''To Live Again'' is a 1969

science fiction Science fiction (sometimes shortened to Sci-Fi or SF) is a genre of speculative fiction which typically deals with imaginative and futuristic concepts such as advanced science and technology, space exploration, time travel, parallel uni ...

novel by American writer

Robert Silverberg Robert Silverberg (born January 15, 1935) is an American author and editor, best known for writing science fiction. He is a multiple winner of both Hugo and Nebula Awards, a member of the Science Fiction and Fantasy Hall of Fame, and a Gr ...

Plot introduction

The book describes a world where all great scientists, economists, thinkers, builders and so on can store a " backup" of their personality (if they can afford the expensive procedure). Most of those who can afford it record their personality once every six months. These personalities can then be transplanted (upon the person's actual death) to other people, "living" alongside the Host, providing him or her with a new insight on life, and on their field of expertise. As the possession of extra personalities can be a mark of prestige, it has become fashionable in high society to buy and possess as many personalities as they have money for. Occasionally, the personalities of strong minded individuals can overwhelm the personalities of their hosts, resulting in the destruction of the host body's personality. The personality is said to have gone "

dybbuk In Jewish mythology, a (; yi, דיבוק, from the Hebrew verb meaning 'adhere' or 'cling') is a malicious possessing spirit believed to be the dislocated soul of a dead person. It supposedly leaves the host body once it has accomplished ...

Reception

Algis Budrys Algirdas Jonas "Algis" Budrys (January 9, 1931 – June 9, 2008) was a Lithuanian-American science fiction author, editor, and critic. He was also known under the pen names Frank Mason, Alger Rome (in collaboration with Jerome Bixby), Jo ...

, finding the novel "genuinely mov ng despite being indifferently crafted, concluded that it succeeded because "the very best parts of this book are the unwritten ones, the ones that play on the good old half-buried fears and longings, the love-death pushme-pullyou that drives men in the old, old quest whose byproduct is power."

Sidney Coleman Sidney Richard Coleman (7 March 1937 – 18 November 2007) was an American theoretical physicist noted for his research in high-energy theoretical physics. Life and work Sidney Coleman grew up on the Far North Side of Chicago. In 1957, h ...

reviewed the novel favorably, saying "At the close of ''To Live Again'', his characters are in various postures of triumph or defeat, but they are convinced they have lived life to the fullest, and have striven after that which is worth the striving. Only the reader is left in horrid fascination, as if he had just witnessed feeding time at the cannibal cage.""Books," ''

F&SF ''The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction'' (usually referred to as ''F&SF'') is a U.S. fantasy and science fiction magazine first published in 1949 by Mystery House, a subsidiary of Lawrence Spivak's Mercury Press. Editors Anthony Boucher ...

'', June 1970, p.53-4

References

1969 American novels 1969 science fiction novels American science fiction novels Novels by Robert Silverberg Doubleday (publisher) books {{1960s-sf-novel-stub