ISFDB banner

Title: Starswarm

You are not logged in. If you create a free account and sign in, you will be able to customize what is displayed.

Title: Starswarm Title Record # 30905
Author: Brian W. Aldiss
Date: 1964-01-00
Type: COLLECTION
Language: English
Note: A number of the short stories in this fix-up originally appeared in the 1963 collection ''The Airs of Earth''.
Synopsis: Adapted from Joseph Milicia's Introduction to the Gregg Press edition: As everyone knows, it is customary for writers to gather previously published stories into books, in pursuit of larger artistic schemes or simply of larger sales... The most memorable volumes as volumes are usually novel-like in some way, as when the stories have a continuing cast of characters in a more or less chronological sequence... or at least a common setting (in science fiction, Ray Bradbury's The Martian Chronicles, 1950...). Somewhat more unusual are volumes with connecting passages: new material to give a framework to the original tales, at best creating an organic whole, at worst gluing the tales together like an album of photographs with captions... In SF, probably the best known volume is Clifford D. Simak's City (1952), in which the links purport to be scholarly analyses of a collection of "ancient tales... Brian Aldiss early in his career produced two volumes of stories with frameworks — they were called "chronicle-novels" by his publisher, Signet. Aldiss comments on the first: "I was ambitious early in my career, and soon began to compose stories which would fit roughly into a millenia-long plan for the future, to create a giant perspective. The result ran to about 110,000 words, which my British and American publishers (Faber and Signet) then regarded as far too long for an SF book. It contained about fourteen stories embodied in connecting narrative. Signet loved the connecting narrative and asked to drop some stories; Faber preferred the stories. So the two hooks [The Canopy of Time, Faber, 1959, and Galaxies Like Grains of Sand, Signet, 1960; Gregg Press, 1977] resulted. I always liked Galaxies Like Grains of Sand the better, believing that the narrative strengthened the stories." Starswarm, on the other hand, originally "was just a collection of tales," and published as such by Faber as The Airs of Earth: "Signet, however, thought the title unadventurous and wanted me to try what they called another "chronicle-novel", to follow up the success of Galaxies Like Grains of Sand. Well, I saw the attractions and was modestly pleased with the results; but here was the case of commercial considerations dictating the shape of the volume.... I altered bits of the stories to fit their procrustian bed." All the same, despite its commercial origin, the Starswarm framework, like that of Galaxies Like Grains of Sand, is of some interest in itself; and while the volume as a whole may be less organically conceived than Galaxies Like Grains of Sand, it is a much finer collection of stories."
User Rating: This title has no votes. VOTE
Current Tags: None Add Tags

Other Titles

Variant Titles Translations
Year Title
1964 Starswarm [as by Brian Aldiss]
Year Language Title
1968Translated by Wessel B. Relsky
Dutch Sterrenhoop [as by Brian Aldiss]
1968Abridged edition: Drops Sector Green/Shards and The Rift/Old Hundredth. Translated by Wulf H. Bergner
German Der Sternenschwarm

Publications

Displaying all variants and translations • Do not display translationsDo not display variants or translations

Title Date Author/Editor Publisher/Pub. Series ISBN/Catalog ID Price Pages Format Type Cover Artist Verif
Starswarm 1964-01-00 Brian Aldiss Signet / New American Library D2411
$0.50?$: US dollar
159
pb?Paperback. Typically 7" by 4.25" (18 cm by 11 cm) or smaller, though trimming errors can cause them to sometimes be slightly (less than 1/4 extra inch) taller or wider/deeper.
coll Checkmark
Starswarm 1964-01-00 Brian Aldiss Signet / New American Library of Canada D2411
C$0.50?C$: Canadian dollar
159
pb?Paperback. Typically 7" by 4.25" (18 cm by 11 cm) or smaller, though trimming errors can cause them to sometimes be slightly (less than 1/4 extra inch) taller or wider/deeper.
coll Checkmark
Sterrenhoop 1968-00-00 Brian Aldiss Meulenhoff (M=SF #11) 11 ƒ2.90 223
pb?Paperback. Typically 7" by 4.25" (18 cm by 11 cm) or smaller, though trimming errors can cause them to sometimes be slightly (less than 1/4 extra inch) taller or wider/deeper.
coll Frank Stoovelaar , Ruurd Groot Checkmark
Der Sternenschwarm 1968-07-00 Brian W. Aldiss Heyne (Heyne Science Fiction & Fantasy #3124) 3124
DM 2.40?DM: German (Deutsche) mark
159+
[1]
pb?Paperback. Typically 7" by 4.25" (18 cm by 11 cm) or smaller, though trimming errors can cause them to sometimes be slightly (less than 1/4 extra inch) taller or wider/deeper.
coll Frank Kelly Freas Checkmark
Starswarm 1971-00-00 Brian Aldiss Signet / New American Library T4558
$0.75?$: US dollar
159
pb?Paperback. Typically 7" by 4.25" (18 cm by 11 cm) or smaller, though trimming errors can cause them to sometimes be slightly (less than 1/4 extra inch) taller or wider/deeper.
coll Checkmark
Starswarm 1976-00-00 Brian Aldiss Signet / New American Library of Canada Y6883
C$1.25?C$: Canadian dollar
159
pb?Paperback. Typically 7" by 4.25" (18 cm by 11 cm) or smaller, though trimming errors can cause them to sometimes be slightly (less than 1/4 extra inch) taller or wider/deeper.
coll Checkmark
Starswarm 1978-06-00 Brian Aldiss Gregg Press 0-8398-2408-4
$9.00?$: US dollar
xvi+
159
hc?Hardcover. Used for all hardbacks of any size.
coll  
Starswarm 1979-00-00 Brian Aldiss Panther / Granada 0-586-04991-6
£0.95?£: UK pound
190
pb?Paperback. Typically 7" by 4.25" (18 cm by 11 cm) or smaller, though trimming errors can cause them to sometimes be slightly (less than 1/4 extra inch) taller or wider/deeper.
coll Checkmark
Starswarm 1985-00-00 Brian Aldiss Panther / Granada 0-586-04991-6
£1.95?£: UK pound
190
pb?Paperback. Typically 7" by 4.25" (18 cm by 11 cm) or smaller, though trimming errors can cause them to sometimes be slightly (less than 1/4 extra inch) taller or wider/deeper.
coll Vincent Di Fate Checkmark
Starswarm 1985-12-00 Brian W. Aldiss Baen Science Fiction Books 0-671-55999-0
$2.95?$: US dollar
246
pb?Paperback. Typically 7" by 4.25" (18 cm by 11 cm) or smaller, though trimming errors can cause them to sometimes be slightly (less than 1/4 extra inch) taller or wider/deeper.
coll Joe Bergeron  
Starswarm 1985-12-00 Brian W. Aldiss Baen Science Fiction Books 0-671-55999-0
C$3.95?C$: Canadian dollar
246
pb?Paperback. Typically 7" by 4.25" (18 cm by 11 cm) or smaller, though trimming errors can cause them to sometimes be slightly (less than 1/4 extra inch) taller or wider/deeper.
coll Joe Bergeron Checkmark
Starswarm 1990-08-00 Brian Aldiss VGSF (VGSF Classics #45) 0-575-04182-X
£3.50?£: UK pound
190
pb?Paperback. Typically 7" by 4.25" (18 cm by 11 cm) or smaller, though trimming errors can cause them to sometimes be slightly (less than 1/4 extra inch) taller or wider/deeper.
coll Image Bank Checkmark
Starswarm date unknown Brian Aldiss Signet / New American Library Y6883
$1.25?$: US dollar
159
pb?Paperback. Typically 7" by 4.25" (18 cm by 11 cm) or smaller, though trimming errors can cause them to sometimes be slightly (less than 1/4 extra inch) taller or wider/deeper.
coll Checkmark
View all covers for Starswarm (logged in users can change User Preferences to always display covers on this page)
Copyright © 1995-2022 Al von Ruff and the ISFDB team
ISFDB Engine - Version 4.00 (04/24/06)