The Magic Goes Away
1978 novel by Larry Niven
The Magic Goes Away is a fantasy novella written by Larry Niven in 1976 and published in book form in 1978 with illustrations by Esteban Maroto. The name is also used to refer to the series which includes this story. Written after the 1973 oil crisis, the series is an allegory for the modern-day energy crisis.
List of works in the series
Background
In "Not Long Before the End", the Warlock, a very powerful sorcerer at least 200 years old, observes that when he stays in one place too long, his powers dwindle, and they return only when he leaves that place. Experimentation leads him to create an apparatus consisting of a metal disc enchanted to spin perpetually. The enchantment eventually consumes all of the mana in the vicinity, which causes a localized failure in all magic. The Warlock realizes that magic is fueled by a non-renewable resource, which would cause great concern among the magicians.
In The Magic Goes Away, the widespread diminishing of magical power triggers a quest on the part of the most powerful of the magicians of the time to harness a new source of magic, the Moon.
In The Magic May Return, it is discovered that mana was originally carried to Earth and the other bodies of the Solar System on the solar wind, which replenishes mana slowly over time. At some point, a god created an invisible shield between Earth and Sun that intercepted the solar mana and caused the eventual decline of magic on Earth.
The public source identifies “The Magic Goes Away” as 1978 novel by Larry Niven. This brief keeps that definition visible, then builds a research path around Magic, Goes and Away.
Why this record matters
A short description can identify a subject without explaining its stakes. For “The Magic Goes Away”, the useful work is to connect “1978 novel by Larry Niven” to the records capable of establishing context and consequence.
Reception evidence should be dated and situated: later canonical status may differ sharply from the work’s initial circulation. The source revision retrieved here is dated Aug 15, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q7749433. The first chronological checks are 1976, 1978 and 1973.
Rights, attribution and provenance may remain disputed even when a general reference summary presents a stable account. The source lead contains qualifying language; that uncertainty should survive quotation, summary and reuse. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.
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This entry incorporates text from “The Magic Goes Away” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.