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} }) </script> </div> </form> </fieldset> <article class="entryArticle content STeditorial"> <header class="entryHeader icon-author"> <h1 class="entryTitle">Robinson, Kim Stanley </h1> </header><p class='tagLine'>Entry updated 6 May 2024. Tagged: Author.</p><div class="browsingBtns"> <span> <input class="button PNI previous" type="button" onclick="window.location.href='/next.php?id=p&entry=robinson_kim_stanley'" value="Prev" /> </span> <span> <input class="button PNI next" type="button" onclick="window.location.href='/next.php?&entry=robinson_kim_stanley'" value="Next" /> </span> <span> <input class="button PNI incoming" type="button" onclick="window.location.href='/incoming.php?entry=robinson_kim_stanley'" value="About This Entry" title="What links to the entry; contributor initials explained; how to cite; other information" /> </span> <span><input class="button PNI" type="button" value="Checklist" onclick="window.location.hash='chklst'" ></span> <span><input class="button PNI" type="button" value="Alpha" onclick="window.location.href='/chron.php?id=robinson_kim_stanley&abc'" ></span> <span><input class="button PNI" type="button" value="Chron" onclick="window.location.href='/chron.php?id=robinson_kim_stanley'" ></span> <span style="cursor: pointer;" onclick="window.open('/gallery.php?link=robinson_kim_stanley');"> <img alt="Icon made by Freepik from www.flaticon.com" style="margin: 0; position: relative; top:-2px;" src="/images/icon-gal.gif"></img></span> </div><p style='float:right; margin-bottom:0; margin-left:10px; position: relative; top: 3px;'> <a href='/gallery.php?id=Burling-KSR.jpg' target='_blank'> <img src='https://x.sf-encyclopedia.com/gal/thumbs/Burling-KSR.jpg' alt='pic'></a></p> <p>(1952-    ) US author who began writing sf stories with "Coming Back to Dixieland" and "In Pierson's Orchestra", both published in <i>Orbit 18</i> (anth <b>1975</b>) edited by Damon <a href="/entry/knight_damon">Knight</a>. He initially published solely in shorter forms, releasing about ten stories before gaining his PhD in English at the University of California in 1982, studying under Fredric <a href="/entry/jameson_fredric">Jameson</a>. In revised form, his thesis was later published as <i>The Novels of Philip K. Dick</i> (<b>1984</b>); thoroughly researched, at ease with the protocols of academic writing while at the same time showing an acute understanding of 1950s sf, it remains a useful study of Philip K <a href="/entry/dick_philip_k">Dick</a>'s thorny oeuvre, though the flood of work on Dick has superseded it in some respects.</p> <p>Robinson became widely known with the publication of his first novel, <i>The Wild Shore</i> (<b>1984</b>), released as one of Terry <a href="/entry/carr_terry">Carr</a>'s <b>Ace Specials</b>, which won a <a href="/entry/locus_award">Locus Award</a>, and which initiates the <b>Three Californias</b> sequence set in three versions of <b>Orange County</b> on the Pacific coast just south of Los Angeles (see <a href="/entry/california">California</a>). The sequence is notable for the ambition and width of the tripartite <a href="/entry/thought_experiment">Thought Experiment</a> it unfolds, drawing upon <a href="/entry/futures_studies">Futures Studies</a> in general, and in particular upon the literatures of <a href="/entry/utopias">Utopia</a> and <a href="/entry/dystopias">Dystopia</a>, each narrative being gravely consistent throughout with the <a href="/entry/hard_sf">Hard SF</a> requirement that any <a href="/entry/technology">Technology</a>-driven or -enabled change be soundly argued. <i>The Wild Shore</i> lucidly examines the sentimentalized kind of American sf <a href="/entry/pastoral">Pastoral</a> typically set in a seemingly secure <a href="/entry/keep">Keep</a>-like enclave after an almost universal catastrophe has transformed the world into a <a href="/entry/ruined_earth">Ruined Earth</a>. Sheltered from the full <a href="/entry/disaster">Disaster</a>, Orange County has become an enclave whose inhabitants nostalgically espouse a re-established American hegemony, but whose smug ignorance of the world outside is ultimately self-defeating. In <i>The Gold Coast</i> (<b>1988</b>), Orange County several decades hence is seen through the lens of <a href="/entry/dystopias">Dystopia</a>; a similar array of characters – similarly related to one another – must grapple with an alternate <a href="/entry/near_future">Near Future</a> outcome: in this case – whose historical line from the present requires only the most rudimentary extrapolation – a polluted, corrupt, desperately overcrowded California suffers from profound <a href="/entry/ecology">Ecological</a> degradation. Under a third set of names, essentially the same characters find themselves, in <i>Pacific Edge</i> (<b>1990</b>), which won a <a href="/entry/john_w_campbell_memorial_award">John W Campbell Memorial Award</a>, breathing the air of <a href="/entry/utopias">Utopia</a>. In this world Orange County has benefited from restrictions on corporate size and strict controls over land use and <a href="/entry/pollution">Pollution</a>. Although the novel shows the near impossibility of imagining a living utopia (that everyone plays softball pretty constantly may not be an entirely convincing synecdoche of a wholesome lifestyle), a sense of earned freshness and relief permeates its pages. As a whole, the three versions of the same story comprise a structurally adventurous and searching <a href="/entry/thought_experiment">Thought Experiment</a>, one that seems never to have been attempted earlier, nor since.</p> <p>Robinson's other early novels are varyingly successful. <i>Icehenge</i> (fixup <b>1984</b>) strikingly conflates three incompatible readings of the significance of an artefact found on Pluto (see <a href="/entry/outer_planets">Outer Planets</a>), exploring a range of issues from epistemology to the nature of historical tradition. <i>The Memory of Whiteness: A Scientific Romance</i> (<b>1985</b>) less successfully attempts to suggest analogues between <a href="/entry/music">Music</a> theory and the structure of the Universe (see <a href="/entry/cosmology">Cosmology</a>), while at the same time conducting its musician hero – typical of Robinson's protagonists, he is an almost constantly active character – on a <a href="/entry/fantastic_voyages">Fantastic Voyage</a> through the solar system, starting with the <a href="/entry/outer_planets">Outer Planets</a> and moving inwards, where <a href="/entry/space_habitats">Space Habitats</a> proliferate; the narrative dynamics of the tale are perhaps too decorously muted, in accordance with the distanced and distancing <a href="/entry/scientific_romance">Scientific Romance</a> perspectives involved. <i>Escape from Kathmandu</i> (<b>1988</b> chap), later expanded as <i>Escape from Kathmandu</i> (coll of linked stories <b>1989</b>), set in a stress-ridden mystical Nepal, amusingly and more relaxedly exploits Robinson's own experience as a mountaineer. <i>A Short, Sharp Shock</i> (<b>1990</b>) carries its athletic and ultimately clear-eyed protagonist into a soul-defining trek across an endless sea-girt peninsula which is freely symbolic of death, or of the nature of life, or simply of the path a person must follow to fill out a human span.</p> <p>Shorter forms have never seemed fully roomy enough for the comfortable expounding of Robinson's premises about the worlds in store, though some of this work is undeniably successful. Earlier stories appear in <i>The Planet on the Table</i> (coll <b>1986</b>), <i>The Blind Geometer</i> (<b>1986</b> chap; with one story added, coll <b>1989</b> dos) – a later but lesser magazine version (August 1987 <a href="/entry/asimovs">Asimov's</a>) won the 1987 <a href="/entry/nebula">Nebula</a> for Best Novella – and <i>A Sensitive Dependence on Initial Conditions</i> (coll <b>1991</b> chap; exp vt <i>Remaking History</i> <b>1991</b>; incorporating <i>The Planet on the Table</i>, further exp as omni <b>1994</b>). Later shorter work has been variously assembled; the most useful titles are probably <i>Vinland the Dream and Other Stories</i> (coll <b>2002</b>) and <i>The Best of Kim Stanley Robinson</i> (coll <b>2010</b>).</p> <p>Of much greater significance was the second of Robinson's three series to date, all of these series being deeply ambitious attempts to argue the future as a cognitively sound extrapolation from human history (see <a href="/entry/history_in_sf">History in SF</a>). The <b>Mars</b> trilogy is prefigured by a draft preview of the arguments of the novels to come in the form of <i>Green Mars</i> (September 1985 <a href="/entry/asimovs">Asimov's</a>; <b>1988</b> chap dos), which treats <a href="/entry/mars">Mars</a> as a realistic habitat for the human species, but is otherwise unconnected to the trilogy itself: <i>Red Mars</i> (<b>1992</b>), which won the 1993 <a href="/entry/nebula">Nebula</a>; <i>Green Mars</i> (<b>1993</b>), which won the 1994 <a href="/entry/hugo">Hugo</a>; and <i>Blue Mars</i> (<b>1996</b>), which again won a <a href="/entry/hugo">Hugo</a> in 1997, plus the <a href="/entry/locus_award">Locus Award</a>. The narrative unpacks in detail a <a href="/entry/future_histories">Future History</a> during the course of which the human settlers of Mars gain political independence of Earth (a full constitution is provided in the text) while engaging in a debate over the ethics and practicalities involved in <a href="/entry/terraforming">Terraforming</a> the planet. With suitable cognitive caution, the cast (and the sequence) comes down on the side of planetary transformation. Faced with a long (and sometimes dogged) presentation of complex arguments – all based on thorough research into the science and <a href="/entry/technology">Technology</a> of Terraforming, and into the physical nature of Mars itself – Robinson has shaped his tale around the experiences over time (a longevity drug proves helpful here, as well as other effects of some moderate <a href="/entry/genetic_engineering">Genetic Engineering</a>) of some of the First Hundred colonists, who reappear from volume to volume over the 200 years of the story arc; the resulting sense of continuity is, quite deliberately, diluted, as though to sidestep a certain sweet-tooth for the transhuman (see <a href="/entry/transcendence">Transcendence</a>) that Robinson shares with many writers of <a href="/entry/hard_sf">Hard SF</a>. <i>The Martians</i> (coll <b>1999</b>) assembles tales that fit into the interstices of the larger enterprise.</p> <p>Two singletons followed the central <b>Mars</b> tales. <i>Antarctica</i> (<b>1997</b>), transparently based on the author's own experiences in Antarctica, is a <a href="/entry/near_future">Near Future</a> tale most interesting for its description of living on (and trekking across) the continent. <i>The Years of Rice and Salt</i> (<b>2002</b>), which won the <a href="/entry/locus_award">Locus Award</a>, is an <a href="/entry/alternate_history">Alternate History</a> whose <a href="/entry/jonbar_point">Jonbar Point</a> is a fifteenth-century Black Death, a <a href="/entry/pandemic">Pandemic</a> whose effects are far more savage than in our world, and which essentially eliminates Western Europe as an engine of history. In the absence of Christian Europe, the history of the next 700 years focuses variously on lands dominated by Islam, on India, and upon immense China. With a clear didactic intent, Robinson creates parallels between this history and our own: <a href="/entry/invention">Inventions</a> and scientific advances are co-ordinated with ours, and a similar (though ultimately very different) Great War haunts the later pages of the long text. The main protagonists live mortal lives but after their posthumous souls are purified in an <a href="/entry/equipoise">Equipoisal</a> bardo (a Buddhist concept for the place where souls await rebirth), they continue new lives, not quite remembering their previous incarnations. Some of the didactic contrivances are forced; but the abiding sense of the tale is of reverence for the constant rebirth and re-affirmation of lives passed in the interstices of the lessons told, lifetime after lifetime passed in the regions of rice and salt, that comprise, in the end, all that matters.</p> <p>Robinson's third trilogy – the <b>Capital Code</b> sequence comprising <i>Forty Signs of Rain</i> (<b>2004</b>), <i>Fifty Degrees Below</i> (<b>2005</b>) and <i>Sixty Days and Counting</i> (<b>2007</b>) – again faces the <a href="/entry/near_future">Near Future</a> directly, in this case at a point when <a href="/entry/climate_change">Climate Change</a> has begun – it would seem undeniably – to transform the world as the Gulf Stream fails, Washington is drowned, and weather patterns worldwide become hugely turbulent. The sequence focuses on America, on American <a href="/entry/politics">Politics</a>, on right-wing American Climate Change Denial, and ultimately on some radical <a href="/entry/technology">Technological</a> fixes for what seems to be an irreversible series of <a href="/entry/disaster">Disasters</a>. There is no clear sense that the solutions offered here will work – even if the American government manages to attempt to implement them – but Robinson's perpetually active protagonists struggle on: hoping to make the story of technological fix come true.</p> <p>In several further singletons, Robinson offers distinctly different angles of vision. <i>Galileo's Dream</i> (<b>2009</b>) complexly suggests that our world is in fact an <a href="/entry/alternate_history">Alternate History</a>, the <a href="/entry/jonbar_point">Jonbar Point</a> for which is the Catholic Inquisition's failure to burn Galileo at the stake, so that he lives out his life in house arrest, squabbling furiously and creating new discourse with the rest of Europe. In the "real" world, his death has inflamed and radicalized much of Europe, causing an intolerant narrowness of vision, a frozenness in the human enterprise climaxing in the appalling <a href="/entry/utopias">Utopias</a> that dominate the moons of <a href="/entry/jupiter">Jupiter</a>; the plot turns on the successful efforts of a team from the "real" world to keep Galileo alive. <i>2312</i> (<b>2012</b>) returns to a panoptic vision of the Solar System, again complexly reconfigured. The traumas attending Earth's transaction of the twenty-first century seem to have generated an empowered, though perhaps unusually athletic, interplanetary civilization; threats to this dynamic comity are duly met; the novel won a <a href="/entry/nebula">Nebula</a> award.</p> <p><i>Shaman</i> (<b>2013</b>), which is both <a href="/entry/prehistoric_sf">Prehistoric SF</a> and <i>Bildungsroman</i>, follows the growth to maturity, 32,000 BCE, of young Loon, who evolves into the profoundly inspired artist (see <a href="/entry/arts">Arts</a>) responsible for some of the paradigmatic images only discovered in the Chauvet cave in France as recently as 1996. Robinson's sense of the haunting modernity of Loon's mind is fully in accord with twenty-first century investigations of this aspect of the human condition, as summarized (for instance) in <i>Ice Age Art: The Arrival of the Modern Mind</i> (<b>2013</b>) by Jill Cook. <i>Aurora</i> (<b>2015</b>), an inventive <a href="/entry/generation_starships">Generation Starship</a> novel that comes late in the history of that topos, carries 2,000 passengers/inhabitants towards the Tau Ceti system; narrated by the ship's <a href="/entry/ai">AI</a>, the tale focuses upon life-histories, which are intricately interwoven into expositions (see <a href="/entry/infodump">Infodump</a>, a procedure to which Robinson is prone but has increasingly mastered) of circumstances familiar to the form: <a href="/entry/communications">Communication</a> problems with Earth, and matters of <a href="/entry/ecology">Ecology</a>, <a href="/entry/evolution">Evolution</a> and <a href="/entry/politics">Politics</a>. Underlying doubts about the prospects for <i>Homo sapiens</i> are darkened in the distant <a href="/entry/near_future">Near Future</a> <i>New York 2140</i> (<b>2017</b>) (see <a href="/entry/new_york">New York</a>), set in a world devastated by <a href="/entry/climate_change">Climate Change</a>, which is responsible for a fifty-foot rise in the ocean level, radically transforming the low-lying metropolis. The complex tale deploys a large cast, articulated through eight interacting subplots, who all reside in the same skyscraper. The portrait achieved of the times to come is realistic. Set three decades into the <a href="/entry/near_future">Near Future</a>, during a period of Chinese dominance on the <a href="/entry/moon">Moon</a>, <i>Red Moon</i> (<b>2018</b>) ostensibly unpacks in terms of the to-ing and fro-ing of its attractive young protagonists, but more than usual in his previous work – whose protagonists tended to be intrinsic to the working out of the <a href="/entry/thought_experiment">Thought Experiment</a> "proposal" of the text in question – they serve as occasions for ruminative explorations of the meaning of the world to come, rather in the manner of the <a href="/entry/scientific_romance">Scientific Romance</a>; this is all the more true with the Thought Experiment at the heart of <i>The Ministry for the Future</i> (<b>2020</b>), the foreboding <a href="/entry/futures_studies">Futures Studies</a> tone of its arguments over how to save the planet contrasting at points, deliberately, with a vision of the <a href="/entry/near_future">Near Future</a> as an arena for the endgame of <i>Homo sapiens</i> (see <a href="/entry/end_of_the_world">End of the World</a>).</p> <p>In a somewhat contrived 1980s attempt to contrast him to <a href="/entry/cyberpunk">Cyberpunk</a> writers, Robinson was described as a Humanist; it proved to be a distinction without content, and the controversy created is now part of the <a href="/entry/history_of_sf">History of SF</a>. Though it might be possible to call him a Hard SF Humanist, what in fact most characterizes the growing reach and power of his work is its cogent analysis and its disposal of such category thinking. In some form or another, Robinson's career has consistently adhered to an overriding cognitive imperative: the argument that <i>Homo species</i> will not thrive unless humane <a href="/entry/utopias">Utopias</a> can be created out of the increasingly disaster-prone real world, an argument intimately married to a conviction that unless we manage against heavy odds to make the world significantly better, we are almost certainly doomed to make it worse; Robinson's more recent works more and more starkly confront this choice. [JC]</p> <p><b>see also:</b> <a href="/entry/ace_books">Ace Books</a>; <a href="/entry/asimovs">Asimov's Science Fiction</a>; <a href="/entry/definitions_of_sf">Definitions of SF</a>; <i>The</i> <a href="/entry/fsf">Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction</a>; <a href="/entry/mathematics">Mathematics</a>; <a href="/entry/messiahs">Messiahs</a>; <a href="/entry/nanotechnology">Nanotechnology</a>; <a href="/entry/nuclear_energy">Nuclear Energy</a>; <a href="/entry/philip_k_dick_award">Philip K Dick Award</a>; <a href="/entry/robert_a_heinlein_award">Robert A Heinlein Award</a>; <a href="/entry/seiun_award">Seiun Award</a>; <a href="/entry/slingshot_ending">Slingshot Ending</a>; <a href="/entry/space_elevator">Space Elevator</a>.</p> <h3 id="chklst">Kim Stanley Robinson</h3> <p><b>born</b> Waukegan, Illinois: 23 March 1952</p> <p><b>works</b></p> <p><input type="button" value="Alphabetical" class="button PNI" onclick="window.location.href='/chron.php?id=robinson_kim_stanley&abc'"> <input type="button" value="Chronological" class="button PNI" onclick="window.location.href='/chron.php?id=robinson_kim_stanley'"></p> <p><b>series</b></p> <p><b>Three Californias</b></p> <ul class="x"> <li><em><a href="/sfeshop.php?field-keywords=The+Wild+Shore&field-author=Robinson+Kim+Stanley" class="link-amazon" target="_blank">The Wild Shore</a></em> (New York: Ace Books, <b>1984</b>) [<b>Three Californias</b>: in the publisher's third <b>Science Fiction Special</b> series: pb/Andrea Baruffi]</li> <li><em><a href="/sfeshop.php?field-keywords=The+Gold+Coast&field-author=Robinson+Kim+Stanley" class="link-amazon" target="_blank">The Gold Coast</a></em> (New York: Tor, <b>1988</b>) [<b>Three Californias</b>: hb/Bruce <a href="/entry/jensen_bruce">Jensen</a>]</li> <li><em><a href="/sfeshop.php?field-keywords=Pacific+Edge&field-author=Robinson+Kim+Stanley" class="link-amazon" target="_blank">Pacific Edge</a></em> (London: Unwin Hyman, <b>1990</b>) [<b>Three Californias</b>: hb/Lee Gibbons] <ul class="x"> <li><em><a href="/sfeshop.php?field-keywords=Three+Californias&field-author=Robinson+Kim+Stanley" class="link-amazon" target="_blank">Three Californias</a></em> (New York: Tor Essentials, <b>2020</b>) [omni of the above three: <b>Three Californias</b>: pb/Jamie Stafford-Hill]</li> </ul></li> </ul> <p><b>Mars</b></p> <ul class="x"> <li><em><a href="/sfeshop.php?field-keywords=Green+Mars&field-author=Robinson+Kim+Stanley" class="link-amazon" target="_blank">Green Mars</a></em> (New York: Tor, <b>1988</b>) [novella: chap: dos: first appeared September 1985 <a href="/entry/asimovs">Asimov's</a>: <b>Mars</b>: pb/Vincent <a href="/entry/di_fate_vincent">Di Fate</a>]</li> <li><em><a href="/sfeshop.php?field-keywords=Red+Mars&field-author=Robinson+Kim+Stanley" class="link-amazon" target="_blank">Red Mars</a></em> (London: HarperCollins, <b>1992</b>) [volume one of central trilogy: <b>Mars</b>: hb/Mel Grant]</li> <li><em><a href="/sfeshop.php?field-keywords=Green+Mars&field-author=Robinson+Kim+Stanley" class="link-amazon" target="_blank">Green Mars</a></em> (London: HarperCollins, <b>1993</b>) [volume two of central trilogy: no connection with <em>Green Mars</em> above: <b>Mars</b>: hb/Peter <a href="/entry/elson_peter">Elson</a>]</li> <li><em><a href="/sfeshop.php?field-keywords=Blue+Mars&field-author=Robinson+Kim+Stanley" class="link-amazon" target="_blank">Blue Mars</a></em> (London: HarperCollins, <b>1996</b>) [volume three of central trilogy: <b>Mars</b>: hb/Peter <a href="/entry/elson_peter">Elson</a>]</li> <li><em><a href="/sfeshop.php?field-keywords=The+Martians&field-author=Robinson+Kim+Stanley" class="link-amazon" target="_blank">The Martians</a></em> (London: HarperCollins, <b>1999</b>) [coll: <b>Mars</b>: hb/Peter <a href="/entry/elson_peter">Elson</a>]</li> </ul> <p><b>Capital Code</b></p> <ul class="x"> <li><em><a href="/sfeshop.php?field-keywords=Forty+Signs+of+Rain&field-author=Robinson+Kim+Stanley" class="link-amazon" target="_blank">Forty Signs of Rain</a></em> (London: HarperCollins, <b>2004</b>) [<b>Capital Code</b>: hb/Dominic <a href="/entry/harman_dominic">Harman</a>]</li> <li><em><a href="/sfeshop.php?field-keywords=Fifty+Degrees+Below&field-author=Robinson+Kim+Stanley" class="link-amazon" target="_blank">Fifty Degrees Below</a></em> (Norwalk, Connecticut: The Easton Press, <b>2005</b>) [<b>Capital Code</b>: hb/nonpictorial]</li> <li><em><a href="/sfeshop.php?field-keywords=Sixty+Days+and+Counting&field-author=Robinson+Kim+Stanley" class="link-amazon" target="_blank">Sixty Days and Counting</a></em> (New York: Bantam Books, <b>2007</b>) [<b>Capital Code</b>: hb/Dominic <a href="/entry/harman_dominic">Harman</a>] <ul class="x"> <li><em><a href="/sfeshop.php?field-keywords=Green+Earth&field-author=Robinson+Kim+Stanley" class="link-amazon" target="_blank">Green Earth</a></em> (New York: Del Rey, <b>2015</b>) [omni of the above three, updated and abridged: <b>Capital Code</b>: pb/Wes Youssi]</li> </ul></li> </ul> <p><b>individual titles</b></p> <ul class="x"> <li><em><a href="/sfeshop.php?field-keywords=Icehenge&field-author=Robinson+Kim+Stanley" class="link-amazon" target="_blank">Icehenge</a></em> (New York: Ace Books, <b>1984</b>) [fixup: pb/Mark Weber]</li> <li><em><a href="/sfeshop.php?field-keywords=The+Memory+of+Whiteness+A+Scientific+Romance&field-author=Robinson+Kim+Stanley" class="link-amazon" target="_blank">The Memory of Whiteness: A Scientific Romance</a></em> (New York: Tor, <b>1985</b>) [hb/Joe Bergeron]</li> <li><em><a href="/sfeshop.php?field-keywords=Escape+from+Kathmandu&field-author=Robinson+Kim+Stanley" class="link-amazon" target="_blank">Escape from Kathmandu</a></em> (Eugene, Oregon: Axolotl Press, <b>1987</b>) [novella: chap: dos: first appeared September 1986 <a href="/entry/asimovs">Asimov's</a>: hb/Donna Gordon] <ul class="x"> <li><em><a href="/sfeshop.php?field-keywords=Escape+from+Kathmandu&field-author=Robinson+Kim+Stanley" class="link-amazon" target="_blank">Escape from Kathmandu</a></em> (New York: Tor, <b>1989</b>) [coll of linked stories/fixup: exp of the above with further linked sections: hb/Wayne <a href="/entry/barlowe_wayne_douglas">Barlowe</a>]</li> </ul></li> <li><em><a href="/sfeshop.php?field-keywords=Antarctica&field-author=Robinson+Kim+Stanley" class="link-amazon" target="_blank">Antarctica</a></em> (London: HarperCollins/Voyager, <b>1997</b>) [hb/Peter <a href="/entry/elson_peter">Elson</a>]</li> <li><em><a href="/sfeshop.php?field-keywords=The+Years+of+Rice+and+Salt&field-author=Robinson+Kim+Stanley" class="link-amazon" target="_blank">The Years of Rice and Salt</a></em> (New York: Bantam Books, <b>2002</b>) [hb/Alan Ayers]</li> <li><em><a href="/sfeshop.php?field-keywords=Galileo+Dream&field-author=Robinson+Kim+Stanley" class="link-amazon" target="_blank">Galileo's Dream</a></em> (London: HarperCollins, <b>2009</b>) [hb/Chris White and Jupiter Images]</li> <li><em><a href="/sfeshop.php?field-keywords=2312&field-author=Robinson+Kim+Stanley" class="link-amazon" target="_blank">2312</a></em> (New York: Orbit, <b>2012</b>) [hb/Kirk Benshoff]</li> <li><em><a href="/sfeshop.php?field-keywords=Shaman&field-author=Robinson+Kim+Stanley" class="link-amazon" target="_blank">Shaman</a></em> (New York: Orbit, <b>2013</b>) [hb/Michal Karcz]</li> <li><em><a href="/sfeshop.php?field-keywords=Aurora&field-author=Robinson+Kim+Stanley" class="link-amazon" target="_blank">Aurora</a></em> (New York: Orbit, <b>2015</b>) [hb/Kirk Benshoff]</li> <li><em><a href="/sfeshop.php?field-keywords=New+York+2140&field-author=Robinson+Kim+Stanley" class="link-amazon" target="_blank">New York 2140</a></em> (New York/London: Orbit, <b>2017</b>) [simultaneous in New York and London: hb/Stephan <a href="/entry/martiniere_stephan">Martinière</a>]</li> <li><em><a href="/sfeshop.php?field-keywords=Red+Moon&field-author=Robinson+Kim+Stanley" class="link-amazon" target="_blank">Red Moon</a></em> (New York: Orbit, <b>2018</b>) [hb/Arcangel Images]</li> <li><em><a href="/sfeshop.php?field-keywords=The+Ministry+for+the+Future&field-author=Robinson+Kim+Stanley" class="link-amazon" target="_blank">The Ministry for the Future</a></em> (New York: Orbit, <b>2020</b>) [hb/]</li> </ul> <p><b>collections and stories</b></p> <ul class="x"> <li><em><a href="/sfeshop.php?field-keywords=The+Planet+on+the+Table&field-author=Robinson+Kim+Stanley" class="link-amazon" target="_blank">The Planet on the Table</a></em> (New York: Tor, <b>1986</b>) [coll: hb/Michael Tedesco]</li> <li><em><a href="/sfeshop.php?field-keywords=The+Blind+Geometer&field-author=Robinson+Kim+Stanley" class="link-amazon" target="_blank">The Blind Geometer</a></em> (New Castle, Virginia: Cheap Street, <b>1986</b>) [novella: chap: illus/hb/Judy King-Rieniets] <ul class="x"> <li><em><a href="/sfeshop.php?field-keywords=The+Blind+Geometer&field-author=Robinson+Kim+Stanley" class="link-amazon" target="_blank">The Blind Geometer</a></em> (New York: Tor, <b>1989</b>) [coll: dos: exp of the above with one story added: pb/Peter <a href="/entry/gudynas_peter">Gudynas</a>]</li> </ul></li> <li><em><a href="/sfeshop.php?field-keywords=A+Short+Sharp+Shock&field-author=Robinson+Kim+Stanley" class="link-amazon" target="_blank">A Short, Sharp Shock</a></em> (Shingleton, California: Mark V Ziesing, <b>1990</b>) [coll: illus/hb/Arnie <a href="/entry/fenner_arnie">Fenner</a>]</li> <li><em><a href="/sfeshop.php?field-keywords=A+Sensitive+Dependence+on+Initial+Conditions&field-author=Robinson+Kim+Stanley" class="link-amazon" target="_blank">A Sensitive Dependence on Initial Conditions</a></em> (Eugene, Oregon: Pulphouse, <b>1991</b>) [coll: chap: in the publisher's <b>Author's Choice Monthly</b> series: pb/George <a href="/entry/barr_george">Barr</a>] <ul class="x"> <li><em><a href="/sfeshop.php?field-keywords=Remaking+History&field-author=Robinson+Kim+Stanley" class="link-amazon" target="_blank">Remaking History</a></em> (New York: Tor, <b>1991</b>) [coll: exp vt of the above: hb/Peter <a href="/entry/gudynas_peter">Gudynas</a>] <ul class="x"> <li><em><a href="/sfeshop.php?field-keywords=Down+and+Out+in+the+Year+2000&field-author=Robinson+Kim+Stanley" class="link-amazon" target="_blank">Down and Out in the Year 2000</a></em> (London: Grafton, <b>1992</b>) [omni of selections from the above plus <em>The Blind Geometer</em> and <em>A Short Sharp Shock</em> above: pb/Chris <a href="/entry/moore_chris">Moore</a>]</li> <li><em><a href="/sfeshop.php?field-keywords=Remaking+History+and+other+Stories&field-author=Robinson+Kim+Stanley" class="link-amazon" target="_blank">Remaking History and other Stories</a></em> (New York: Tor, <b>1994</b>) [omni of the above plus <em>The Planet on the Table</em> above: pb/Peter <a href="/entry/gudynas_peter">Gudynas</a>]</li> </ul></li> </ul></li> <li><em><a href="/sfeshop.php?field-keywords=Black+Air&field-author=Robinson+Kim+Stanley" class="link-amazon" target="_blank">Black Air</a></em> (Eugene, Oregon: Pulphouse, <b>1991</b>) [story: chap: first appeared March 1983 <a href="/entry/fsf">F&SF</a>: pb/Gregorio Montejo]</li> <li><em><a href="/sfeshop.php?field-keywords=Vinland+the+Dream+and+Other+Stories&field-author=Robinson+Kim+Stanley" class="link-amazon" target="_blank">Vinland the Dream and Other Stories</a></em> (London: HarperCollins, <b>2002</b>) [coll: pb/Chris <a href="/entry/moore_chris">Moore</a>]</li> <li><em><a href="/sfeshop.php?field-keywords=The+Lucky+Strike+plus+A+Sensitive+Dependence+on&field-author=Robinson+Kim+Stanley" class="link-amazon" target="_blank">The Lucky Strike plus A Sensitive Dependence on Initial Conditions and "A Real Joy to Be Had": Outspoken Interview</a></em> (Oakland, California: PM Press, <b>2009</b>) [coll: fiction/nonfiction: pb/John Yates]</li> <li><em><a href="/sfeshop.php?field-keywords=The+Best+of+Kim+Stanley+Robinson&field-author=Robinson+Kim+Stanley" class="link-amazon" target="_blank">The Best of Kim Stanley Robinson</a></em> (San Francisco, California: Night Shade Books, <b>2010</b>) [coll: hb/Eugene Wang]</li> <li><em><a href="/sfeshop.php?field-keywords=Metamorphosis&field-author=Robinson+Kim+Stanley" class="link-amazon" target="_blank">Metamorphosis</a></em> (Seattle, Washington: Aqueduct Press, <b>2015</b>) with Alaya Dawn <a href="/entry/johnson_alaya_dawn">Johnson</a> [coll: each author taking approximately half the volume: in the publisher's <b>WisCon Guest of Honor Offerings</b> series: pb/Kathryn Wilham]</li> <li><em><a href="/sfeshop.php?field-keywords=Stan+Kitchen+A+Robinson+Reader&field-author=Robinson+Kim+Stanley" class="link-amazon" target="_blank">Stan's Kitchen: A Robinson Reader</a></em> (Framingham, Massachusetts: The NESFA Press, <b>2020</b>) [coll: contains fiction and nonfiction: hb/Tom Killion]</li> </ul> <p><b>nonfiction</b></p> <ul class="x"> <li><em><a href="/sfeshop.php?field-keywords=The+Novels+of+Philip+K+Dick&field-author=Robinson+Kim+Stanley" class="link-amazon" target="_blank">The Novels of Philip K. Dick</a></em> (Ann Arbor, Michigan: UMI Research Press, <b>1984</b>) [nonfiction: Philip K <a href="/entry/dick_philip_k">Dick</a>: hb/nonpictorial]</li> <li><em><a href="/sfeshop.php?field-keywords=The+High+Sierra+A+Love+Story&field-author=Robinson+Kim+Stanley" class="link-amazon" target="_blank">The High Sierra: A Love Story</a></em> (New York: Little, Brown, <b>2022</b>) [nonfiction: hb/photographic]</li> </ul> <p><b>works as editor</b></p> <ul class="x"> <li><em><a href="/sfeshop.php?field-keywords=Future+Primitive+The+New+Ecotopias&field-author=Robinson+Kim+Stanley" class="link-amazon" target="_blank">Future Primitive: The New Ecotopias</a></em> (New York: Tor, <b>1994</b>) [anth: hb/Carol <a href="/entry/russo_carol">Russo</a>]</li> <li><em><a href="/sfeshop.php?field-keywords=Nebula+Awards+Showcase+2002+The+Year+Best+SF&field-author=Robinson+Kim+Stanley" class="link-amazon" target="_blank">Nebula Awards Showcase 2002: The Year's Best SF and Fantasy Chosen by the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America</a></em> (New York: Penguin/Roc, <b>2002</b>) [anth: #36 in overall sequence: <a href="/entry/nebula_anthologies">Nebula Anthologies</a>: <b>Nebula Awards</b>: pb/Ray <a href="/entry/lundgren_ray">Lundgren</a>]</li> </ul> <p><b>nonfiction as editor</b></p> <ul class="x"> <li>Kenneth Rexroth. <em><a href="/sfeshop.php?field-keywords=In+the+Sierra+Mountain+Writings&field-author=Kenneth+Rexroth" class="link-amazon" target="_blank">In the Sierra: Mountain Writings</a></em> (New York: New Directions, <b>2012</b>) [poetry/prose: coll: edited with an introduction by Robinson: pb/]</li> <li><em><a href="/sfeshop.php?field-keywords=Green+Planets+Ecology+and+Science+Fiction&field-author=Robinson+Kim+Stanley" class="link-amazon" target="_blank">Green Planets: Ecology and Science Fiction</a></em> (Middletown, Connecticut: Wesleyan University Press, <b>2014</b>) with Gerry <a href="/entry/canavan_gerry">Canavan</a> [nonfiction: anth: <a href="/entry/ecology">Ecology</a>: hb/Brian Kinney, Shutterstock]</li> </ul> <p><b>about the author</b></p> <ul class="x"> <li>Tom Joyce and Christopher P <a href="/entry/stephens_christopher_p">Stephens</a>. <em><a href="/sfeshop.php?field-keywords=A+Checklist+of+Kim+Stanley+Robinson&field-author=Stephens+Christopher+P" class="link-amazon" target="_blank">A Checklist of Kim Stanley Robinson</a></em> (Hastings-on-Hudson, New York: Ultramarine, <b>1991</b>) [bibliography: chap: pb/nonpictorial]</li> <li>William J Burling, editor. <em><a href="/sfeshop.php?field-keywords=Kim+Stanley+Robinson+Maps+the+Unimaginable&field-author=William+J+Burling" class="link-amazon" target="_blank">Kim Stanley Robinson Maps the Unimaginable</a></em> (Jefferson, North Carolina: McFarland and Company, <b>2009</b>) [nonfiction: anth: in the publisher's <b>Critical Explorations</b> series: pb/Ally Union]</li> <li>David Sergeant. <em><a href="/sfeshop.php?field-keywords=The+Near+Future+in+Twenty-First-Century+Fiction&field-author=David+Sergeant" class="link-amazon" target="_blank">The Near Future in Twenty-First-Century Fiction: Climate, Retreat and Revolution</a></em> (Cambridge, Cambridgeshire: Cambridge University Press, <b>2023</b>) [nonfiction: chapters five on <em>Red Moon</em> and eight on <em>New York 2140</em>: in the publisher's <b>Cambridge Studies in Twenty-first Century Literature and Culture</b> series: hb/]</li> </ul> <p><b>links</b></p> <ul class="x"> <li><a target="_blank" href="http://kimstanleyrobinson.info/">Kim Stanley Robinson</a></li> <li><a target="_blank" href="https://www.isfdb.org/cgi-bin/ea.cgi?49">Internet Speculative Fiction Database</a></li> <li><a target="_blank" href="https://sf-encyclopedia.com/gallery.php?link=robinson_kim_stanley">Picture Gallery</a></li> </ul> <p><b>previous versions of this entry</b></p> <ul><li><a href='https://web.archive.org/web/*/http://www.sf-encyclopedia.com/entry/robinson_kim_stanley' target='_blank'>Internet Archive</a></li></ul><br /><br /></article></div> <div class="sideBarsWrapper"> <div class="sideBarsColsWrapper clearfix"> <div class="column sideBar12 clearfix"> <div class="columnForm"><aside id="blogFeed" class="widget"> <div class="content STeditorial clearfix"> <h2>Recently visited entries<span style="background:url(/images/thingSFE2.png) !important"></span></h2><ul style='width: 50%; 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