Dying Inside
By Robert Silverberg

I have not read any Silverberg and he is a giant of the science-fiction genre, so it is time I rectified that. I think Dying Inside was an excellent book to start with.

First published in 1972, Dying Inside concerns a man born with the ability to read people's minds. Imagine how great that would be? Well, not so fast! Set in mid-seventies New York, David Selig is now in his forties and has lived a decade or so with the realisation his powers are waning. This causes him much anxiety, to say the least, but the "gift" he was born with has been a blessing as well as a huge curse in his life. What might a life be like if you had this ability? Would you always want to know what people really thought of you?

Selig is not a particularly likeable man. He is cynical, unhappy with his station in life and full of guilt about his power. In fact, ignoring the telepathic ability, he exhibits many of the traits of the stereotypical New Yorker, and a Jewish one at that. I have not read much Roth, but perhaps he would be at home in a Roth novel. Or think of Woody Allen, minus the jokes, but plenty of black humour. Dying Inside is sometimes called "literary" science-fiction (descriptive terms like this can be fuzzy); in fact it is barely "science-fiction" at all. At least so far as most people would think science-fiction is (consider: Orwell's Nineteen Eight Four is science-fiction).

Perhaps "literary" because of this. Silverberg is a well read and erudite man and he has spent time polishing his prose here, inserting clever and thoughtful literary and philosophical references. He also conjures up the atmosphere of the New York of the times, especially the Seventies, post JFK and King assassinations, and the cultural, social and educational milieu (and dysfunction).

Not a long book, I found it quite a pleasure to read.