An even bigger birthday upcoming: Arthur C. Clarke hits the big Nine-Oh

[thatcrazycajun]

On 16 December 2007 (this Sunday), one of the most towering talents of any literary genre, our very own Sir Arthur Charles Clarke, CBE, turns 90. BoingBoing.net reports the story here and offers a link to the Grand Master's very own blog, where you can wish him many happy returns directly. Congratulations, Mr. C., and may you remain with us at least long enough to see us actually make a real trip to Jupiter.

What's your favorite work by Sir Arthur? Mine is his excellent memoir Astounding Days: A Science Fictional Autobiography (his scientific autobiography is a separate volume, Ascent to Orbit). As far as his fiction is concerned, I have to go with the Odyssey series, beginning with 2001: A Space Odyssey (which actually began life as a short story, then progressed to a novel only after the movie was made) and ending with 3001: The Final Odyssey.

Comments

[smoooom.livejournal.com]

Dolphin Island. It was the first SF book I read. Grade 8. I was very disappointed when I figured out that it was pretend not real. It expanded my world of books. SF was good as was Fantasy. (Lewis) BOOKS!!!!!

[banjoplayinnerd.livejournal.com]

True confessions time. When I was young and impressionable and of the proper age to be doing such things, I found a couple of copies of Playboy hidden on top of the hutch in the kitchen. I don't remember any more what I was looking for up there, but I know what I found . . . all sorts of pictures of girls that interested me in ways that I hadn't exactly expected, and a story by Clarks called "Dial 'F' for Frankenstein" that scared the living je-ne-sais-quois out of me. I don't know why I found it all that scary, but I did. The gist of it was that at a certain time after all of the world's telephone networks had been computerized and linked together, every telephone in the world started to ring. Those who picked up the phone heard a sound that one of the characters in the story described as "a birth cry."

Anyway that's one of the stories that's stuck with my for mumbledy-ump years, even though I haven't re-read it since Dad (presumably) figured out that his security had been breached and the magazines disappeared.

[acelightning.livejournal.com]