Most Helpful Customer Reviews
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11 of 11 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Haunting, 21 Sep 2005
I am certain that everyone has at some point wished that they could read minds, it's one of those childhood dreams that often sticks way into adulthood when we still wonder about what each other is really thinking about. Dying Inside shows the torment that such a power could bring, as the main character David, upon realising that his power is abating speaks about how his life has been affected and in some ways ruined by it.
This book was far more intimate and emotional than I had initially expected. David recalls his life in a very matter-of-fact sort of a way, which is probably what gives the novel its power because it seems all the more real that way, the way things are explained suggests the inhuman apathy that a telepath could inhibit. What is steadily revealed is that his ability prevents him from being close to any other person, and in the same breath omnipotently intimate and aware of their most private thoughts. What makes the story even more real is that David is not an especially pitiable nor likeable person. The story demonstrates that his power manages to alienate him from society rendering him a mere supernatural voyeur who in spite of his intelligence lives a very meagre and solitary life.
I found this book an unexpected pleasure, even though in some places it can be quite sexually graphic, and some may say that the story does not go anywhere, it is more about becoming aquainted with David's personality, so you can understand just what it is that he is loosing.
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8 of 8 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
A powerful exploration of the human psyche, 26 Jun 2005
I initially read this book about four years ago and it made a lasting impression, so I re-read it again recently and found it just as absorbing. One thing should be pointed out from the start as one reviewer has noted, this isn't full-on SF. Steer clear if that's what you're looking for (incidentally there are other books in S.F. Masterworks series that are not hard SF e.g. I am Legend). I should also add that I do not personally believe in the existence of powers such as telepathy or ESP! So, to the book itself... Dying Inside charts the life of 41 year old David Selig and his gift/curse of being able to read people's minds. It explores his struggle for self-understanding and the manner in which his ability both elevates and alienates him from humanity. The story is told through a variety of narrative devices such as the re-reading of old letters, flashbacks to past events, and Selig's present situation as his power begins to ebb away. The themes dealt with in the novel are intensely human and concern love, rejection and acceptance, ageing, and what it means to understand and know others. I found Silverberg's approach to the concept of telepathy to be intensely vivid and convincing, as Selig veers from God-like omnipotence with his power through to being a despairing misfit; all of which is expressed through Selig's day-to-day life and encounters, such as his relationships, work and social identity. In structure the novel does not follow any real plot and at times it lacks cohesion, but this seems to work in the novel's favour as it mirrors and reflects Selig's character. It also contains some beautiful descriptive writing (particularly toward the end of the novel). To put the novel into context, it was published in 1972 in a decade where the author hit a rich vein of form, with books such as The Man in the Maze and The Stochastic Man. Overall, on a personal level this remains one of my favourite SF novels. If you're looking for a futuristic storyline, built around science and technology then this won't be for you. But if this and the other reviews intrigue you then I'd certainly recommend you give it a read.
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2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Good on every level, 25 Oct 2003
It is Manhattan, 1976 and David Selig is looking back on his life, a story which is delivered to us in first person, sometimes personally addressing a long-lost love in the hope that she may be reading this, and now and again objectively and dispassionately in the third person.
Selig is 42 and confesses immediately that from an early age he was able to read the thoughts of others, although apparently unable to project his thoughts into their minds.
Previously, novels which have dealt with telepathy are most often associated with Homo Superior; generally benign upgrades on Homo sapiens for whom telepathy is an essential tool for communication and understanding.
Silverberg presents a different view in that Selig's talent makes him anything but superior. At a very early age he realised that he was different and learned to hide his telepathy from everyone. Growing up, the very ease with which he is able to analyse others' motives and opinions prevents him from developing the social skills with which to initiate and maintain real relationships.
During the course of the novel he encounters one other like himself, Tom Nyquist, a man seemingly at ease with his telepathy and with whom Selig shares an uneasy friendship, since the freakish talent is one of the few things they have in common. Nyquist has no qualms about exploiting his talent to work the stock-market, lifting sensitive share information from the minds of those in the know and selling the tips on to a regular cadre of investors.
Selig employs his talent only to produce written-to-order term papers for students at a local university, tailoring the essays to their individual strengths and weaknesses and guaranteeing them a minimum mark of B+.
The only other person in Selig's life - his adopted sister Judith - is bound to him by both familial relationship and her long experience of Selig's talent. It is interesting that Silverberg has created this character as a sister only in name (i.e. not genetically connected) and yet still taboo in terms of a true sexual relationship one presumes, particularly within an orthodox Jewish community.
Their relationship is a prickly yet indissoluble one, and as John Clute points out in his scholarly foreword to this volume, he has 'married her more deeply than any man she sleeps with'.
Selig's insights into the human soul give him a unique view of the human condition, mostly depressing since he is able to see the truth behind the smile; the hidden motives underlying seemingly kind words and actions.
His one experience of true happiness within a human mind occurred in his childhood where he slipped into the mind of a farmer, experiencing the old man's almost Buddhist sense of enlightenment and oneness with the natural world around him.
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