Mr. Gibson, whose work appeared on Broadway for five decades, was known for the demanding roles he wrote for women. Working frequently with director Arthur Penn, he helped make a star of actress Anne Bancroft in the plays "The Miracle Worker" (1959) and "Two for the Seesaw" (1958).

They also collaborated on "Golda" (1977), a critically panned study of power with Bancroft as Israeli Prime Minister Golda Meir. The author reworked the play into a monologue, which became "Golda's Balcony" (2003), a popular hit starring Tovah Feldshuh and later a film with Valerie Harper.

In addition to winning the Tony for "The Miracle Worker," which has been revived countless times in community theaters, Mr. Gibson was also nominated for a Tony for "Two for the Seesaw" and "Golden Boy" (1964).

At what point did American life become stranger than science fiction?

If I had gone into a publisher in New York in 1981 and told them I wanted to write a novel that is set in a world where the climate is out of whack and Mideast terrorists have hijacked airplanes and in response the U.S. has invaded the wrong country - it's too much. Contemporary reality is like an overlapping set of dire science-fictional scenarios.

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Do you feel that you've transcended the science-fiction genre in your work?

My roots are in a genre. That is the funny thing. Novels are called novels because, ideally, they provide a novel experience. But in genre, you're sort of buying a guarantee that you are going to have essentially the same experience again and again. It's a novel. It won't be too novel. Don't worry.