Entry 724, on 2008-03-20 at 11:01:37 (Rating 1, News)
Yesterday the great science fiction writer Arthur C. Clarke died at the age of 90. During the era when science fiction was a much more prominent literary form Clarke was one of the leading writers along with a few others such as Isaac Asimov.
He is probably most famous for two things I guess. One was his collaboration with Stanley Kubrick in creating the movie 2001: A Space Odyssey, surely one of the greatest movies of all time; and the other was his "invention" of the idea of communications satellites.
But his influence goes away beyond those two things. So many people were inspired by his books. He made the brave prediction of a Moon landing before 2000 and when Neil Armstrong landed their in 1969, NASA said Clarke provided the essential intellectual drive that led them to the Moon. A cynic might say it was more a political competition with the Russians but I know science fiction was the introduction to science for many people of the era.
During my time at school I read all the science fiction I could get and I loved Clarke's books above all the others. He had a way of making future science totally convincing but the stories behind the science were always so much bigger than just what was on the surface. Two of his best books, 2001: A Space Odyssey and Childhood's End, dealt with the future evolution of the human race but used totally believable extensions of science to do it.
I remember debating with my English teacher at high school about the purpose of good fiction. He insisted fiction was to explore how people react in different environments and different situations, and that is no doubt true in many cases. But I saw science fiction as more than that. Its a way to explore ideas, to discuss what our future should be and to warn about some possible future routes, and to introduce ideas that are so crazy there is no other place they can be presented.
But within Clarke's lifetime many of his "crazy" ideas happened. Humans did land on the Moon (unless you believe the Moon conspiracy, of course) and communications satellites (and many other types of space technology) have become so much a part of our lives that we just take them for granted.
It was said that if you read 2001: A Space Odyssey once and thought you understood it then you were probably fooling yourself. I don't know whether that's quite true because Clarke's style was always very direct and his books were very easy to read. But it was the ideas he presented which had so much hidden depth and lead to so many unexpected consequences so maybe the idea is justified.
I owe a lot of my interest in science to the science fiction I read during the 70s and 80s and I think Clarke's books influenced me more than any others because they showed me the beauty of what other people might have thought were just dry technical ideas. Thank you Arthur.
I just read through the Wikipedia entries for the books (linked in the text above) and there was even more to these books than I thought. I must re-read them. I can't believe that Clarke's death affected me so much. He hasn't written anything good in years buts his death has still made me feel quite depressed.
Comment 2 by SF Fan on 2008-03-30 at 19:24:33:
I just found your blog when looking for information about Arthur C. Clarke. Thank you for sharing your thoughts on his work. I was also a great fan.
Comment 3 by OJB on 2008-07-17 at 10:41:20:
Even after his deaths he's still writing new books! Have a look here.
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