My God... It's Full Of Stars

[filkertom]

Tremendous sadness. Sir Arthur C. Clarke has passed away at the age of 90. If I have to tell you who he is, you just haven't been paying attention.

What's your favorite book or story by Sir Arthur? I'd go for The Nine Billion Names of God or Rendevous With Rama.

Comments

[scifantasy.livejournal.com]

Childhood's End.

[phillip2637.livejournal.com]

Absolutely. There were parts of that book where I would read a page, pace for awhile and digest what I'd read, repeat....

[vulpine137.livejournal.com]

Rendevous With Rama or 2001 & 2010.

[redaxe.livejournal.com]

The Nine Billion Names of God is brilliant, and contributes one of the all-time classic endings.

2001 is marvelous, both as a book and as a movie. Some of the characters suffer some flatness, but as a whole, it drew me in both as an adolescent and repeatedly as an adult, from beginning to end.

[lapislaz.livejournal.com]

I'd have to go with Childhood's End, too. Although "Nightfall" would have to be a very close second.

[starcat-jewel.livejournal.com]

"Nightfall" is by Asimov. Did you mean Against the Fall of Night?

Somebody tell lapislaz....

[markiv1111.livejournal.com]

"Nightfall" was written by Isaac Asimov. Might you be thinking of "The Wall of Darkness"? (You probably aren't; thinking about it for 30 seconds, the stories aren't that similar.) I found the entire short story collection *Expedition to Earth* to contain numerous excellent stories; my favorite (though I can't locate it right now) is the one that ended with, "And suddenly I knew young David would never be an architect." Go back and look at the endings of the stories, and then go back and read that one from the beginning. It left me simply awestruck.

Nate

Re: Somebody tell lapislaz....

[lapislaz.livejournal.com]

Thank you, Nate! I don't know where I've been keeping my brain lately, but it's obviously not in the library.

[stoutfellow.livejournal.com]

The City and the Stars had a tremendous impact on me when I was young; the image, toward the end, of Vanamonde and the Mad Mind clashing in a universe of dead stars impressed me with the concept of deep time as nothing else ever has.

[batyatoon]

"The Star" was the first time I ever read a story with Christian imagery that nonetheless left me not only moved, but shaken.

[wildcard9.livejournal.com]

I heard an audio reading of the Nine Billion Names Of God. Wow, that is a great story. I honestly can not remember what else I have read by him, but it was that audio adaption that got me interested in his writing.

[madamruppy.livejournal.com]

Rama is good but I have always been a fan of 2001 and 2010. The world lost an amazing man.

[sazettel.livejournal.com]

So there I was at the New Orleans Nebula Award ceremony. Connie Willis was the MC, and she decided that we needed a montage, like they do of movie clips at the Oscars. So, she read a montage of SF lines and concepts.
"I know where I came from -- but where did all you zombies come from"..."First Law: A robot may not injur a human being or through inaction cause a human being to come to harm..." We sat and listened, but when she got to "Overhead, without any fusss..." a banquet room full of science fiction authors was all murmuring along "the stars were going out."

It was the only line the whole room spoke, and that said a great deal.

[sarekofvulcan.livejournal.com]

metaquotesed here.

[jhayman.livejournal.com]

Just posted on this myself...

I'm tempted to say, all of them. Certainly I was a fan of his writing long before the 2001 hurrah.

Tales from the White Hart was funny and made SF so accessible.
Nine Billion Names...
Childhood's End
City and the Stars
Any of the dozens of short fiction, especially The Star...

What an incredibly fruitful and unique life.

[twfarlan.livejournal.com]

The Songs of Distant Earth is one of my favorites, perhaps because I consider it one of his under-rated novels.

One more visionary mind, lost to flawed flesh and unintentional mortality. The name of god is 01; may it save us to archive unending.

[que-sara-sara.livejournal.com]

I have yet to read any of his books, but I could be the reincarnation of the guy who ran through a movie screen during 2001 yelling that he saw god.

I didn't like

[capplor.livejournal.com]

Childhood's End, but somehow it sticks in my mind.

[msminlr.livejournal.com]

I enjoyed Glide Path, the lightly-fictionalized tale of his days in the RAF in one of the first radar-guided airport approach control crews.

I had been reading SF (all Heinlein, Asimov, and Norton) for most of the 9th grade before I found The Nine Billion Names of God and discovered that there were more than THREE SF writers. Sometime before the end of that year I found one of the novels in the Okie-City set, A Life for The Stars, I think it was.

I haven't read (most of) the books

[madmanotl.livejournal.com]

One time in a library, I saw a book titled 2061, episode three. Having enjoyed 2001 and 2010, I decided to borrow it and fully enjoyed the book.

I do wish I could devote more time to reading.

[ericcoleman]

It's not a well known book, but The Deep Range has been one of my favorite books for decades now. I need to read it again.

[ginevra007.livejournal.com]

First let me raise a glass to someone I never met in person, only through his work, and who had a profound influence on my life as a reader of Science Fiction.

Childhoods End, I remember so very well, I still refer to it today, when people who have not read it tell me they work from home. I remember in the book, how people no longer had to live and work in the same place. Sound familiar? (grin)

2001 and 2010 Loved the movies, and the books. But "The Nine BIllion Names of God", had the most memerable closing line. If you have not read it, you can do so on line, here http://lucis.net/stuff/clarke/9billion_clarke.html.

[peteralway.livejournal.com]

Thank you for the link. I hadn't read the story before.

[sffilk.livejournal.com]

R.I.P. One of the truly great ones is gone.

[theturbonerd.livejournal.com]

My favorite is one of his non-fiction works: PROFILES OF THE FUTURE

It is times like this that I truly hope that there is an afterlife. Sir Arthur deserves an endless world full of beautiful seas to swim and scuba in.

Godspeed Arthur C. Clarke. The world is a smaller place without you. You will be greatly missed.

[hyrkanian.livejournal.com]

Sir Arthur was one of the ones you expect to be around forever. :( A sad day.

[thatcrazycajun.livejournal.com]

I'd like to put in a vote for Astounding Days, Sir Arthur's delightful autobiography of his early fan activities in Britain, his experiences in the 1940s efforts of the British Aeronautical Society to build a rocket and get it into orbit and his reminiscences of the publishing run of Astounding/Analog, in whose pages he was frequently published both as a lettercol writer early on and a paid author later. It's still in print and fairly easy to come by a copy, and I highly recommend it for anyone who wants to know the man behind the literature.

For his fiction, I'd also have to go with 2010: Odyssey Two. But Childhood's End is a close second.

[surakofb5.livejournal.com]

I can only pick one? How about four or five?

His short fiction was brilliant. I loved "The Nine Billion Names of God". I always thought "Superiority" was a marvelous cautionary tale. "The Curse" was a beautiful and poignant vignette, although not much of a plot. "Take a Deep Breath" struck me as exactly what vacuum exposure would *really* be like. And "Neutron Tide" spends three pages setting up a pun worthy of you, Tom.

Among his long fiction, I especially liked the lesser-known books, such as The Sands of Mars and Imperial Earth. But really, I loved them all.

[pickledcritter.livejournal.com]

I would have to go for The Nine Billion Names of God - I recall reading it in one of the children's/YA reading magazines from the early-mid 70s - I want to say Read magazine, but it may have been another one...

That was probably my gateway into actual SF as opposed to the kid fantasy stuff of Lloyed Alexanader, Susan Cooper, etc.

[stevemb.livejournal.com]

Actually, the first thing that comes to mind (probably jarred by a news comment about "cell phone pictures out of Tibet") was one of his nonfiction quotes:

"The very existence of new information channels, operating in real time and across all frontiers, will be a powerful influence for civilized behaviour. If you are arranging a massacre, it will be useless to shoot the cameraman who has so inconveniently appeared on the scene. His pictures will already be safe in the studio five thousand miles away and his final image may hang you."

[thatcrazycajun.livejournal.com]

What a great quote...and one I hadn't heard or read before. And it has Sir Arthur's typical pungent wit. Thanks for posting that, Steve.