Description
Walter M. Miller Jr is best remembered as the author of A Canticle for Leibowitz, universally recognized as one of the greatest novels of modern SF. But as well as writing that deeply felt and eloquent book, he produced many shorter works of fiction of stunning originality and power. His profound interest in religion and his innate literary gifts combined perfectly in the production of such works as The Darfstellar, for which he won a Hugo in 1955, Conditionally Human, I, Dreamer and The Big Hunger, all of which are included in this brilliant and essential collection.
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 showCaptain Videoin 1953. Late in the 1950s, Miller assembled a novel from three closely related novellas he had published inThe Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fictionin 1955, 1956, and 1957. The novel, entitledA Canticle for Leibowitz, was published in 1959.A Canticle for Leibowitzis 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 ofA 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, titledSaint Leibowitz and the Wild Horse Woman, was completed by Bisson and published in 1997.
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