Edgar Pangborn SF Gateway Omnibus

From the vaults of The SF Gateway, the most comprehensive digital library of classic SFF titles ever assembled, comes an ideal introduction to the fantastic work of Edgar Pangborn.

Edgar Pangborn studied music at Harvard when just 15 years old, eventually turned his back on music to focus on his writing. He flourished in the early '50s, producing a string of highly-regarded stories for the likes of Galaxy, The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction and Ellery Queen's Mystery magazine. His work helped establish a new 'humanist' school of science fiction, and has been cited as an influence by Ursula Le Guin. This omnibus contains the Hugo-shortlisted Davy, International Fantasy Award-winner A Mirror for Observers and story collection Good Neighbours and Other Strangers.

DAVY: A HUGO and NEBULA AWARD nominee, this post-apocalyptic science fiction novel is Pangborn's most acclaimed. It is set in the Northeastern United States some centuries after an atomic war ended high-technology civilization. Davy comes of age in a pseudo-medieval society dominated by a Church that actively suppresses technology.

A MIRROR FOR OBSERVERS: The Martians, long exiled from their home planet, have for millennia been observers of the world of men. Forbidden by their laws to interfere with human destiny, they wait for mankind to mature. From the turmoil of mid 20th-century America, word comes to the Observers that one their renegades is hoping to encourage humanity in its headlong rush to self-destruction through the corruption of a single rare intellect. The struggle between Observer and Abdicator for the continuance of the human species is one of the classic conflicts in the annals of science fiction.

GOOD NEIGHBORS AND OTHER STRANGERS: A collection of short stories reflecting Pangborn's fresh writing style and mastery of the short form.

About the Author

Edgar Pangborn was born in New York City and pursued music studies at Harvard when just 15 years old. He went on to study at the New England Conservatory but did not graduate from either course. He then turned his back on music, focusing on writing. It was in the early 1950s that his writing career flourished, and he produced a string of highly regarded stories for the likes of Galaxy, The Magazine Of Fantasy And Science Fiction and Ellery Queen's Mystery Magazine. His work helped establish a new 'humanist' school of science fiction, and he has been cited by Ursula Le Guin as one of the authors who convinced her that it was possible to write worthwhile, humanly emotional stories within science fiction and fantasy. He died in New York in 1976.