The Man in the Maze

Rating:
Summary: Good enough story, but lacking Silverberg's usual depth.
Review: A man is hopelessly exiled from Earth after he is transformed by aliens during Earth's first contact with aliens. He is altered in a manner that prevents people from being near him without suffering great stress. He finds refuge on another world containing a mysterious deserted alien city. The city resembles a huge maze, and contains hidden deadly traps and technology which hamper efforts to reach the center of the city from outside. The exiled man takes up residence in that virtually inaccessible area. Many years later Earth sends a party to find and contact him, believing he is capable of solving a problem with a new race of aliens that threaten Earth. Most of the story is taken up with the adventure through the maze toward the center. The adventure's ending is disappointingly dull, though high expectations are previously built. This book continually strives to take off but never succeeds. It lacks the mental depth present in many of Silverberg's other works. It is fair enough as far as the field goes, but other books by Silverberg had me looking forward to thought provoking material that was absent or veiled here.

Rating:
Summary: A complex and fascinating epistemological web
Review: After an encounter with an alien race that leaves him with a strange 'disease', Richard Muller exiles himself to Lemnos, a place famous for a vast, deadly maze that was built there long ago. He alone succeeded in getting to its center; now, veteran Charles Boardman, the one who convinced Muller to go on that ill-fated mission, and the young Ned Rawlins, whose late father was Muller's friend, must get Muller out of the maze and back to Earth for one last, heroic task (to do so, they, too, must master the maze). Getting through the maze won't be as difficult as it will be to actually convince Muller to follow them; thus, a psychological battle plays out during most of the book. In my mind, this isn't as fascinating as are all the different paths leading to different sorts of knowledge: in the first third of the work, Boardman's crew uses robots programmed to replicate the information that was saved during earlier, unsuccessful tries to get through the maze - that way, human lives are saved while the crew can afford to lose dozens of robots; some of the maze's sections are easier for the robots to go through, because they can more easily doubt their sense perception, whereas humans must close their eyes so that they won't be confused by appearances; meanwhile, Muller, having lived nine years in the maze and thus knowing it better than anyone, is still speculating about its possible origin, hidden secrets and traps. The only limitation to the various speculations is, plainly... death.

Rating:
Summary: A complex and fascinating epistemological web
Review: After an encounter with an alien race that leaves him with a strange `disease', Richard Muller exiles himself to Lemnos, a place famous for a vast, deadly maze that was built there long ago. He alone succeeded in getting to its center; now, veteran Charles Boardman, the one who convinced Muller to go on that ill-fated mission, and the young Ned Rawlins, whose late father was Muller's friend, must get Muller out of the maze and back to Earth for one last, heroic task (to do so, they, too, must master the maze). Getting through the maze won't be as difficult as it will be to actually convince Muller to follow them; thus, a psychological battle plays out during most of the book. In my mind, this isn't as fascinating as are all the different paths leading to different sorts of knowledge: in the first third of the work, Boardman's crew uses robots programmed to replicate the information that was saved during earlier, unsuccessful tries to get through the maze - that way, human lives are saved while the crew can afford to lose dozens of robots; some of the maze's sections are easier for the robots to go through, because they can more easily doubt their sense perception, whereas humans must close their eyes so that they won't be confused by appearances; meanwhile, Muller, having lived nine years in the maze and thus knowing it better than anyone, is still speculating about its possible origin, hidden secrets and traps. The only limitation to the various speculations is, plainly... death.

Rating:
Summary: Tragic Tale of Self Induced Exile
Review: Dick Muller was a hero... that is, until an encounter with an alien race left him unable to be tolerated in a human's prescence. When the human race rejected him, he left...to a planet with a giant maze on it. No one has ever reached the center of the maze. Now the human race needs Dick Muller to save the planet but first they must find him and convince him to come back and save the race that sent him into exile.
This book is great. My favorite book of all time. I highly recommend it to everyone!

Rating:
Summary: Tragic Tale of Self Induced Exile
Review: Dick Muller was a hero... that is, until an encounter with an alien race left him unable to be tolerated in a human's prescence. When the human race rejected him, he left...to a planet with a giant maze on it. No one has ever reached the center of the maze. Now the human race needs Dick Muller to save the planet but first they must find him and convince him to come back and save the race that sent him into exile.
This book is great. My favorite book of all time. I highly recommend it to everyone!

Rating:
Summary: an amazing tale
Review: it is some 18 years since I heard this book broadcast as a series on "Morning Book Reading" on ABC Radio back in the days when it was heard at 9a.m. it has remained fresh in my mind ever since, it is an enthralling tale which kept me listening day after day and waiting for the next episode. It always struck me as being an ideal book to be turned into a film but, as far as I know it hasnt been-yet!
The tale involves an astronaut who has been 'infected' by aliens in a manner which makes it impossible for anybody to be close to him without feeling psychological pain. Taking himself off to an uninhabited planet which has been arranged into a deadly maze by previous aliens, he defeats the maze and lives comfortably, on his own - until Earth needs him.
An expedition is sent out to bring him back and the book deals with the efforts of the Earth crew to also beat the maze and make contact. The maze has a whole series of grizzly traps, which keep the reader guessing as to what will be next.
The astronaut returns to Earth fixes up the problem and in doing so is 'cured' but prefers to return to his planet instead of remaining on Earth.
A super good story. I will be reading it again

Rating:
Summary: Sophocles Redux
Review: Mankind is threatened by an alien that strips us of our free will. We can't communicate with these aliens, so we can't fight or appease them. Our only hope is Dick Muller, who, in mankind's first contact with an alien race, was permanently maimed and cannot live with humans anymore. However, it is precisely this injury that gives him the opportunity to let the aliens know we are a thinking race. The only question is-will he reject the human race that previously rejected him?

This modern retelling of the myth of Philoctetes is short, sweet, and to the point. It doesn't pause for discursive considerations of the maning of life or the nature of the human beast; that would belabor a subtle point and lose the larger meaning. The whole piece is a careful consideration of the limits of the human animal, and what makes it possible to live with one another.

This silver-age SF gem presaged such Silverberg classics as Dying Inside, a more careful meditation on the same themes. It also dovetails neatly into the New Wave of science fiction, in which the great source of speculation isn't scientific advancement, but the limits of the human being. All in all, it becomes a forward-thinking insight using a framework as old as time. Though imperfect, it belongs to a class of book that just doesn't get written anymore.

Rating:
Summary: Sophocles Redux
Review: Mankind is threatened by an alien that strips us of our free will. We can't communicate with these aliens, so we can't fight or appease them. Our only hope is Dick Muller, who, in mankind's first contact with an alien race, was permanently maimed and cannot live with humans anymore. However, it is precisely this injury that gives him the opportunity to let the aliens know we are a thinking race. The only question is-will he reject the human race that previously rejected him?

This modern retelling of the myth of Philoctetes is short, sweet, and to the point. It doesn't pause for discursive considerations of the maning of life or the nature of the human beast; that would belabor a subtle point and lose the larger meaning. The whole piece is a careful consideration of the limits of the human animal, and what makes it possible to live with one another.

This silver-age SF gem presaged such Silverberg classics as Dying Inside, a more careful meditation on the same themes. It also dovetails neatly into the New Wave of science fiction, in which the great source of speculation isn't scientific advancement, but the limits of the human being. All in all, it becomes a forward-thinking insight using a framework as old as time. Though imperfect, it belongs to a class of book that just doesn't get written anymore.