technology has been displaced by magic, in much
the same fashion as in the Dying Earth series by
Jack VANCE. Whereas Vance uses that venue for
lighthearted though clever adventures, Harrison
has a much more serious attitude, and his stories
often draw upon sword and sorcery devices, al-
though with a very distinct flavor and certainly far
more attention to literary values than is common
in that form.
The first book in the series is The Pastel City
(1971), which establishes this setting quite color-
fully. Viriconium is one of the last surviving cities,
ruled by a queen and menaced by external ene-
mies, chiefly those living in underground warrens.
Although the opening novel can be read as sci-
ence fiction, since the promised magic fails to ma-
terialize, the intent and tone of the series is clearly
inclined toward the metaphysical rather than the
scientific. A Storm of Wings(1980) is in one sense
very similar, although this time the enemy is a
swarm of oversized and unusually intelligent lo-
custs. Harrison adds an extra level of interest by
alternating between human and locust viewpoints.
The Floating Gods(1983, also published as In
Viriconium) is the last novel in the series. A lonely
artist seeks to find his own personal way in a city
beset by plague, rampant crime, and the gradual
decay of its institutions. A fourth volume, Virico-
nium Nights(1984), whose contents differ from
edition to edition, is a collection of stories using
that setting. The four volumes were published in a
combined edition as Viriconium(1988). The best of
the short stories are “Viriconium Nights” (1981),
“The Lords of Misrule” (1984), and “The Luck in
the Head” (1983).
Harrison has not added to the series since the
1980s and has written only intermittent fantasy, al-
though The Course of the Heart(1992) is quite
good. His reputation remains high because the
Viriconium series is one of the very small handful
of story sequences of a dying earth to rise above
the level of simple fantasy adventure.
“The Voice in the Night”William Hope
Hodgson(1907)
Although William Hope HODGSON wrote many
tales of terror set at sea, this quiet tale in which
nothing violent occurs is his most famous and most
chilling. A fishing schooner is lying becalmed one
night when the crew is hailed by a mysterious
voice from a small boat requesting that they pro-
vide some food for the rower, a man, and the
woman he left behind on a nearby uncharted is-
land. Although the fishermen are perfectly happy
to provide the supplies, they are puzzled by the
speaker’s unwillingness to approach the boat or to
allow them to shine a light in his direction. Never-
theless, they place food in a box and push it off, for
which charity they receive shouted thanks.
Hours pass, and the man returns, still remain-
ing out of sight. Having restored his strength, he
agrees to tell them his story. He and his wife were
survivors of the sinking of another vessel, unhap-
pily named The Albatross,who managed to con-
trive a raft and subsequently drifted about until
they encountered a derelict ship. The ship was de-
serted, but the larder was stocked. The only bad
aspect of the situation was the profuse growth of
fungus, in some places piled up into man-sized
lumps. Their efforts to clear even part of the ship
came to naught, because the fungus always re-
turned within hours, and they eventually decided
to move to the nearby island, which was also heav-
ily overgrown with the same substance.
Their situation soon worsened. They began to
run short of food, surviving primarily on occasional
fish they managed to catch. Even worse, spots of
the fungus appeared on their skin, and although
they removed it on each occasion, the infection
appeared to be growing. Then the man discovered
that his wife had started eating the fungus, which
proved to be mildly addictive, and although he
convinced her stop, it seemed likely that starvation
would overcome their aversion. Days later, while
exploring the interior of the island, the man en-
countered a clump of fungus that moved and real-
ized that it was what remained of one of the crew
of the derelict ship. He and his wife are doomed to
the same fate, and they cannot come close to the
fishermen for fear of spreading the infection even
further.
Hodgson offers no hope for his characters.
They are literally doomed to lose their humanity, if
not their lives. The story led to several imitations,
most notably “Fungus Isle” (1923), by Philip M.364 “The Voice in the Night”