EDIT: 11/29/2015: Hi. It's been almost five years since I wrote this review and I've learned a lot about feminism and misogyny and what constitutes GOOD writing to me. So I decided I should come back to this and append this review with a disclaimer: I wrote this before A: coming out as trans and B: realizing that I don't have to defend a writer for the things they do well when their writing is overshadowed by disgusting and horribly backwards views regarding marginalized groups. So while I'm gonna leave this review as I wrote it, (It's seriously weird to me that this throwaway review I wrote years ago still gets likes and is apparently the highest rated review of this collection. Whaaaaat?) I am going to reduce the rating I gave it from three to two stars and put this big red disclaimer on here: Don't read this. I don't care if it's considered a classic of scifi. I don't care if you really liked the game. I don't care about how meaningful the social commentary in it is. The title story shames it's lone female character for being raped and victimized by the other protagonists and another story focuses around the idea that a woman is pathetic because she "lets" one of her shipmates rape her. And the rest of the stories just treat women like utter shit.
Seriously. It's gross.
You don't need to read this. There are plenty of other scifi novels and collections that are just as if not more well regarded that do not have such heinous opinions about women in them. Hell, there are plenty of works that DO have terrible social views that are still far more redeemable than this dreck. Just because IHNMAIMS has name brand recognition does not mean you need to read it or you Fail At Liking Sci Fi.
So yeah okay, now that I've gotten the new and updated review out of the way, here's the original one that has somehow managed to hang on and be the most well received review here. Enjoy!
*****
Harlan Ellison is an asshole.
No really. He is a sexist, condescending, cocky, arrogant prick. His sense of superiority oozes out of every one of the stories' introductions in this collection. Wherever there is a female character, she is portrayed as weak, whorish or manipulative. In the intro to "Pretty Maggie Moneyeyes" he casually refers to the woman that inspired the story as someone who he wanted to lay, but didn't get an opportunity to. He constantly talks about his writing as if it was God's gift to science fiction.
Harlan Ellison is an asshole.
But he is an excellent writer! I had long given up on science fiction due to how much garbage there is in the genre, so when I picked up "I Have No Mouth and I Must Scream" on a friend's recommendation I didn't expect much. I was pleasantly surprised. Ellison's writing has a natural flow to it, very rarely feeling stilted or forced.
His story telling is hallucinogenic in quality; each story in this collection reads like an acid trip. Plots swirl and contort. Characters pass through realities both familiar and foreign like they were just walking to the store, unquestioning, accepting of the alien nature of the worlds around them. Everything about this collection has a dreamlike feel to it, always just real enough to fool the senses into not recognizing the facade around them.
The title story I Have No Mouth and I Must Scream starts the collection off with a bang as it tells the story of a cruel, hateful AI that eternally torments the last five humans left alive. It perfectly embodies that hallucinatory quality that I mentioned before; AM manipulates the five poor peoples' DNA, grants them immortality just so it can torture them indefinitely, sets them against giant beasts of legend, all while displaying control over matter and reality that is Godlike in nature. Lonelyache is the story of a man who's depression and regret over the failure of his marriage drives him to adultery, until his sins come together to quite literally haunt him. Delusion For a Dragon Slayer is easily the trippiest of the tales as it weaves through a parable about the afterlife and the horrid beast that hides in the heart of all men.
This is not to say that this collection is perfect. There is a reason why I rated it three stars and not four or five. Not all the stories are worth a second read; Big Sam Was My Friend plods along, and while it makes a poignant point at the end about selfishness and selflessness, it's not quite enough to save it from its boring, plodding pace. Eyes of Dust is a similar situation. Again, it hits home with its commentary on vanity, but the ending is convoluted at best, leaving the metaphor mixed and confusing. And the rampant sexism is very hard to ignore, especially in World of the Myth where Ellison comes just short of justifying rape because a woman flirts or teases a man with no other way to release himself sexually. Seriously I cannot express just how anti-woman this book is, you just have to read it to see what I mean. And his inflated sense of self in the introductions is very off putting. I understand that it's okay to feel good about you work, but Ellison's conceit is obnoxious at best and almost comes to overshadow the stories themselves, particularly when they deal with the dangers of being arrogant and selfish.
So while these stories were, for the most part, exceptionally written, I don't think I will be reading any of them again (except for the title piece, which is easily one of the top ten best science fictions that I've ever read). Ellison's fables, while arguably insightful and thought provoking, suffer greatly from the offensively blatant misogyny and Ellison's own ego. It was worth a read, but borrow it from a library before you decide to buy it.
Levi Cooper
Checked and cringe
Jordan Morales
>You don't need to read this. There are plenty of other scifi novels and collections that are just as if not more well regarded that do not have such heinous opinions about women in them. Hell, there are plenty of works that DO have terrible social views that are still far more redeemable than this dreck. Just because IHNMAIMS has name brand recognition does not mean you need to read it or you Fail At Liking Sci Fi.
>No really. He is a sexist, condescending, cocky, arrogant prick. His sense of superiority oozes out of every one of the stories' introductions in this collection. Wherever there is a female character, she is portrayed as weak, whorish or manipulative. In the intro to "Pretty Maggie Moneyeyes" he casually refers to the woman that inspired the story as someone who he wanted to lay, but didn't get an opportunity to.
This is doubly funny since people on the right often think he's a nigger apologist and a proto-SJW, especially in terms of feminism.
Oliver Gomez
kek for misinformation
Hunter Reed
>It's been almost five years since I wrote this review and I've learned a lot about feminism and misogyny and what constitutes GOOD writing to me. So I decided I should come back to this and append this review with a disclaimer: I wrote this before A: coming out as trans Stopped reading there. 1/10 apply you'reself
Brayden Evans
It's strange how it reads like shitty bait you'd read on /pol/ but it's a real person with these very real thoughts
Samuel Hernandez
really good take
James Perry
This holy shit that was actually cringe, as in my face visibly contorted and I felt emotional shame
James Ramirez
>I had long given up on science fiction due to how much garbage there is in the genre >I wrote this before A: coming out as trans
He gave up reading science fiction. Then he became science fiction.
