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Synopsis
The Reproductive System
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Book Description
'Superb entertainment. It is full of invention, wit and subtly sad comedy... Will surely become a classic' The Sunday Times
About the Author
John Sladek (1937 - 2000)
John Sladek was born in Iowa in 1937 but moved to the UK in 1966, where he became involved with the British New Wave movement, centred on Michael Moorcock's groundbreaking New Worlds magazine. Sladek began writing SF with 'The Happy Breed', which appeared in Harlan Ellison's seminal anthology Dangerous Visions in 1967, and is now recognized as one of SF's most brilliant satirists. His novels and short story collections include The Muller Fokker Effect, Roderick and Tik Tok, for which he won a BSFA Award. He returned to the United States in 1986, and died there in March 2000.
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The Reproductive System
Published by
Orion Publishing Co, United Kingdom, London, 1986
ISBN 10: 0575038519
ISBN 13: 9780575038516
Used
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Seller: WorldofBooks, Goring-By-Sea, WS, United Kingdom
Seller rating 5 out of 5 stars
Paperback. Condition: Very Good. The book has been read, but is in excellent condition. Pages are intact and not marred by notes or highlighting. The spine remains undamaged. Seller Inventory # GOR005248451
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The Reproductive System
Seller: Crappy Old Books, Barry, United Kingdom
Seller rating 5 out of 5 stars
Paperback. Condition: As New. John Sladek?s The Reproductive System is a science-fiction satire about machines that reproduce themselves, which is already rude enough before humanity gets involved. It begins with the sort of brilliant technological idea that makes engineers beam, administrators approve funding, and readers quietly edge toward the exits: self-replicating robots. Because if there is one thing history has taught us, it is that making a machine capable of making more of itself will certainly remain under sensible supervision. The device at the centre of the chaos is meant to be clever, useful, rational and probably filed under ?progress.? Naturally, it begins producing more machines, then more complications, then the sort of expanding mechanical nuisance that turns a good invention into a species-level paperwork crisis. Sladek has great fun with the human talent for building systems nobody fully understands and then acting injured when the system takes the instructions seriously. This is not solemn, chrome-plated science fiction with everyone gazing at the stars and using words like destiny. It is comic, sharp, deranged and deeply suspicious of technological optimism. The future here is not a shining avenue but a workshop full of badly anticipated consequences. Scientists tinker, institutions blunder, machines multiply, officials fail to grasp the obvious, and human stupidity proves, once again, to be the most renewable energy source. The title is beautifully clinical, which makes the absurdity worse. The Reproductive System sounds as if it might be found in a biology classroom, but Sladek applies the phrase to machinery, bureaucracy and society with equal malice. Reproduction, after all, is not automatically a blessing. Sometimes what reproduces is error. Sometimes it is paperwork. Sometimes it is a robot with more confidence than judgement. Sometimes it is the same human folly, freshly manufactured in bulk. Sladek belongs to that gleefully subversive line of science-fiction writers who looked at the genre?s love of technology and asked whether the readers had considered suing. His machines are not merely gadgets; they are satirical instruments, exposing the vanity of inventors, the emptiness of institutional language and the absurdity of assuming intelligence will be present just because complexity has arrived. The robots may be mechanical, but the real automation is human incompetence repeating itself. For readers of satirical science fiction, rogue-machine stories, black comedy, anti-bureaucratic mischief, self-replicating technology and old Gollancz oddities with bite, The Reproductive System is splendid shelf material. It is clever, brisk, strange and maliciously funny in that particular way where the joke keeps pointing at civilisation and asking who approved the design. Good copy, as sold by Crappy Old Books. A solid Gollancz hardback about machines making more machines and people making the usual mess of things. No guarantee it will not reproduce if left near other SF books, though frankly the shelf could probably use the company. Seller Inventory # 7220
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The Reproductive System
Seller: -OnTimeBooks-, Phoenix, AZ, U.S.A.
Seller rating 5 out of 5 stars
Condition: very_good. Gently read. May have name of previous ownership, or ex-library edition. Binding tight; spine straight and smooth, with no creasing; covers clean and crisp. Minimal signs of handling or shelving. 100% GUARANTEE! Shipped with delivery confirmation, if you're not satisfied with purchase please return item! Ships USPS Media Mail. Seller Inventory # OTV.0575038519.VG