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    The Status Civilization
    The Status Civilization
    The Status Civilization
    Ebook193 pages2 hours

    The Status Civilization

    By Robert Sheckley

    3.5/5

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    "Yes sir. Well, there are three men outside trying to kill me...."

    "Quite right," Mr. Frendlyer said. "And today is Landing Day. You came off the ship that landed today, and have been classified a peon.... I'm happy to say that everything is in order. The Landing Day Hunt ends at sundown. You can leave here with the knowledge that everything is correct and that your rights have not been violated."

    "Leave here? After sundown, you mean."

    Mr. Frendlyer shook his head and smiled sadly. "I'm afraid not. According to the law you must leave here at once."

    "But they'll kill me!"

    "That's very true. Unfortunately it can't be helped. A victim by definition is one who is to be killed.... We protect rights, not victims."

    Omega: Prison planet

    Life Expectancy: Three years maximum

    Most people are luckier than that....
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherSimon & Schuster
    Release dateApr 1, 2012
    ISBN9781440543326
    Author

    Robert Sheckley

    Robert Sheckley was one of the funniest writers in the history of science fiction. He did screwball comedy, broad satire, and farce. He could also be deadly serious, but he was always entertaining and always had something pointed to say about our world using the skewed versions of reality he created in his fiction. Starting in the early 1950s, he was an amazingly prolific short story writer, with a lot of his stories appearing in Galaxy Magazine. He launched his novel-writing career with Immortality, Inc., which he followed up with a sequence of excellent books: The Status Civilization, Journey Beyond Tomorrow, and Mindswap. He continued to produce novels and short stories in abundance until his death in 2005.

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    Reviews for The Status Civilization

    3.5/5

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    • 4/5
      The speaker held out his hands to quiet the murmur that ran through the auditorium. He said, "All of you are criminals. And all of you have one thing in common: an inability to obey the basic obligatory rules of human society. Those rules are necessary for civilization to function. By disobeying them, you have committed crimes against all mankind. Therefore mankind rejects you. You are grit in the machinery of civilization, and you have been sent to a world where your own sort is king. Here you can make your own rules, and die by them. Here is the freedom you lusted for; the uncontained and self-destroying freedom of a cancerous growth."On arrival at the prison planet Omega, the memory-wiped prisoners,are told their names and crimes and left to make their way as best they can through the intricacies of the society that has developed among the prisoners who arrived before them. Will Barrent strikes it lucky on his first day on Omega when he survives his first encounter with one of Omega's violent holidays, but his non-conformist ways seem bound to get him into deep trouble sooner or later. I really liked how no-one would tell the newcomers anything they needed to know . . . if they were lucky they would find out before they made a fatal mistake. To start with I found this book a fun read, but in the second half it became more interesting as it gives the reader a lot to think about. The rules and customs of Omega seemed illogical to the reader to start with, as well as to the new arrivals, but gradually the reasons for the warped nature of Omegan society and its relationship with what was happening back on Earth became clear.
    • 3/5
      Two vastly different social structures (on two different planets) were packed into this novella.

      The first was a prison planet in which inmates had created a world that worshipped evil and status was driven up by authorized kills.

      The second was a cold conforming world in which order reigned.

      I found both worlds incredibly fascinating. As with so many dystopian worlds I was left with many unanswered questions and a few confusions.

      Despite this I found the concepts fresh and I enjoyed the ideas.


    • 4/5
      Most of this book was a fun read. The parts on Omega, a planet where they worship evil and the biggest crime was not committing a crime are great. It starts to get a little odd when it gets back to Earth.

      That is all.
    • 4/5
      A satire which examines notions of good and evil, of laws and their absence and the meaning of criminality. And it also looks at conformity and gets the chance to have a dig at the theme-park approach to leisure whilst it's at it.Robert Sheckley was one of the best satirists in SF. This isn't my favourite work of his but the good bits are very good and its an effortless read, as much of his work is.
    • 3/5
      This book is about a massively distopian society where the knowledge of the rules is deliberately withheld. Knowledge is power, and the prison planet Omega is a mirror image of the Earth that condemns criminals to the hell that their crimes merit. Until you come to knowledge of the rules...especially the ones that rule both planets....
    • 3/5
      This book is an odd one. I think it can only be read as social satire, and not subtle about it to my mind. The mandatory worship at the Church of Evil bit laid it on especially thick. The priests are not "father", but "uncle". They call you "nephew" rather than "son". Good exists in the world only because evil needs a contrast ... This is a dark novel that begins with Will Barrent waking up on his way to a prison planet. His memories have been mostly wiped - he doesn't even know his name. They call him "402", his cell/room number, and tell him his name later when they tell him he has been exiled for murder. The first two-thirds of the novel is Will making his way through the society of this prison planet - he has been told that the place is run by the prisoners themselves and he should know that the average person lives only 3 years. He catches some breaks with very close calls, making me wonder how a person could manage even 3 weeks let alone 3 years. We get some glimpses of secondary characters but they weren't quite enough for me to flesh out the "normal" experiences of some of the other prisoners. It is pretty clear that Will Barrent's path is not typical. Barrent doesn't accept his fate - he has a drive to escape and return to earth. He succeeds and the last third of the novel covers his escape and return to earth. The big reveal upon returning is pretty good; not something I would have guessed. I haven't read Sheckley since I was a teenager probably. His "People Trap" really impressed me back then. This book dates to 1968. It was a satisfying read. The cover art of my book is by Jerome Podwill. It is quite interesting and what attracted me to this book.
    • 4/5
      The novel starts off with the protagonist, Will Barrent, arriving on the planet of Omega in complete confusion. He is part of a group of prisoners, and his memories have been completely wiped out. He knows that he has committed a crime but doesn't know what he did. He has been given a life sentence on the prison planet of Omega. The planet is a place of complete chaos where crime and disorder rule. Barrent does what he can to survive, meanwhile non-conforming with the rules of the planet, which make those in charge want him dead. In the process of going through numerous trials where his life is in jeopardy, he becomes part of an underground society in Omega, whose ultimate goal is to get back to Earth.This was a well-conceived and well-written novel. The author does a good job of getting into the head of Barrent, allowing the reader to feel the same confusion that his character must feel under those circumstances. The choices he makes are logical ones. Although he has been convicted of a crime, it is quickly apparent that he was not guilty of his crime. The society and the rules associated with it on Omega were fascinating. There are some comical aspects of the novel as well as good social commentary. The writing was solid and it was not overly long as most science fiction novels are. This was a good novel that I would recommend.Carl Alves - author of Blood Street
    • 4/5
      Somehow in my early years of SF reading I missed all the Sheckley stories. Now that I am doing a personal survey of the Golden years of SF I'm glad I found him. This was a fun read and more. It has stuck with me since. He introduces interesting concepts worth more then a passing thought. What kind of world are we creating and do we have anyone to blame but ourselves? Better then an average three star book. I will read more Sheckley.

    Book preview

    The Status Civilization - Robert Sheckley

    The Status Civilization

    Robert Sheckley

    Prologue logo

    a division of F+W Media

    This edition published by

    Prologue Books

    an imprint of Simon & Schuster, Inc.

    57 Littlefield Street

    Avon, MA 02322

    www.prologuebooks.com

    Text Copyright © 1960 by Robert Sheckley

    Cover Art, Design, and Layout Copyright © 2012 Simon and Schuster

    All rights reserved.

    Cover art © 123rf.com / © Igor Korionov

    This e-book edition: April 2012

    Published in association with Athans & Associates Creative Consulting

    Names, characters, corporations, institutions, organizations, events, or locales in this novel are either the product of the author’s imagination or, if real, used fictitiously. The resemblance of any character to actual persons (living or dead) is entirely coincidental.

    ISBN 10: 1-4405-4333-X

    ISBN 13: 978-1-4405-4333-3

    ePub ISBN 10: 1-4405-4332-1

    ePub ISBN 13: 978-1-4405-4332-6

    ePDF ISBN 10: 1-4405-4581-2

    ePDF ISBN 13: 978-1-4405-4581-8

    To Anya

    Contents

    Chapter One

    Chapter Two

    Chapter Three

    Chapter Four

    Chapter Five

    Chapter Six

    Chapter Seven

    Chapter Eight

    Chapter Nine

    Chapter Ten

    Chapter Eleven

    Chapter Twelve

    Chapter Thirteen

    Chapter Fourteen

    Chapter Fifteen

    Chapter Sixteen

    Chapter Seventeen

    Chapter Eighteen

    Chapter Nineteen

    Chapter Twenty

    Chapter Twenty-One

    Chapter Twenty-Two

    Chapter Twenty-Three

    Chapter Twenty-Four

    Chapter Twenty-Five

    Chapter Twenty-Six

    Chapter Twenty-Seven

    Chapter Twenty-Eight

    Chapter Twenty-Nine

    Chapter Thirty

    Chapter One

    His return to consciousness was a slow and painful process. It was a journey in which he traversed all time. He dreamed. He rose through thick layers of sleep, out of the imaginary beginnings of all things. He lifted a pseudopod from primordial ooze, and the pseudopod was him. He became an amoeba which contained his essence; then a fish marked with his own peculiar individuality; then an ape unlike all other apes. And finally, he became a man.

    What kind of man? Dimly he saw himself, faceless, a beamer gripped tight on one hand, a corpse at his feet. That kind of man.

    He awoke, rubbed his eyes, and waited for further memories to come.

    No memories came. Not even his name.

    He sat up hastily and willed memory to return. When it didn’t, he looked around, seeking in his surroundings some clue to his identity.

    He was sitting on a bed in a small gray room.

    There was a closed door on one side. On the other, through a curtained alcove, he could see a tiny lavatory. Light came into the room from some hidden source, perhaps from the ceiling itself. The room had a bed and a single chair, and nothing else.

    He held his chin in his hand and closed his eyes. He tried to catalogue all his knowledge, and the implications of that knowledge. He knew that he was a man, species Homo sapiens, an inhabitant of the planet Earth. He spoke a language which he knew was English. (Did that mean that there were other languages?) He knew the commonplace names for things: room, light, chair. He possessed in addition a limited amount of general knowledge. He knew that there were many important things which he did not know, which he once had known.

    Something must have happened to me.

    That something could have been worse. If it had gone a little further, he might have been left a mindless creature without a language, unaware of being human, of being a man, of being of Earth. A certain amount had been left to him.

    But when he tried to think beyond the basic facts in his possession, he came to a dark and horror-filled area. Do Not Enter. Exploration into his own mind was as dangerous as a journey to — what? He couldn’t find an analogue, though he suspected that many existed.

    I must have been sick.

    That was the only reasonable explanation. He was a man with the recollection of memories. He must at one time have had that priceless wealth of recall which now he could only deduce from the limited evidence at his disposal. At one time he must have had specific memories of birds, trees, friends, family, status, a wife perhaps. Now he could only theorize about them. Once he had been able to say, this is like, or, that reminds me of. Now nothing reminded him of anything, and things were only like themselves. He had lost his powers of contrast and comparison. He could no longer analyze the present in terms of the experienced past.

    This must be a hospital.

    Of course. He was being cared for in this place. Kindly doctors were working to restore his memory, to replace his identity, to restore his judgment apparatus, to tell him who and what he was. It was very good of them; he felt tears of gratitude start in his eyes.

    He stood up and walked slowly around his small room. He went to the door and found it locked. That locked door gave him a moment of panic which he sternly controlled. Perhaps he had been violent.

    Well, he wouldn’t be violent any more. They’d see. They would award him all possible patient privileges. He would speak about that with the doctor.

    He waited. After a long time, he heard footsteps coming down the corridor outside his door. He sat on the edge of the cot and listened, trying to control his excitement.

    The footsteps stopped beside his door. A panel slid open, and a face peered in.

    How are you feeling? the man asked.

    He walked up to the panel, and saw that the man who questioned him was dressed in a brown uniform. He had an object on his waist which could be identified, after a moment, as a weapon. This man was undoubtedly a guard. He had a blunt, unreadable face.

    Could you tell me my name? he asked the guard.

    Call yourself 402, the guard said. That’s your cell number.

    He didn’t like it. But 402 was better than nothing at all. He asked the guard, Have I been sick for long? Am I getting better?

    Yes, the guard said, in a voice that carried no conviction. The important thing is, stay quiet. Obey the rules. That’s the best way.

    Certainly, said 402. But why can’t I remember anything?

    Well, that’s the way it goes, the guard said. He started to walk away.

    402 called after him, Wait! You can’t just leave me like this, you have to tell me something. What happened to me? Why am I in this hospital?

    Hospital? the guard said. He turned toward 402 and grinned. What gave you the idea this was a hospital?

    I assumed it, 402 said.

    You assumed wrong. This is a prison.

    402 remembered his dream of the murdered man. Dream or memory? Desperately he called after the guard. What was my offense? What did I do?

    You’ll find out, the guard said.

    When?

    After we land, the guard said. Now get ready for assembly.

    He walked away. 402 sat down on the bed and tried to think. He had learned a few things. He was in a prison, and the prison was going to land. What did that mean? Why did a prison have to land? And what was an assembly?

    • • •

    402 had only a confused idea of what happened next. An unmeasurable amount of time passed. He was sitting on his bed, trying to piece together facts about himself. He had an impression of bells ringing. And then the door of his cell flew open.

    Why was that? What did it mean?

    402 walked to the door and peered into the corridor. He was very excited, but he didn’t want to leave the security of his cell. He waited, and the guard came up.

    All right, now, the guard said, No one’s going to hurt you. Go straight down the corridor.

    The guard pushed him gently. 402 walked down the corridor. He saw other cell doors opening, other men coming into the corridor. It was a thin stream at first; but as he continued walking, more and more men crowded into the passageway. Most of them looked bewildered, and none of them talked. The only words were from the guards:

    Move along now, keep on moving, straight ahead.

    They were headed into a large circular auditorium. Looking around, 402 saw that a balcony ran around the room, and armed guards were stationed every few yards along it. Their presence seemed unnecessary; these cowed and bewildered men weren’t going to stage a revolt. Still, he supposed the grim-faced guards had a symbolic value.

    They reminded the newly awakened men of the most important fact of their lives: that they were prisoners.

    After a few minutes, a man in a somber uniform stepped out on the balcony. He held up his hand for attention, although the prisoners were already watching him fixedly. Then, though he had no visible means of amplification, his voice boomed hollowly through the auditorium.

    This is an indoctrination talk, he said. Listen carefully and try to absorb what I am about to tell you. These facts will be very important for your existence.

    The prisoners watched him. The speaker said, "All of you have, within the last hour, awakened in your cells. You have discovered that you cannot remember your former lives — not even your names. All you possess is a meager store of generalized knowledge; enough to keep you in touch with reality.

    I will not add to your knowledge. All of you, back on Earth, were vicious and depraved criminals. You were people of the worst sort, men who had forfeited any right to consideration by the State. In a less enlightened age, you would have been executed. In our age, you have been deported.

    The speaker held out his hands to quiet the murmur that ran through the auditorium. He said, All of you are criminals. And all of you have one thing in common: an inability to obey the basic obligatory rules of human society. Those rules are necessary for civilization to function. By disobeying them, you have committed crimes against all mankind. Therefore mankind rejects you. You are grit in the machinery of civilization, and you have been sent to a world where your own sort is king. Here you can make your own rules, and die by them. Here is the freedom you lusted for; the uncontained and self-destroying freedom of a cancerous growth.

    The speaker wiped his forehead and glared earnestly at the prisoners. But perhaps, he said, "a rehabilitation is possible for some of you. Omega, the planet to which we are going, is your planet, a place ruled entirely by prisoners. It is a world where you could begin again, with no prejudices against you, with a clean record! Your past lives are forgotten. Don’t try to remember them. Such memories would serve only to restimulate your criminal tendencies. Consider yourselves born afresh as of the moment of awakening in your cells."

    The speaker’s slow, measured words had a certain hypnotic quality. 402 listened, his eyes slightly unfocused and fixed upon the speaker’s pale forehead.

    A new world, the speaker was saying. You are reborn — but with the necessary consciousness of sin. Without it, you would be unable to combat the evil inherent in your personalities. Remember that. Remember that there is no escape and no return. Guardships armed with the latest beam weapons patrol the skies of Omega day and night. These ships are designed to obliterate anything that rises more than five hundred feet above the surface of the planet — an invincible barrier through which no prisoner can ever pass. Accommodate yourselves to these facts. They constitute the rules which must govern your lives. Think about what I’ve said. And now stand by for landing.

    The speaker left the balcony. For a while, the prisoners simply stared at the spot where he had been. Then, tentatively, a murmur of conversation began. After a while it died away. There was nothing to talk about. The prisoners, without memory of the past, had nothing upon which to base a speculation of the future. Personalities could not be exchanged, for those personalities were newly emerged and still undefined.

    They sat in silence, uncommunicative men who had been too long in solitary confinement. The guards on the balcony stood like statues, remote and impersonal. And then the faintest tremor ran through the floor of the auditorium.

    The tremor came again; then it changed into a definite vibration. 402 felt heavier, as though an invisible weight were pressing against his head and shoulders.

    A loudspeaker voice called out, Attention! The ship is now landing on Omega. We will disembark shortly.

    • • •

    The last vibration died away, and the floor beneath them gave a slight lurch. The prisoners, still silent and dazed, were formed into a long line and marched out of the auditorium. Flanked by guards, they went down a corridor which stretched on interminably. From it, 402 began to get some idea of the size of the ship.

    Far ahead, he could see a patch of sunlight which shone brightly against the pale illumination of the corridor. His section of the long shuffling line reached the sunlight, and 402 saw that it came from an open hatchway through which the prisoners were passing.

    In his turn, 402 went through the hatchway, climbed down a long stairway, and found himself on solid ground. He was standing in an open, sunlit square. Guards were forming the disembarked prisoners into files; on all sides, 402 could see a crowd of spectators watching.

    A loudspeaker voice boomed, Answer when your number is called. Your identity will now be revealed to you. Answer promptly when your number is called.

    402

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