--- title: "Beside Still Waters by Robert Sheckley — Classic Ebook | Publica Now" description: "Read a free sample of Beside Still Waters by Robert Sheckley at Publica Now — a public-domain classic ebook, readable online." canonical: "https://publica.now/creators/vito/works/beside-still-waters-1" --- Literary # Beside Still Waters by Robert Sheckley [ V Vito ](https://publica.now/creators/vito) Follow $2.99 [ Sign in to buy ](https://publica.now/access?redirect=%2Fcheckout%2Fbeside-still-waters-1) Secure payment on Stripe. publica.now never sees your card. Share Link copied Format epub Published May 03, 2026 Rating No reviews yet ![Beside Still Waters](https://fls-a13cb2d7-1b3e-4883-a0bd-297afd110a11.367be3a2035528943240074d0096e0cd.r2.cloudflarestorage.com/works/01kqnrv2zbyyyh7ymqe0jj7v71/editions/2026-09-06-html-v1/cover.png?X-Amz-Content-Sha256=UNSIGNED-PAYLOAD&X-Amz-Algorithm=AWS4-HMAC-SHA256&X-Amz-Credential=d29ce3bb571c165c97a702f29f7aee93%2F20261010%2Fauto%2Fs3%2Faws4_request&X-Amz-Date=20261010T221545Z&X-Amz-SignedHeaders=host&X-Amz-Expires=3600&X-Amz-Signature=0ccebcca011e7f0fb447c211164230cd6f755d632853b42de62311dcefc37850) ## About this work When a man of the future wants true solitude, the open spaces of Earth will not do. Mark Rogers chooses a slab of rock floating four light-years east of Andromeda, where he can search for rare metals, grow crops, and watch the stars in peace. His only companion is Charles, a standard-model robot with a thirty-word vocabulary. But Mark is a tinkerer, and over the years he modifies Charles’s speech, manners, and outlook—building, piece by piece, a personality unlike his own. In the silence of space, their conversations turn to loneliness, love, and the possibilities of a life shaped by memory. Gentle, wry, and quietly poignant, Robert Sheckley’s “Beside Still Waters” brings human questions to an improbably distant corner of the universe. This Publica.now Classics edition includes a new typographic cover and publisher opening and closing pages. Sample ## Take a look inside BESIDE STILL WATERS BY ROBERT SHECKLEY When people talk about getting away from it all, they are usually thinking about our great open spaces out west. But to science fiction writers, that would be practically in the heart of Times Square. When a man of the future wants solitude he picks a slab of rock floating in space four light years east of Andromeda. Here is a gentle little story about a man who sought the solitude of such a location. And who did he take along for company? None other than Charles the Robot. Mark Rogers was a prospector, and he went to the asteroid belt looking for radioactives and rare metals. He searched for years, never finding much, hopping from fragment to fragment. After a time he settled on a slab of rock half a mile thick. Rogers had been born old, and he didn't age much past a point. His face was white with the pallor of space, and his hands shook a little. He called his slab of rock Martha, after no girl he had ever known. He made a little strike, enough to equip Martha with an air pump and a shack, a few tons of dirt and some water tanks, and a robot. Then he settled back and watched the stars. The robot he bought was a standard-model all-around worker, with built-in memory and a thirty-word vocabulary. Mark added to that, bit by bit. He was something of a tinkerer, and he enjoyed adapting his environment to himself. At first, all the robot could say was "Yes, sir," and "No, sir." He could state simple problems: "The air pump is laboring, sir." "The corn is budding, sir." He could perform a satisfactory salutation: "Good morning, sir." Mark changed that. He eliminated the "sirs" from… [ Sign in to buy ](https://publica.now/access?redirect=%2Fcheckout%2Fbeside-still-waters-1) The sample continues in the full work. [ #Robots -- Fiction ](/search?query=Robots+--+Fiction) [ #robots ](/search?query=robots) ## Reviews No reviews yet. Be the first to share your thoughts. [Sign in to leave a review](https://publica.now/access?redirect=%2Fcreators%2Fvito%2Fworks%2Fbeside-still-waters-1) No reviews yet. Be the first to share your thoughts. 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