In 1959, Walter M. Miller, Jr., culminated a brief publishing career of eight years with his only novel, A Canticle for Leibowitz . Since that time he has not published another new piece of fiction, although it has been announced that the long anticipated second novel, a parallel work to Canticle, will soon be finished. That one book, however, along with a handful of short stories and novellas, has secured for him a position among the best and most original contemporary science fiction writers. More than thirty years after its publication, Canticle continues to be hailed as one of the greatest science fiction novels ever written and an important work of modern literature. This reference guide presents a complete record of Miller's work and of the resulting criticism. The primary bibliography is divided into books, both English and foreign-language editions; short fiction in periodicals; anthologized works; nonfiction; and adaptations.
In the books section, a physical description of English-language first editions is given. Annotations and content notes are provided as appropriate for the other sections, and characters in the short fiction are listed and identified. The secondary material, organized chronologically, contains annotated entries for articles and parts of books, reviews, and dissertations. Also included are a biographical and critical essay on Miller, glossaries of characters and terms and of allusions and other representations in A Canticle for Leibowitz , and individual indexes for both the primary and secondary materials. Title pages, book covers, and jackets of the major works are reproduced.