Hyperion (1989)
Hyperion is a 1989 american science fiction book written by Dan Simmons.
Seven pilgrims board a treeship bound for Hyperion, an Outback world beyond the farcaster web, where the Time Tombs drift backward through time under the guard of a creature called the Shrike. An Ouster invasion fleet is closing in, and this pilgrimage will be the last. To pass the voyage, each traveler tells the story of how Hyperion has already marked their life: a priest, a soldier, a poet, a scholar, a detective, a captain, a diplomat. Simmons borrows Chaucer's frame and fills it with six novellas' worth of far-future grief, faith, and wonder, each told in a different voice.
Quick answers
What is Hyperion about?
Seven pilgrims board a treeship bound for Hyperion, an Outback world beyond the farcaster web, where the Time Tombs drift backward through time under the guard of a creature called the Shrike. An Ouster invasion fleet is closing in, and this pilgrimage will be the last. To pass the voyage, each traveler tells the story of how Hyperion has already marked their life: a priest, a soldier, a poet, a scholar, a detective, a captain, a diplomat. Simmons borrows Chaucer's frame and fills it with six novellas' worth of far-future grief, faith, and wonder, each told in a different voice.
When was Hyperion published?
Hyperion was published in 1989.
Who made Hyperion?
Hyperion was written by Dan Simmons.
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Explore Hyperion guides
Hyperion in our writing
- Evergreen / Cross-media: Seven Science Fiction Worlds Worth Disappearing Into
- Companion guide: Alien Contact
- Companion guide: Foundation: The Complete Guide to Isaac Asimov's Galactic Empire
- Companion guide: Hyperion Cantos: The Complete Guide to Dan Simmons' Far-Future Epic
A few thoughts on Hyperion
Mass Effect builds the same kind of galaxy: alien politics, an ancient threat, and crewmates whose pasts drive the plot. The Expanse sets core worlds against spacefaring outsiders much as the Hegemony faces the Ousters, told through rotating viewpoints. Interstellar turns relativistic travel into the engine of grief, a cost several of these pilgrims know firsthand.
Strangers on a shared journey who take turns telling their life's defining story
Hyperion's seven pilgrims pass the voyage by telling how the same world already marked them, one novella-length confession at a time. Wizard and Glass has Roland do the same for his own ka-tet, and Phoenix strings together lives from different eras around one immortal bird. Oathbringer converges several damaged pasts on one coming war, and Galaxy Express 999 turns each stop into its own small story.
Space opera on the edge of an invasion, epic in scale and grief
An Ouster fleet is closing on Hyperion while the pilgrims still tell their stories, the same dread that hangs over The Expanse's factions and Mass Effect's crew bracing for a war bigger than any of them. Project Hail Mary sends one man alone across the dark for something like the pilgrims' wonder, and Interstellar folds grief and time into the same kind of impossible distance.
Ancient ruins guarded by something older than the people exploring them
The Time Tombs on Hyperion drift backward through time under a guardian nobody understands, and that dread runs through games about older, half-forgotten worlds. Breath of the Wild's ruins are watched over by machines left by a lost civilization, Skyrim buries ancient magic under its mountains, The Witcher 3's Wild Hunt predates any kingdom it rides through, and God of War faces gods older than anyone alive.