The City and the Stars

Lore & Background

The City and the Stars takes place at least two and a half billion years from the present in the city of Diaspar, where Earth's oceans have gone and humanity has all but departed. The city is completely enclosed, run by a Central Computer, and its people are created and stored by machines. The main character, Alvin, is a 'Unique' who feels compelled to leave the city, unlike all others who fear the outside due to a legend of ruthless invaders. With help from Khedron the Jester, Alvin finds a secret underground transport system and escapes to Lys, a green oasis where people live naturally and are telepaths.

Alvin's quest leads him to discover the truth behind the fears: the Invaders were a myth, and Shalmirane was actually a fortress that destroyed the Moon due to the Mad Mind or its agents. He encounters a robot belonging to a religious cult and learns that the Galactic Empire left the galaxy after being summoned or drawn away by a transcendent intelligence (the Mad Mind). Alvin reunites Diaspar with Lys and sends the robot to search for the lost people of the Empire, hoping to revive Earth's environment.

Reader's Guide

The City and the Stars is significant as a major revision of Arthur C. Clarke's first novel, Against the Fall of Night, showcasing his development as a writer and his evolving ideas about information processing. The novel contrasts two civilizations—technological Diaspar and agrarian, telepathic Lys—and explores themes of fear, isolation, and the consequences of rejecting the universe. Its legacy includes remaining in print alongside the original version, and it has inspired a sequel by Gregory Benford in the book Beyond the Fall of Night (1990). The work is a key example of Clarke's vision of a far-future Earth and his interest in the interplay between technology and human nature.

Did You Know?

• The original novel was rejected by the editor of Astounding Science-Fiction, according to the author.
• Clarke revised the novel to showcase what he had learned about writing and about information processing.
• A psychiatrist and patient once discussed the two versions in therapy without realizing they had each read a different novel.

From Rejection to Revision: The Novel's Origins

The City and the Stars, published in 1956 by British author Arthur C. Clarke, is a complete reimagining of his debut novel, Against the Fall of Night. That earlier work was turned down by the editor of Astounding Science-Fiction before eventually appearing in Startling Stories magazine in 1948. Years later, Clarke undertook a thorough revision, renaming the book and reshaping individual scenes as well as the details of its two contrasting civilizations. He intended the new edition to demonstrate the craft and understanding of information processing he had developed in the intervening years. Remarkably, the original 1948 version stayed in print even after the revised edition hit shelves. Clarke himself shared a charming anecdote in introductions to the book: a psychiatrist and a patient each admitted during a session that they had discussed the novel that day, only to realize afterward that one had read the original and the other the rewrite, without either suspecting a difference existed.

The Enclosed World of Diaspar

The story unfolds at least two and a half billion years from the present, in an age when Earth's oceans have dried up and humanity has nearly vanished from the planet. The only known human habitation is the fully sealed city of Diaspar, where no one has entered or left for as long as anyone can remember. A deep insular conservatism grips every resident, rooted in a legendary pact: a race of ruthless invaders supposedly drove humanity back from the stars and permitted survival only on the condition that they never leave the planet. The entire city operates under a Central Computer that repairs structures, generates new bodies for citizens, and archives their minds in memory banks at the end of each life. At any given moment only a small fraction of the population is actually alive; the rest persist as stored consciousness. The singular exception is Alvin, a rare Unique who carries no memories of prior lives and, unlike everyone else, feels an irresistible compulsion to find a way out.

Alvin's Escape and the World of Lys

With the help of Khedron the Jester, Alvin exploits the Central Computer to uncover a sealed underground transport terminal, the last remnant of a once-connected network of cities. Beyond Diaspar he discovers Lys, a vast green oasis ringed by mountains, where people conceive, are born, age, and die naturally. Its inhabitants have deliberately rejected hyper-advanced machinery, using machines only for basic labor-saving tasks, and instead cultivated the arts of the mind. They are telepaths, communicating wordlessly across great distances. Alvin befriends a young man named Hilvar, and together they follow a signal light to Shalmirane, the fortress ruins where the Invaders were supposedly defeated. There they meet an extraterrestrial creature and a strange robot tied to a religious cult from the Galactic Empire era. Alvin persuades the creature to lend him the robot, but its creator, the Master, had forbidden it from revealing any information. Back in Diaspar, the Central Computer breaks the block by fabricating an illusion of the prophesied return of the Great Ones.

The Cosmic Truth Behind the Myths

The novel's closing revelations dismantle everything the characters had accepted as history. The fearsome Invaders were a myth; Shalmirane was actually the site used to destroy the Moon and prevent a catastrophic collision with Earth. Both Diaspar and Lys descend from humans who deliberately turned their backs on the universe, rejecting history's greatest scientific project: the creation of a disembodied intellect. The first attempt produced a powerful but insane entity called the Mad Mind, which devastated the galaxy and its civilizations before being imprisoned in a strange artificial star known as the Black Sun. Alvin retrieves the Master's still-functional ship from outside Diaspar, brings Hilvar aboard, and they journey into deep space. There they encounter Vanamonde, a being of pure intellect, whom Hilvar's telepathic gifts allow him to communicate with and bring back to Earth. From Vanamonde the true history finally emerges: he is the second, successful experiment of the ancient empire's project, reframing both civilizations' fears as inherited trauma rather than rational response to a real threat.