"Blindsight"
by Robert Silverberg
Form: Novelette
Year: 1986
ID: 102
Publication history:
- 1986: Playboy December 1986, Magazine
- 1987: Terry Carr's Best Science Fiction and Fantasy of the Year #16, Tor Mass market paperback
- 1991: Cities in Space, Ace Mass market paperback
- 1992: Pluto in the Morning Light (The Collected Stories of Robert Silverberg Volume 1), Grafton Trade paperback, ISBN 0-586-21369-4, 396 pp.
- 2000: Fictionwise, Fictionwise Online
- 2003: Voile vers Byzance: Nouvelles au fil du temps, tome 3, 1981-1987, Flammarion Trade paperback, ISBN 2080682547, 768 pp., in French as Voir sans yeux
Other resources:
[None on record]
Comments:
In his introduction to this story in Pluto in the Morning Light, Silverberg says the idea for this story came from the headlines of the day. Dr Joseph Mengele, the notorious Nazi doctor who experimented on human subjects, had just died, and Silverberg's thoughts turned to science fictional reflections of the situation. He also invoked some twists to it, creating a nice variation on the theme.
This short work became part of the novel Hot Sky at Midnight (pages 1-78 interspersed with other material). It concerns the arrival of Victor Farkas at the orbiting colony called Valparaiso, a notorious haven for all kinds of people who seek sanctuary, be they political refugees or simple criminals. Farkas is notable for his complete lack of eyes: his face is smooth skin where they should be, but he perceives the world by a method he calls He senses objects by non-visual clues missed by the sighted. He comes to Valparaiso in search of the doctor responsible for the gene splice that made him the way he is.