The Man Who Awoke

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The Man Who Awoke is a science fiction novel by Laurence Manning. It was initially serialised in five parts during 1933 in Wonder Stories magazine. Later it was published as one complete novel.

Norman Winters puts himself into suspended animation for 5,000 years at a time and his ensuing adventures as he tries to make sense of the societies he encounters each time he wakes.

• 5000 A.D. Humanity staggers to save itself amid the world's littered, stagnant wreckage after what has become know as the great Age of Waste.

• 10,000 A.D. The world is dominated by the Brain - the immovable in purpose super computer that knows all, sees all, and feels nothing. Thanks to its cradle-to-grave supervision, human life is easy and comfortable, but what will happen when The Brain realizes people are superfluous?

• 15,000 A.D. People can now program their choice of dreams and sleep their lives away. Winters awakes to find the sleeping outnumber the living. He cannot stop the implosion of civilization by himself.

• 20,000 A.D. After an abused Age of Freedom came an Age of License. Genetic experiment heralded the terrifying Age of Anarchy.

• 25,000 A.D. Scientists discover the secret sought through the centuries – immortality. But is Mankind ready for it? Immortality is frightfully boring without a purpose.

The novel might be easliy dismissed as standard pulp fare if it had not presaged concepts popularized decades later...green consumerism, the Matrix, and stem cells have only appeared in most peoples' worldview very recently. This book was recently re-released.