Arthur C. Clarke at 90
Published on Dec 18, 2007 at 6:53 pm.
2 Comments.
Filed under science fiction.
Happy Birthday Arthur C. Clarke! OK, it is a few days late, but I don’t think that he’ll mind.
For those that don’t know, Arthur C. Clarke is a prolific science fiction writer and visionary. I first became acquainted with Clarke through reading Childhood’s End. I began reading science fiction quite early, and I was either still in elementary school or just into junior high when I read the book, and I still remember aspects of it today. I really should find time to read it again. But, most people know of Clarke through is 2001: A Space Odyssey. Even people who are not scifi readers know that name, because Clarke worked with film maker Stanley Kubric to make a movie by the same name. The movie became a classic, though I never cared for the ending sequence. And, of course, there are also the very large number of other books and stories that he wrote.
A lot of people who don’t read science fiction don’t understand why those of us who do read it like it so much. They are thinking of the old pulp scifi stories, in which the story is about the same in every tale. But, what I like are works like Clarke and many others. They are well thought out and researched. These authors write science fiction, but it is science fiction. That is, they write fiction based on science. Yeah, I like some of the old pulp writers like E. E. “Doc” Smith. I loved reading his work growing up, and recently I reread some of it. But, much of what he wrote was, quite simply, scientifically impossible. You had to seriously suspend your disbelief to enjoy it. But, Clarke knows science, and his work extends and projects what he believes is possible.
And he should know science. Clarke has a degree (with honors) in physics and mathematics. He wrote what many would call “hard science fiction”. And Clarke was not just a science fiction writer whose sole goal was to entertain, sell books, and make money. He knew that the farther out a satellite orbited, the longer that it took to orbit the Earth. So, he proposed that a satellite sufficiently distant would orbit once per 23 hours 56 minutes (the rotational rate of Earth). That means that such a satellite (we now call them geostationary or geosynchronous satellites) would stay over one spot on Earth’s equator, making tracking it trivial. That would make such satellites perfect for routine communication. Indeed that is how we use many of them today! But, he also proposed, several years before the first satellite was even put into orbit around Earth, that satellites could be used to augment weather forecasting. Indeed, today it would be unthinkable for a weather forecaster not to use satellite data!
In his book Rendezvous with Rama, Clarke mentions a space watch program designed to survey the skies looking for dangerous asteroids. Such a program is now in place. Clarke also wrote The Hammer of God about a potential impact on Earth (I highly recommend this book!).
Arthur C. Clarke, a true great among science fiction writers, turned 90 years old a couple of days ago: December 16. So, happy belated birthday!
-Astroprof
(Image courtesy Arthur C. Clarke Foundation)
Ed Davies on December 19, 2007 at 6:41 pm: 1
I think my first Arthur C. Clarke book was A Fall Of Moondust but, yes, Childhood’s End is one of his best though pretty much all of his books are good. Some seem rather dated now, of course, sort of like Shakespeare only writing quotes - a lot of Sir Arthur’s themes set the scene for other hard sci-fi writers later.
What are a bit of a disappointment are his later “joint” books where he has basically sold his brand to other writers who’ve produced OK books but not really worthy of the name on the cover. I didn’t realise that The Hammer of God wasn’t one of these; I’ll have to have a look so thanks for mentioning it.
Astroprof’s Page » Arthur C. Clarke: 1917-2008 on March 18, 2008 at 9:31 pm: 2
[…] Today, I read that the famous science fiction author Arthur C. Clarke has died. I wrote about him a few months ago just after his 90th birthday. For about a half century he had lived in Sri Lanka. His health has been poor for some years, too. Though his name has been listed as coauthor on several books in recent years, I suspect that other people wrote them with some guidance from Clarke. Those books read somewhat different from his earlier works. […]