Songs of the Dying Earth

Jack Vance was a seminal figure in the development of modern fantasy - so much so that it's nearly impossible to imagine the genre as we know it today without him. In the course of his more than 50-year career, he has published dozens of major novels, as well as collections filled with marvelously crafted stories, winning the Hugo Award, the Nebula Award, the Edgar Award, the Grand Master Award from the Science Fiction Writers of America, and several World Fantasy Awards, including the prestigious Lifetime Achievement Award. Vance's masterpiece, The Dying Earth, may be the most influential fantasy novel of the 20th century, surpassed only by J.R.R. Tolkien's Lord of the Rings trilogy. It has not only inspired several generations of fantasy writers, from Gene Wolfe and Michael Moorcock to Neil Gaiman and George R.R. Martin, but its influence has reached deep into the realms of graphic novels, comics, fantasy role-playing games such as Dungeons & Dragons, and even computer gaming. The an