Walter M. Miller

A Canticle for Leibowitz

Winner of the 1961 Hugo Award for Best Novel and widely considered one of the most accomplished, powerful, and enduring classics of modern speculative fiction, Walter M. Miller, Jr.'s A Canticle for Leibowitz is a true landmark of twentieth-century literature -- a chilling and still-provocative look at a post-apocalyptic future. In a nightmarish ruined world slowly awakening to the light after sleeping in darkness, the infant rediscoveries of science are secretly nourished by cloistered monks dedicated to the study and preservation of the relics and writings of the blessed Saint Isaac Leibowitz. From here the story spans centuries of ignorance, violence, and barbarism, viewing through a sharp, satirical eye the relentless progression of a human race damned by its inherent humanness to recelebrate its grand foibles and repeat its grievous mistakes. Seriously funny, stunning, and tragic, eternally fresh, imaginative, and altogether remarkable, A Canticle for Leibowitz retains its ability to enthrall and amaze. It is now, as it always has been, a masterpiece.

Evan

What nonsense, old man! he chided himself. When you tire of living, change itself seems evil, does it not? for then any change at all disturbs the deathlike peace of the life-weary.

Kyle Kettler

But neither infinite power nor infinite wisdom could bestow godhood upon men. For that there would have to be infinite love as well. 

Damn. Walter M. Miller Jr. may have written A Canticle for Leibowitz in the 50s, but I think everyone in 2025 especially needs the faith of Texan (New Mexican? Utahn? Arizonan?) monks struggling to keep knowledge alive for an anti-intellectual, post-nuclear humanity. Rarely has a book filled me with so much hope and despair at the same time. Miller writes the characters with such compassion, grief, and humor. Definitely one of the novels I'd teach if I were an English professor specializing in speculative fiction and hoping to irrevocably change the life of at least one (1) skeptical undergrad taking the class just to fulfill a genEd credit.

alice

A very entertaining critique/"retrospect" of mankind and the cycles it is seemingly doomed to repeat.

I must say I knew nothing about this book being three separate sections, so when the ending of the first part hit, I was pretty devastated. By the middle/end of the second, I knew how things would likely go, and by the third? Part of you simply forces yourself to remain disconnected, immediately knowing it will only go downhill for everyone. Yet, still: mankind perseveres and, more importantly, feels and cares. Despite the author being plagued with depression and an eventual suicide, you can tell Miller cared a lot about his fellow man and that even though critical failure is seemingly a guaranteed part of our species, it's worth trying despite it.

I liked "A Canticle for Leibowitz". I had heard good things repeatedly and the book did not disappoint, though it definitely takes on a structure I wasn't familiar with initially: three largely-disconnected parts as centuries pass between them. 

I must say the first part was the best one. I admired Brother Francis the most and I believe he's given the most time to breathe. While there are good elements of the second story, I think the third was the next best one, as the doomed Abbot Zerchi (and yes, even I noticed the cyclical lingual-structure of the abbot names) is shown to be the most emphatic case of consideration. 

I'm not totally sure I can recommend this book. It's largely depressing, though nothing Miller says is wrong or really remotely 'out there'. Despite the entire thing being based around its religious characters, I'm not totally sure Miller was a very religious guy at heart. If I'm right (and I'm just gonna go ahead and choose to be), books like this are a nice affirmation that Mormons and such are in denial to think you have to worship the Big Guy in order to give a shit. Boy, did Miller know his Latin.

I really enjoyed "A Canticle for Leibowitz", though I'm just never going to be sure I can recommend it. I certainly do not think it has a large audience waiting for it anywhere in this century; maybe give it another five hundred years (just before the end (or, possibly, just after)), and maybe there it'll find its crowd.

A very entertaining critique/"retrospect" of mankind and the cycles it is seemingly doomed to repeat.

  

I must say I knew nothing about this book being three separate sections, so when the ending of the first part hit, I was pretty devastated. By the middle/end of the second, I knew how things would likely go, and by the third? Part of you simply forces yourself to remain disconnected, immediately knowing it will only go downhill for everyone. Yet, still: mankind perseveres and, more importantly, feels and cares. Despite the author being plagued with depression and an eventual suicide, you can tell Miller cared a lot about his fellow man and that even though critical failure is seemingly a guaranteed part of our species, it's worth trying despite it.

  

I liked "A Canticle for Leibowitz". I had heard good things repeatedly and the book did not disappoint, though it definitely takes on a structure I wasn't familiar with initially: three largely-disconnected parts as centuries pass between them. 

I must say the first part was the best one. I admired Brother Francis the most and I believe he's given the most time to breathe. While there are good elements of the second story, I think the third was the next best one, as the doomed Abbot Zerchi (and yes, even I noticed the cyclical lingual-structure of the abbot names) is shown to be the most emphatic case of consideration. 

  

I'm not totally sure I can recommend this book. It's largely depressing, though nothing Miller says is wrong or really remotely 'out there'. Despite the entire thing being based around its religious characters, I'm not totally sure Miller was a very religious guy at heart. If I'm right (and I'm just gonna go ahead and choose to be), books like this are a nice affirmation that Mormons and such are in denial to think you have to worship the Big Guy in order to give a shit. Boy, did Miller know his Latin.

  

I really enjoyed "A Canticle for Leibowitz", though I'm just never going to be sure I can recommend it. I certainly do not think it has a large audience waiting for it anywhere in this century; maybe give it another five hundred years (just before the end (or, possibly, just after)), and maybe there it'll find its crowd.

A  canticle for Leibowitz

Sherry

This was one of the few times I've thought " this book was not written for me ". I'm not sure if being Catholic would have made it better for me but there was a lot of Latin phrases that meant nothing to me.

Sarah Sammis

I read this book the first time in seventh grade and it blew my mind. I think I had to read it about three times before I could wrap my mind around it. My mother gave this copy to me a couple Christmases ago as it's just a must have!

I plan to reread this in 2009.

It left me speechless. Haunting, hopeful, and profound. 

Andrew John Kinney

altlovesbooks

"Blasphemous old cactus."

I am neither religious enough nor science-y enough to get the most out of this book. I feel like the author was trying to be too coy at burying a message about mankind being doomed to repeat the past and morality and other dense topics, but forgot to include a cohesive story to tie it all together. 

The book takes place in post-WWIII America, after a period of time when books, learning, and science was rejected. Monks in monasteries gather what's left of knowledge, painstakingly record it by hand in books, and quietly file it away in libraries to be recovered later. If this sounds familiar, it's because the author was trying to get you to see early on that history repeats itself. You'll see this theme again and again and again. The book follows one of these monasteries through the years, the Order of St. Leibowitz. Important, key knowledge is recovered (I guess, science-y terms are used liberally throughout this book), and we track what changes are wrought by this discovery. Technology slowly comes back, and we keep our eye on this monastery and how it changes (or doesn't) with the times. 

The author makes liberal use of time jumps throughout the story, making it hard to remember who was who when looking back through the years, and also giving the story a layer of complexity it didn't really need. I was lost for large parts of the middle book, where the author takes a long period of time to not explain science-y things and also establish some conflict within post-apocalypse America. There's lots of references in here that went over my head, presumably because I'm not quite as up on my religious doctrine as maybe others might be.

It's kind of a convoluted mess I didn't really enjoy. The beginning had promise, but then we time jumped and I lost what interest it had built up. By the time we got to it, the ending was fairly predictable. Lots of people like this book, but I guess I just wasn't one of them.

Michael Springer

I have some seriously mixed feelings about this one. Here's why.
 
It's good. It's effective. It wrestles with big ideas. And, I think the author hates science. WAIT! Don't swear at me yet! Read my review, THEN you can start swearing. Trust me, you'll have a lot more ammunition.
 
For those of you who haven't read this sucker yet, it tells of a time in the future, after mankind has mostly killed itself off with nuclear bombs. Following this event, the common people (now calling themselves Simpletons, as a way of showing their hatred of the intellectuality that lead to the science that destroyed so much of the world) do away with scientists and just about anyone else with an education. Books are burned, of course. About the only educated people who are allowed to live are members of the church, who then take it upon themselves to preserve the books and knowledge that remain. 
 
As time passes, most of this knowledge loses its meaning. Our story takes place in a temple for Saint Liebowitz the Engineer. Sacred relics such as the holy grocery list, the enigmatic temple called "Fallout Shelter", and a blueprint of a squirrel cage, are the fragments of the past that remain. The priests patiently preserve many relics of the past, and we see the passage of time at this temple as the world changes yet again. Science begins being harnessed by man again, and eventually science goes beyond what it was even before the last nuclear disaster. 
 
This is a story about knowledge and the fear of it. It is about the shared ground between religion and science as well, and the ways these two systems of thought diverge. This book MADE ME ANGRY, especially in the last of the three sections. But it is quite good, and a lot of that strength comes from the weighty issues involved. Don't get me wrong, though. This isn't just a book of ideas: it's also steadily funny, full of strong imagery, highly inventive, and it successfully spans centuries in just 300-some pages. It's one of the better SF books I've read, period. 
 
Now that we've got all that out of the way, here's why I wanted to kick Walter Miller in the balls while I was reading it. Everyone else seems to agree that he tried to portray both the scientists and the priests in a fair light. They are wrong. 
 
*MILD SPOILERS AHEAD*
 
You see, the scientists in this book are multifaceted. That doesn't automatically mean they're portrayed fairly. These scientists are fairly portrayed like republicans are portrayed fairly in The West Wing. They get a fair shake just like Draco Malfoy does by the end of the Harry Potter septology. In other words, they might not be evil people, but they're fucking dicks. Scientist #1 doesn't give half a fuck about the temple and is just using them for their library. Then, book three builds to a moral battle between a priest and scientist #2 where, let's face it, when the priest punches the scientist in the face, IT FEELS GOOD. This book is not a balanced debate between two sides. In this book, the priests are the good guys, and they get shat upon by the scientists. 
 
Moving on from the portrayal of scientists, lets talk about the portrayal of science itself. There's a lightbulb, powered at huge effort, that is apparently unnecessary since they stop using it after the scientist leaves and replace it with a large cross. Then, in the far future, we have one example of a complex machine, and it doesn't work properly. Even if it did work, it doesn't have that amazing of a function considering the future possibilities of science. Science is portrayed as novelty in this scene. BUT, science does work sometimes, i.e. when you want to create nuclear power and nuke the shit out of Earth. 
 
Of course, you also have the doctors and nurses who are using medicine to save all of the people suffering from radiation sickness and other nasty side-effects of science. These people have genuine good intentions. But, these intentions are undermined since they are giving lethal injections to anyone who is suffering horribly from radiation sickness and definitely going to die. As the abbott makes clear, this evil outweighs the good they are doing. (Because, somehow, it is suicide to let someone else kill you? Isn't that what every martyr does?) 
 
It is true that many centuries ago the church was involved in the development of evolution theory, and for a long time science and the church were homies. That was then and this is now. 
 
In 2010, religious superstition is standing in the way of stem cell research. It is causing endless war in many parts of the globe. It tells us we are more important than other animals and even our environment, and thus entitles us to think only of ourselves. The church wants to make sex as dangerous as possible by making condoms and birth control taboo, even though god is silent on these issues in the Bible (not to mention his now controversial stances on slavery and wearing clothing of mixed materials). 

In other words, The view of reality in this book doesn't mesh well with current events. But many other readers who share some of my philosophical beliefs have loved this book, and haven't been frustrated by it at all. So, perhaps I'm overreacting. 

Whatever my issues with the book, I have to admit it's very well written, and quite unique. This is considered a classic of the SF genre, and it's easy to see why. If you're a fan of the genre, this book still feels fresh and original 60 years after it was written.

Hernando

I would give it a 4.6 rate and I understand why it is still considered a masterpiece.
The book is quite a slog, very so, but is so unique in itself.

Aside, the way Miller found death and looking at this book and see how he wrote the discussion about euthanasia is indeed staggering. Depression is quite a thing. 

The following are probably one of the best lines I've ever read in a SF book:

"
We are the centuries.

We are the chin-choppers and the golly-woppers, and soon we shall discuss the amputation of your head.

We are your singing garbage men, Sir and Madam, and we march in cadence behind you, chanting rhymes that some think odd.

Hut two threep foa!
Left!
Left! He-had-a-good-wife-but-he
Left!
Left!
Left!
Right!
Left!

Wir, as they say in the old country, marschieren weiter wenn alles in Scherben fällt.

We have your eoliths and your mesoliths and your neoliths. We have your Babylons and your Pompeiis, your Caesars and your chromium-plated (vital-ingredient-impregnated) artifacts.

We have your bloody hatchets and your Hiroshimas. We march in spite of Hell, we do– Atrophy, Entropy, and Proteus vulgaris,

telling bawdy jokes about a farm girl name of Eve
and a traveling salesman called Lucifer.

We bury your dead and their reputations.
We bury you. We are the centuries.

Be born then, gasp wind, screech at the surgeon’s slap, seek manhood, taste a little of godhood, feel pain, give birth, struggle a little while, succumb:

(Dying, leave quietly by the rear exit, please.)

Generation, regeneration, again, again, as in a ritual, with blood-stained vestments and nail-torn hands, children of Merlin, chasing a gleam. Children, too, of Eve, forever building Edens– and kicking them apart in berserk fury because somehow it isn’t the same. (AGH! AGH! AGH!–an idiot screams his mindless anguish amid the rubble. But quickly! let it be inundated by the choir, chanting Alleluias at ninety decibels.)

Hear then, the last Canticle of the Brethren of the Order of Leibowitz, as sung by the century that swallowed its name:

 V: Lucifer is fallen.
 R: Kyrie eleison.
 V: Lucifer is fallen.
 R: Christe eleison.
 V: Lucifer is fallen.
 R: Kyrie eleison, eleison imas!
"

Walter M. Miller, Jr.

The classic science fiction novel of a future dark age and humanity's new renaissance It is a new dark age of fear and ignorance. An atomic Flame Deluge has ravaged the earth, and humanity's survivors have turned against science. In the depths of a hellish desert, the Order of St Leibowitz preserves the few remnants of mankind's knowledge. Then a humble monk makes a miraculous discovery of several artefacts - including a note written by blessed St Leibowitz himself, which reads: Pound pastrami can kraut six bagels - bring home for Emma Could this holiest of relics hold the key to humanity's salvation? A Canticle For Leibowitz is a sharp, satirical examination of humanity that is chilling, provocative and endlessly imaginative - an undisputed science fiction classic.

Book One: the Saint Leibowitz Series

It is always interesting to experience works seminal for their genres for the first time and 'A Canticle for Leibowitz' is no exception of this.

Told with a healthy dose of humour and wit (that we almost seem to have lost in the mainstream of the genre nowadays), 'A Canticle for Leibowitz' feels like a reflection on human nature. It manages to highlight the cyclical nature of history and, alongside that, the inevitability of human acts. It asks if humankind is bound to repeat the same mistakes, going though the same motions over and over again. A true testament to its poignancy, in spite of having been published in 1959, looking forwards to a future far ahead, it still feels relevant to the challenges to the society of today, in 2023.

It is always interesting to experience works seminal for their genres for the first time and 'A Canticle for Leibowitz' is no exception of this.

Told with a healthy dose of humour and wit (that we almost seem to have lost in the mainstream of the genre nowadays), 'A Canticle for Leibowitz' feels like a reflection on human nature. It manages to highlight the cyclical nature of history and, alongside that, the inevitability of human acts. It asks if humankind is bound to repeat the same mistakes, going though the same motions over and over again. A true testament to its poignancy, in spite of having been published in 1959, looking forwards to a future far ahead, it still feels relevant to the challenges to the society of today, in 2023.

A Canticle For Leibowitz

Kelsey Lynn

I need To find my notes and write this review haha. This was hands down my favorite read so far though for the Hugos, It's a beautiful introspective of the cycle that man has created or is creating for it's self.

Fraser Simons

I really dug a few aspects of this book. Primarily, the demonstration of cyclical history and the endurance of a belief system in a post-apocalyptical setting was particularly noticeable and satisfying. Some stand out characterization conjoined with some a couple philosophical discussions were already great.

That said, you can tell this is an older book, because these ideas have been integrated into the cultural consciousness, and to mention show up in sci-fi works not infrequently. The setting didn’t feel very grounded as well. My attention fluctuated quite a bit because the prose just didn’t click with me. I tend to like specificity and scene setting. Talking heads in undefined space only engage me so much. 

In the end, the structure was just a lot more interesting to me than the granular plot beats. But it was still enjoyable.

Richie B

A Canticle For Leibowitz is a novel that spans roughly 1,800 years and is split into 3 parts. It takes place after a nuclear war has left the world devastated and humanity is left in a new 'Dark Ages'. We follow the Order of Leibowitz monks as they take on the mission of preserving human knowledge from prior to the 'Flame Deluge' (their name for the nuclear war that left humanity scattered and devastated.) 

Let me start off this review by saying I LOVED THIS BOOK SO MUCH. 
I've been very interested in dystopian science fiction recently and this is the most unique novel I've come across yet. This book was so hard to put down once I started reading it and I finished the final section in roughly an hour because it was so engrossing .. 
The aspects of this book I particularly enjoyed was how it was separated into the three parts and how we could see humanity's progress in slowly rebuilding themselves. I loved the philosophical ideas regarding science and Christianity. This novel requires us to ask ourselves important questions like: Is it possible for human free will to change the course of the future or is history destined to repeat itself? A truly interesting perspective on human nature and one of the best novels I've read in a very long time.

*i apologize if this review is poorly written and all over the place it's the first one I've ever written

Donald

Teaghan Grayson

I love this book so much. If you're ever looking for a book to give a teenager about the faith, particularly a teenage boy, as a present for Confirmation or for any other time, this is a perfect option. Despite being published in 1957, Miller created a book that is truly timeless, and the nuclear war that happened during the time of St. Leibowitz could just as easily have occurred during our present moment as it could have during Miller's. All this highlights that the struggles of the people of God are ageless and reoccurring. The monks of this single monastery faced the same challenges over the course of a millennia again and again. Their struggles are ours as well.

A Canticle for Leibowitz is a book where the themes matter much more than the plot. The book itself is really three short stories whose common thread is that they all take place in the monastery of a new religious order created after a nuclear war that is often mentioned throughout the book, but never fully described or understood by the reader or by the decedents of those who survived. Miller uses these three stories to tell a tale about the history of the Church, beginning with the Early Christians surviving in a time of chaos, to the waning High Middle ages and the dawn of the renaissance, to the modern era. Each part takes place in a world not unlike the one of our past, but filled with enough quick snapshots of post-fallout life to keep up a sci-fi aesthetic. The first two sections in particular remind of a version of the Fallout video game series if religion were actually taken seriously. All the details and hints of backstory are wonderful, but never detract from Miller's true purpose of describing the role of the Church in the world. Our mission will continue until the Second Coming and nothing will ever stop it, not princes, not wars, not even nuclear weapons.

Jeffrey Pillmann

Nicht gerade was man leicht zu lesen nennen würde. Dennoch in gleichen Teilen faszinierend und zutiefst beunruhigend.

Julia A.

Tenía todo para encantarme (monjes y latín, vaya) pero no acabé de pillarle la gracia.

Elodia

I really liked each section individually, but all together it felt disjointed, since each takes place 600 years after the previous section. There were a few things that connected each section to the previous ones, but it took time for me to get used to new characters each time a section ended.

A Canticle for Leibowitz

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