I've just started reading 'The Stars my Destination' by Alfred Bester .... again.
I first read it when I was a kid, it was published in the mid fifties. I've read it many times and consider it to be one of the greatest SciFi novels ever written. When it was first published in the UK, it was titled Tiger Tiger. It was not uncommon to rename books and films for perceived changes in viewing on either side of the pond. I think the original title was better, but I understand the change as at the head of the book Alfred Bester quoted a verse from William Blake:
Tyger Tyger, burning bright,
In the forests of the night;
What immortal hand or eye,
Could frame thy fearful symmetry?
Which does describe Gully Foyle, the central character of the story, pretty much on the knuckle. But Gully has his own personal little poem:
Gully Foyle is my name
And Terra is my nation.
Deep space is my dwelling place
And death's my destination.
.... but by the end of the book the final line of his little poem becomes: The Stars my destination.
It's never been filmed, I can't think why. It would make a cracking movie in the hands of the right director. (David Lynch need not apply.)
There is a prologue which sets the scene and state of the human race a few centuries down the line, and then you're hit with a great opening line:
"He was one hundred and seventy days dying, and not yet dead."
I was about 11 years old when I first read that line. And was hooked for life right there.