Game More, Pay Less
Buy used
£7.04
FREE delivery 25 - 27 June. Details
Or fastest delivery Tomorrow, 23 June. Order within 9 hrs. Details
Used: Very Good | Details
Sold by WeBuyGames
Condition: Used: Very Good
Comment: Buy from the UK's book specialist with confidence. Now with Royal Mail tracking on all UK orders! Enjoy same or next-day dispatch from a top-rated and trusted Amazon seller.
Only 1 left in stock.
Kindle app logo image

Download the free Kindle app and start reading Kindle books instantly on your smartphone, tablet or computer – no Kindle device required.

Read instantly on your browser with Kindle for Web.

Using your mobile phone camera - scan the code below and download the Kindle app.

QR code to download the Kindle App

Follow the author

Charles Leonard Harness
Follow
Something went wrong. Please try your request again later.

The Rose Paperback – 1 Oct. 1969

by Charles L. Harness (Author), Michael Moorcock (Introduction)
Essef - The legendary SF Classic. In a world where a terrifying Ultimate Weapon is just about to be perfected, a scattered handfull of people are on the brink of making a giant evolutionary step and becoming more than human. This edition also includes two shorter stories: 'The Chessplayers' and 'The New Reality'.
Read more
Previous slide of product details
  1. Print length
    160 pages
  2. Language
    English
  3. Publisher
    HarperCollins Distribution Services
  4. Publication date
    1 Oct. 1969
  5. ISBN-10
    058602879X
  6. ISBN-13
    978-0586028797
Next slide of product details
Save 15% on Baby Einstein

Product details

  • Publisher ‏ : ‎ HarperCollins Distribution Services
  • Publication date ‏ : ‎ 1 Oct. 1969
  • Edition ‏ : ‎ New
  • Language ‏ : ‎ English
  • Print length ‏ : ‎ 160 pages
  • ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 058602879X
  • ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-0586028797
  • Item weight ‏ : ‎ 113 g

About the author

Follow authors to get new release updates, plus improved recommendations.
Charles Leonard Harness

Charles Leonard Harness

Brief content visible, double tap to read full content.
Full content visible, double tap to read brief content.

Discover more of the author’s books, see similar authors, read book recommendations and more.

Customer reviews

4.4 out of 5 stars
9 global ratings

Review this product

Share your thoughts with other customers
Write a customer review

Top reviews from United Kingdom

  • The 'Big Leaf'
    5.0 out of 5 stars Reprint Urgently Required.
    Reviewed in the United Kingdom on 29 January 2013
    Format: PaperbackVerified Purchase
    Even in an old yellowed copy with small tightly packed print the magic shines through.
    The Rose may well be the most wonderful science fiction writing of all time. It's highly evocative and quite timeless.

    This edition also included a tale of a chess playing mouse that is easily the funniest thing ever written about chess and chess players!
    Helpful
     Report
  • J Behan
    3.0 out of 5 stars Hard to quantify... Buy it for "The Chessplayers".
    Reviewed in the United Kingdom on 24 August 2011
    Format: PaperbackVerified Purchase
    I really rather enjoyed this novella and the reason why eludes me. It's a high-drama future-opera and possibly the campest thing in SF that's not penned by Samuel R. Delany. The whole thing is about a woman and a man who are drawn together apparently by fate, who both suffer from similar physical deformities and both are obsessed with visions and dreams about a nightingale and a rose; the heroine even goes to the extent of composing a ballet that is apparently channelled through her dreams and appears to portend her own death, for she, she believes is represented by the nightingale, who dies, giving colour to the rose.

    Wierd, huh? In some ways, this story is too strange and psychedelic to describe, a hazy trip through a motley future, dripping with symbolism, which, if it refers to anything, I was too often unable to place. The underlying argument of the whole piece is rather provocative for a work of sci-fi, namely that in art is the precedent of all great discoveries and that science is a blunt instrument, lacking the nuance and genius of true creative insight. This is laudably championed by the satyrical anti-hero of the piece, and there are several amusing and quotable passages on the topic.

    But in the end, it's a mad, mad, mad, mad story that only succeeds through brevity; much more and I wouldn't have been able to take it. It's in a flamboyant, feverish and nightmarish style that will alienate a good number of hard SF fans The few sections aimed at adding an SF flavour, such as when the heroes hide in the rose garden, or use music in a 5/4 meter to evade an assassin, might be implausible enough to make you throw this book at the wall. I found it strangely compelling nonetheless, and persevered through the urge to groan and roll my eyes.

    Most paperback editions, like the Panther edition I read, are packaged with the short story "The Chess Players", which is a brilliantly-observed and clever little set-piece of sci-fantasy that is only superficially about a mouse that plays chess. This is a rare treat and worth buying the rest of the book for.
    2 people found this helpful
    Helpful
     Report
  • Amazon Customer
    5.0 out of 5 stars Five Stars
    Reviewed in the United Kingdom on 22 August 2017
    Format: PaperbackVerified Purchase
    A1
    Helpful
     Report
  • I. Baxter
    4.0 out of 5 stars More old masters
    Reviewed in the United Kingdom on 21 August 2010
    Format: PaperbackVerified Purchase
    I'm gradually working my way through all the missing items from an S.F. collection started over half a century ago.This is a replacement for an old one that fell to bits.I've been re-reading it on and off since it first came out, so I must like it,musn't I? If you're a Harness fan, you've got it already. If you're new to the genre,and looking to plough through some of the old classics, this is a good a place as any to start.It's a short,quirky story of the kind that John.W.Campbell Jnr. liked to get out of his stable of "Analog" authors in the forties and fifties.The plot's reviewed elsewhere in these pages,so have have quick look at that, then just buy it.
    Helpful
     Report
  • paul barker
    3.0 out of 5 stars pretentious pulp
    Reviewed in the United Kingdom on 6 August 2019
    Format: PaperbackVerified Purchase
    This is a review of The Rose itself, or rather the 1st half, at that point I gave up.
    The story is essentially the classic 1950s theme of mutations spontaneously generating Supermen, written in a traditional pulp style. If that was all it would be OK but unfortunately its mixed with a mass of pretentious twaddle about Science versus Art.
    Moorcock & Watson both rave about it on the cover but they are both given to the pretentious themselves.
    Helpful
     Report
  • Molerat
    3.0 out of 5 stars Pretentious? Moi?
    Reviewed in the United Kingdom on 7 December 2014
    Format: Paperback
    In the intro, Michael Moorcock assures us that ’The Rose’ is “never pompous, never pretentious”. Oh, but it is, it is. It considers humanity’s next step up the evolutionary ladder and the complementarity of art and science by admixing Wilde's ‘The Nightingale and the Rose’ and Weber’s ‘Invitation to the Dance’, plus a sprinkling of Baudelaire, Swinburne and Sophocles. Oh, and Milton, thereby falling foul of Brian Aldiss’ “old saw that any SF story which goes on about Milton’s ‘Il Penseroso’ is bound to be twee.” (Although, to be fair, Aldiss apparently liked ‘The Rose’.) Harness is more interested in his ideas than in telling a coherent story: with Post-It Notes on their foreheads indicating their roles (the Artist, the Psychiatrist, the Nightingale, etc), characterless characters make long speeches and then “security men” try to kill them. Sort of an oratorio with handguns. Finally, the insipid heroine sprouts wings. Ecce homo superior.

    Two short stories are packed in with the novella. ‘The New Reality’ begins with a flawed premise and flows on to a trite conclusion. ‘The Chessplayers’, on the other hand, is a little comic gem, and my only reason for giving this package three stars rather than two.
    One person found this helpful
    Helpful
     Report

Top reviews from other countries

  • deadpan
    5.0 out of 5 stars Vintage SF
    Reviewed in the United States on 21 February 2025
    Format: PaperbackVerified Purchase
    I've had many transactions with King Crab and the books are always as described. All positive experiences. I look forward to buying more vintage SF from this seller!
    Report