Arthur C. Clarke is dead, alas. Let’s all get together and kick some ass




The title is stolen from the sub title of a novel about Philip K. Dick, but I thought it fitting when I saw the news. In retrospect, I am kinda sick about yesterdays post. At 90 years of age, Mr. Clarke was a visionary from the Golden Age of Science Fiction. Retaining a childlike sense of wonder for the future combined with a hunger for the science of the present, Clarke was a GrandMaster in every sense of the word.

 

Author of over 70 books, nominated for a Nobel Prize for his writing which formed the basis for communications satellites in 1945, he was the last of the BIG 3 (Heinlein and Asimov) although I have always put Bradbury in the same list.

 

Clarke, besides predicting comsats, also said there would be a man on the moon by 1970  and he was correct. One of the founders of the British Interplanetary Society, he was respected by all who knew him. Astronomer, Sir Patrick Moore said today” (he was) a great visionary, brilliant science-fiction writer and a great forecaster.”.

 

Born in 1917, in Somerset, England, he joined the RAF during WWII. During this period he was know for both his fiction and technical works. His television commentary alongside Walter Cronkite during the Apollo Missions were……….amazing. As a child they stayed with me forever.

 

Many will remember him as the author of the short story The Sentinel, which was the basis for Stanley Kubrick’s 1964 film “2001, A Space Odyssey”.

 

On his 90th. Birthday, he posted a a series of greeting to the world on YouTube. They should be required viewing for every single person on earth.

 

You will be missed by all who know of you, Sir. Gods speed.

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