Stars in My Pocket Like Grains of Sand

infobox Book |
name = Stars in my Pocket Like Grains of Sand
title_orig =
translator =


image_caption = Dust-jacket from the first edition
author = Samuel R. Delany
illustrator =
cover_artist =
country = United States
language = English
series =
genre = Science fiction novel
publisher = Bantam Books
release_date = 1984
english_release_date =
media_type = Print (Hardcover & Paperback)
pages = 368 pp
isbn = ISBN 0-553-05053-2
preceded_by =
followed_by = The Splendor and Misery of Bodies, of Cities (unfinished)

"Stars in My Pocket Like Grains of Sand" (1984) is a science fiction novel by Samuel R. Delany. It was part of a planned diptych whose second half, "The Splendor and Misery of Bodies, of Cities", remains unfinished; in September 1996 the "Review of Contemporary Fiction" printed an excerpt.

Plot summary

The novel takes place in a far future in which human societies have developed divergently on many planets. They are beginning to coalesce into two broad factions, one generally permissive (the Sygn) and one generally conservative (the Family) by today's standards, in an attempt to find a stable defense against the planet destroying phenomenon known as "cultural fugue".

The story opens on the planet Rhyonon. A tall, misfit youth undergoes the "RAT" (Radical Anxiety Termination) procedure, a form of psychosurgery which makes him a passive slave, after which he is known as Rat Korga. After living under a number of masters, Rat's world is destroyed by cultural fugue. It is later explained that an alien race known as the Xlv may have something to do with cultural fugue, though the explanation is far from conclusive. Rat Korga survives the catastrophe (though badly injured) because he is deep inside a mine shaft at the time. He is the only known being to ever survive cultural fugue.

On one of the Sygn worlds, where sexual relationships take many forms—monogamous, promiscuous, anonymous, and interspecies—Marq Dyeth, an "industrial diplomat" who liaises with alien cultures, is informed that Rat Korga is his perfect sexual match by a former connection in the powerful and mysterious WEB. The WEB sends Rat Korga to Marq's home planet, Velm, under the guise of a student and they begin a romantic affair. They go on a hunting expedition and return to a dinner party which becomes chaotic due to the presence of the Thants and planetwide interest in the survivor. The Thants are humans of another world who were friends of the Dyeth's until deciding to align themselves with the Family who has promised them the position of "focus unit" on another world, Nepiy, making them effectively rulers of that planet. Soon after, Rat Korga must leave the planet because of the threat of cultural fugue.

Major themes

As in "Trouble on Triton", the novel explores conflicting ideas about personal freedom and desire (Korga has voluntarily opted for a form of psychosurgery making him incapable of anxiety or independent thought), and definitions of gender (the novel invents an alternate use of grammatical gender, in which the pronouns "he" and "she" reveal the speaker's sexual interest in the subject rather than the subject's biological sex or social gender). Like several of Delany's other works, it portrays a relationship between an intellectual and a disadvantaged person. It also includes extended digressions by Dyeth as the narrator, speaking to the reader about history, art, sex, politics and civilization.

Editions

* Bantam, 1984, 368 pp, hardcover. ISBN 0-553-05053-2
* Bantam Spectra, 1985, 368 pp, paperback. ISBN 0-553-25149-X
* QPB/Bantam, 1985, 368 pp, paperback. no ISBN
* Grafton/Panther, 1986, 464 pp, paperback, ISBN 0-586-06749-3
* Bantam Spectra, 1990, 385 pp, paperback, ISBN 0-553-25149-X, adds a 10 page afterword on postmodernism
* Wesleyan University Press, 2004, 356 pp, paperback. ISBN 0-8195-6714-0, adds a foreword by Carl Freedman

Reviews

* Negative Review: http://www.goldkeys.com/ScienceFiction/reviews/999976472X.html
* Positive Review: http://www.sfreviews.com/docs/Samuel%20R.%20Delaney_1984_Stars%20In%20My%20Pocket%20Like%20Grains%20Of%20Sand.htm

External links

* "From "The Splendor and Misery of Bodies, of Cities". [http://www.centerforbookculture.org/review/96_3.html The Review of Contemporary Fiction, Vol. XVI, no. 3, 1996] .

References

*cite web
last = Brown
first = Charles N.
authorlink = Charles N. Brown
coauthors = William G. Contento
title = The Locus Index to Science Fiction (1984-1998)
work =
publisher =
date =
url = http://www.locusmag.com/index/b132.htm#A1755.43
format =
doi =
accessdate = 2008-01-01