deft, and if you like short stories from this era and can readily find this, give it a go.

[Michael Shaw · Rating 4 out of 5]

A fun collection of short stories, but not up to the level of work he showed in A Canticle for Leibowitz.

[Reya · Rating 5 out of 5]

"Miller is first and foremost a talented writer. The fact that most of his writing concerns itself with science fiction is only secondary." (back cover)

This collection of short stories is both beautifully written and engrossing as great science fiction. Each story feels very unique in tone, with a wide variety of themes. Two of the stories seem to take place in modern times, whereas a few are hundreds or thousands of years into the future. Another spans perhaps hundreds of thousands or even millions of years, which left me with a feeling of awe - and insignificance! There are computers in charge of cities, tales of humans in the far future rediscovering technology of their ancestors, and generations of men laboring to their deaths for 800 years for the future of the human race. At times it's frightening, while at other times there is slightly dark humor. It has both great writing and thought-provoking ideas about the future that sci-fi nerds like me really dig.

This book was first sold in 1964 for 50 cents, so finding this copy might be difficult. However, Miller is best known for his classic sci-fi novel, A Canticle for Leibowitz, which is still in print.

[Isabel (kittiwake) · Rating 4 out of 5]

When the restless ones, the wild-eyed spacers were gone, the addicts got religion and the federalists became placid anarchists and the Parliaments voted themselves out of existence. There was peace on the third planet of 27 Lambda Serpentis, and good will among the inhabitants thereof. They made love and studied sociology under a friendly sun, under a pleasant blue sky forever.
From "The Big Hunger".

Nine science fiction stories by the author of one of my favourite books "A Canticle for Leibowitz", who was just as good at short fiction. I bought this book recently from a used book store, and was irritated to find that five of these stories are also found in "The Darfsteller and other Stories" which I already own, and that I had read nearly all of the stories before. My favourites are "You Triflin' Skunk!"," Big Joe and the Nth Generation" and "The Big Hunger".

[Ruskoley · Rating 3 out of 5]

After reading this collection, it is unsurprising data that the author eventually committed suicide. Most of these stories are heavy, very heavy. A few are quite dark and grim. However, all of them are well-written. I mean, written with artistry and command. Nevertheless, a couple of the stories are too dismal for me. My favorites were "You Triflin' Skunk" and "Dumb Waiter." The story "I, Dreamer" is actually the one I found most disturbing. Anyway: solid, if average, vintage science-fiction reading.

[Rob · Rating 4 out of 5]

A pretty solid set of short stories from a top-notch SF author. These aren't all winners, but Miller's poetic prose and command of language mean that even the duds are worth reading. There isn't too much of a theme across all these, besides a general focus on interplanetary travel.

Recommended if you liked A Canticle for Liebowitz or are looking for classic SF short stories.

[Cameron Kunzelman · Rating 3 out of 5]

There's a lot of mid-20th century ideology going on here, with all the sexism and underlying libertarianism that you might expect from science fiction in that time period. That said, "The Big Hunger," the final story in the collection, is an amazing must-read.

[Charles · Rating 3 out of 5]

Nine of Miller's Short stories. Not nearly as fine as "A Canticle For Leibowitz," but an interesting and eclectic collection.