"The Weapon Too Dreadful To Use" was published in the May 1939 issue of Amazing Stories. It was reprinted in the August 1965 issue of Amazing and the 1972 collection The Early Asimov.
"The Weapon Too Dreadful to Use" was the eleventh story written by Asimov, but the second to be published.
The Plot
The people of Earth have colonised Venus, despite the intelligent species native to the planet, who are treated as inferiors with no rights.
One of the Venusians shows his Earthman friend the ruins of an ancient city, where they discover details of an ancient weapon, apparently abandoned millennia before as being too dreadful to actually use, but, as the domination by the colonists increases, elements of the Venusian resistance obtain the weapon and use it on the colonial cities and their population. The weapon works by disconnecting the brain from the mind, and within a short time, the Venusians take back control of their planet from the defenseless colonists.
Earth surrenders and signs a peace treaty with Venus. The Venusians then destroy the weapon.
Saturday, August 6, 2011
Friday, August 5, 2011
Asimov's short stories: Marrooned Off Vesta
"Marooned Off Vesta " was the third science fiction story written by Asimov, and the first to be published. It appeared in Amazing Stories in its March 1939 issue (which arrived on news stands on January 10, 1939).
In beginning his science fiction career, Asimov had first written "Cosmic Corkscrew", which he completed on June 19, 1938 (after having worked on it, off an on, for 13 months). He brought it in to John Campbell, whom he had met some weeks earlier when he'd visited the Astounding offices in person to find out why the latest issue of that magazine was delayed. That story was rejected by Campbell and a couple of other magazines, and is now lost.
The second story Asimov completed was "Stowaway," which took him 18 days. He went to John Campbell's office a second time to submit the story, on July 18, 1938, and then stayed and talked to Campbell about science fiction for an hour. On the way home, he already was working out the idea for "Marooned Off Vesta."
The rejection letter for "Stowaway" came 4 days later, but Asimov was undeterred because Campbell went through a detailed critique of the story and why it was rejected. Asimov submitted it to Thrilling Wonder Stories on August 3, 1938.
Meantime, on July 30, 1938, eight days after Campbell had rejected "Stowaway", he completed "Marooned Off Vesta."
He also quickly completed two other stories, "The Irrational Planet" and "Ring Around the Sun." He did not feel "The Irrational Planet" worthy of Astouding, but submitted the others, which Campbell rejected.
Asimov kept on writing, and kept on submitting short stories.
Unlike Astounding, whose offices were in Mahattan, which Asimov could easily visit, the offices for Amazing were in Chicago.
On Friday, October 21, 1938, Asimov received a letter from editor Raymond Palmer informing him that "Marooned Off Vesta" had been accepted. The check for it arrived on October 31. Payment was a penny a word, the story was 6,400 words long, so the check was for $64.
Where to find it
Anthologized in:
Asimov's Mysteries (1968)
The Best of Isaac Asimov (1973)
Because this story had appeared in other anthologies, it was not included in The Early Asimov (1972) anthology, which consisted only of stories that had not been anthologized.
The Plot
Three men have survived the wreck of the spaceship Silver Queen in the Asteroid Belt and find themselves trapped in orbit around the asteroid Vesta.
The Silver Queen, in its wrecked state, now has three airtight rooms, one spacesuit, three days' worth of air, a week's supply of food, and a year's supply of water. The trapped men manage to use the limited resources at their disposal to rescue themselves.
The Sequel
In 1958, to commemorate the 20th anniversary of the story's pubblication, Asimov wrote a sequel called "Anniversary", also set twenty years after the original story. Both stories appeared in the March 1959 issue of Amazing Stories.
In beginning his science fiction career, Asimov had first written "Cosmic Corkscrew", which he completed on June 19, 1938 (after having worked on it, off an on, for 13 months). He brought it in to John Campbell, whom he had met some weeks earlier when he'd visited the Astounding offices in person to find out why the latest issue of that magazine was delayed. That story was rejected by Campbell and a couple of other magazines, and is now lost.
The second story Asimov completed was "Stowaway," which took him 18 days. He went to John Campbell's office a second time to submit the story, on July 18, 1938, and then stayed and talked to Campbell about science fiction for an hour. On the way home, he already was working out the idea for "Marooned Off Vesta."
The rejection letter for "Stowaway" came 4 days later, but Asimov was undeterred because Campbell went through a detailed critique of the story and why it was rejected. Asimov submitted it to Thrilling Wonder Stories on August 3, 1938.
Meantime, on July 30, 1938, eight days after Campbell had rejected "Stowaway", he completed "Marooned Off Vesta."
He also quickly completed two other stories, "The Irrational Planet" and "Ring Around the Sun." He did not feel "The Irrational Planet" worthy of Astouding, but submitted the others, which Campbell rejected.
Asimov kept on writing, and kept on submitting short stories.
Unlike Astounding, whose offices were in Mahattan, which Asimov could easily visit, the offices for Amazing were in Chicago.
On Friday, October 21, 1938, Asimov received a letter from editor Raymond Palmer informing him that "Marooned Off Vesta" had been accepted. The check for it arrived on October 31. Payment was a penny a word, the story was 6,400 words long, so the check was for $64.
Where to find it
Anthologized in:
Asimov's Mysteries (1968)
The Best of Isaac Asimov (1973)
Because this story had appeared in other anthologies, it was not included in The Early Asimov (1972) anthology, which consisted only of stories that had not been anthologized.
The Plot
Three men have survived the wreck of the spaceship Silver Queen in the Asteroid Belt and find themselves trapped in orbit around the asteroid Vesta.
The Silver Queen, in its wrecked state, now has three airtight rooms, one spacesuit, three days' worth of air, a week's supply of food, and a year's supply of water. The trapped men manage to use the limited resources at their disposal to rescue themselves.
The Sequel
In 1958, to commemorate the 20th anniversary of the story's pubblication, Asimov wrote a sequel called "Anniversary", also set twenty years after the original story. Both stories appeared in the March 1959 issue of Amazing Stories.
Wednesday, August 3, 2011
Asimov in the News: Fun with physics: 5 must-reads
From Hindustan Times: Fun with physics: 5 must-reads
Surely You’re Joking, Mr Feynman!: Adventures Of A Curious Character by Richard Feynman, Ralph Leighton (contributor), Edward Hutchings (editor), 1985, W W Norton
An edited collection of reminiscences by the Nobel prize-winning physicist Richard Feynman, the book is based on taped conversations with Feynman’s friend Ralph Leighton. Covering various incidents in Feynman’s life, some are light-hearted in tone, such as his fascination with safe-cracking, while others are more serious, but very readable
Atoms In The Family: My Life With Enrico Fermi
by Laura Fermi, 1987
Laura Fermi’s engrossing account of life with the great atomic scientist, Enrico Fermi, traces their emigration to the United States in the 1930s. Combining intellectual biography with social history, she traces her husband’s career from his childhood, when he taught himself physics, through his rise in the Italian university system coinciding with the rise of fascism, to his winning the Nobel prize, a perfect opportunity to flee the country without arousing official suspicion, and his journey to the US.
What Is Life?: With ‘Mind and Matter’ And ‘Autobiographical Sketches’
by Erwin Schrödinger, 1967, Cambridge University Press
These two essays by Erwin Schrödinger, one of the founders of quantum mechanics, constitute a physicist’s musings about biology, from basic physical principles. The book, especially the first essay, influenced many famous biologists such as Francis Crick.
View From A Height
by Isaac Asimov, 1963, Doubleday
This is a collection of 17 essays by the famous science writer Isaac Asimov, perhaps better known for his fiction. It’s a book of wide-ranging, extremely comprehensible, and highly entertaining facts which capture the beauty and excitement of science. Asimov enlightens and entertains the reader with fascinating inquiries into a wide array of provocative topics: the recipe for the planet earth, the changing concepts of time in a world of split seconds, the possibility of non carbon-based life forms, the physical dimensions of man (among earth’s animals: are we pygmies or giants? Why is an elephant the size it is?), and much more.
Childhood’s End
by Arthur C Clarke, 1953, Ballantine
One of the most famous science fiction novels, its theme of an alien invasion of our planet by a benign ruling race has influenced many works of fiction and cinema, including the author’s own screenplay for Stanley Kubrick’s film 2001: A Space Odyssey.
Surely You’re Joking, Mr Feynman!: Adventures Of A Curious Character by Richard Feynman, Ralph Leighton (contributor), Edward Hutchings (editor), 1985, W W Norton
An edited collection of reminiscences by the Nobel prize-winning physicist Richard Feynman, the book is based on taped conversations with Feynman’s friend Ralph Leighton. Covering various incidents in Feynman’s life, some are light-hearted in tone, such as his fascination with safe-cracking, while others are more serious, but very readable
Atoms In The Family: My Life With Enrico Fermi
by Laura Fermi, 1987
Laura Fermi’s engrossing account of life with the great atomic scientist, Enrico Fermi, traces their emigration to the United States in the 1930s. Combining intellectual biography with social history, she traces her husband’s career from his childhood, when he taught himself physics, through his rise in the Italian university system coinciding with the rise of fascism, to his winning the Nobel prize, a perfect opportunity to flee the country without arousing official suspicion, and his journey to the US.
What Is Life?: With ‘Mind and Matter’ And ‘Autobiographical Sketches’
by Erwin Schrödinger, 1967, Cambridge University Press
These two essays by Erwin Schrödinger, one of the founders of quantum mechanics, constitute a physicist’s musings about biology, from basic physical principles. The book, especially the first essay, influenced many famous biologists such as Francis Crick.
View From A Height
by Isaac Asimov, 1963, Doubleday
This is a collection of 17 essays by the famous science writer Isaac Asimov, perhaps better known for his fiction. It’s a book of wide-ranging, extremely comprehensible, and highly entertaining facts which capture the beauty and excitement of science. Asimov enlightens and entertains the reader with fascinating inquiries into a wide array of provocative topics: the recipe for the planet earth, the changing concepts of time in a world of split seconds, the possibility of non carbon-based life forms, the physical dimensions of man (among earth’s animals: are we pygmies or giants? Why is an elephant the size it is?), and much more.
Childhood’s End
by Arthur C Clarke, 1953, Ballantine
One of the most famous science fiction novels, its theme of an alien invasion of our planet by a benign ruling race has influenced many works of fiction and cinema, including the author’s own screenplay for Stanley Kubrick’s film 2001: A Space Odyssey.
Asimov in the News: Brentwood, St. Louis Sci Fi Book Club discussed Foundation
I'm a bit late with this...but if you live in Brentwood, which I assume is a suburb of St. Louis, check out their scifi book club.
Thursday, Aug. 4
SCI FI BOOK CLUB: The Sci Fi Book Club meets at 7 p.m. Aug. 4 at the Brentwood Public Library, 8765 Eulalie Ave., to discuss "Foundation" by Isaac Asimov. Visit www.brentwood.lib.mo.us.
http://www.stltoday.com/suburban-journals/metro/life/article_60f15189-2a1a-5e68-9dd0-538bc6cf2daf.html#ixzz1U0On4B8F
Thursday, Aug. 4
SCI FI BOOK CLUB: The Sci Fi Book Club meets at 7 p.m. Aug. 4 at the Brentwood Public Library, 8765 Eulalie Ave., to discuss "Foundation" by Isaac Asimov. Visit www.brentwood.lib.mo.us.
http://www.stltoday.com/suburban-journals/metro/life/article_60f15189-2a1a-5e68-9dd0-538bc6cf2daf.html#ixzz1U0On4B8F
Monday, August 1, 2011
Galway, Ireland: Hawkwind’s Nik Turner on music, deep space, and hanging out with Lemmy
Galway Advertiser: Hawkwind’s Nik Turner on music, deep space, and hanging out with Lemmy
By Kernan Andrews
THE GREAT science fiction writer Isaac Asimov once declared that “writing, to me, is simply thinking through my fingers”. For Nik Turner playing the saxophone is something similar, it is thinking and communicating through his breath and fingers.
Nik Turner, the former flautist, saxophonist, vocalist, and songwriter with the legendary space-rock/prog-rock band Hawkwind is coming to Galway to play The Western Hotel, Prospect Hill, on Friday August 5.
“I may have played Galway a long time ago with Hawkwind in the 1970s and I arranged some gigs in 1990 with might have taken in Galway, but you could say it’s the first time I’ve played according to my memory,” laughs Nik during our Monday morning interview.
For his Galway show Nik and his Space Ritual band will perform Hawkwind classics written by Nik, or co-written with Robert Calvert, such as ‘Master Of The Universe’ and ‘Brainstorm’, as well as other musical incarnations from his long and varied career.
“There will be a lot of variety as I have played with a lot of bands,” says Nik. “People will know me also from Inner City Unit and The Nik Turner Band, so everything will depend on how people in the band feel. We could even have requests from the audience which might make for an interesting variety.”
Inspirations
Nik was born in Oxford in 1940 into a family involved in the theatre, before moving to Kent when he was 13. “Margate was where I mis-spent most of my youth,” he laughs.
This was the early to mid 1950s when jazz was the coolest thing around and rock’n’roll was bubbling under the surface, firing Nik’s imagination in the process.
“I was subject to all kinds of influences - Miles Davis, John Coltrane, Dizzy Gillespie - as well as Bill Haley, Elvis, Chuck Berry, and Fats Domino,” he says. “I learned to play saxophone at 17 and carried on from there.”
A turning point came in the mid 1960s during a trip to West Berlin where he experienced the then divided city’s thriving free jazz scene.
“I was in Berlin to spend some time with some friends,” Nik recalls, “and I was hanging around in psychedelic clubs, seeing Eric Dolphy play, and meeting German musicians who were expressing the idea that you didn’t have to be technically proficient to express yourself and it sort of expressed an idea I had that I wanted to ‘play free jazz in a rock band’.
“That idea had a profound influence as I was told by a guy in a music shop that 90 per cent of people who came in to buy saxophones said they wanted to play like me. I think it opened the door to experimental music for a lot of people.”
Fired up by the sounds he encountered in Berlin and encouraged to pursue his idea of free jazz with rock, Nik helped put together a band in 1968-69, along with his old friend, the late Robert Calvert, and guitarist Dave Brock - Hawkwind was born.
Hawkwind
Hawkwind are a true phenomenon in British music, for 40 years, in various shapes and guises, the band has combined psychedelic rock, blues, proto-heavy metal, free jazz, space rock, and lengthy instrumental jams, often referencing science fiction and space themes in their lyrics and album cover art.
The late 1960s was all about space. The Russians and the Americans were locked in ‘The Space Race’, which culminated in the Apollo moon landings of 1969; the year before Arthur C Clarke and Stanley Kubrick had unveiled 2001: A Space Odyssey; Pink Floyd were singing ‘Astronomy Domine’ and ‘Set The Controls For The Heart Of The Sun’; and a generation of new sci-fi writers were producing influential pulp and literature.
“I’d read a lot of American science fiction,” recalls Nik. “I lived near Margate where there was an American air force base and I was hanging around with US airmen who gave me these pulp sci-fi books. Later Hawkwind became involved with [science fiction writer] Michael Moorcock and he turned me on to Arthur C Clarke and Isaac Asimov.
“Everybody was talking about space and it was a new direction bands were taking at the time like The Pink Floyd and also the German bands like NEU! and Nektar. It was a whole movement.
“As well as outer space there was also the ‘Inner Space’ journey and meditation. There was a book called Be Here Now by Richard Alpert, who went under the name Baba Ram Das, which gave meditation and yoga poses you could adopt. It was very good and Timothy Leary at the time did an album of the Tibetan Book Of The Dead with Ash Ra Temple. It was all going on.”
Hawkwind’s heyday was the 1970s (although the band and indeed all former members still active in music retain a devoted and fanatical cult following), and this period produced the hit single ‘Silver Machine’ (1972) and the classic live album Space Ritual (1973).
‘Silver Machine’ was written by Robert Calvert, but the vocalist on the track was Hawkwind’s most famous alumni - Ian Kilmister, better known as Lemmy, who would later form the mighty metal icons Motörhead.
“He’s great, we get on really well,” says Nik of his former bandmate who was in Hawkwind from 1971 to 1975. “The band had a house in London but it was me and Lemmy who lived there. Some of the other members came to stay from time to time. We had a bit of a commune really.
“I saw him at the end of last year with Motörhead playing a gig at what used to be the Hammersmith Odeon and we had a good time chatting in the dressing room. I asked if he might like to take part in a special Hawkwind reunion show and he said he’s up for it, so it might happen.”
The success of ‘Silver Machine’ gave Hawkwind enough money to allow the ambitious Space Ritual stage show and album become a reality.
“The concept was based on the Pythagorean ‘Music of the Spheres’ with the idea of the band as a space ship which the audience powered,” says Nik. “We recorded several shows on the tour and put it together for a live album.”
The album cover was designed by the late Barney Bubbles, one of the greatest graphic designers of all time. Prominent on the album’s sleeve was a depiction of a curvaceous, goddess like female. The illustration was based on the band’s sole Irish member Stacia Blake, who performed interprative dance at the band’s concerts often wearing nothing but body paint. Today Stacia is back in Ireland and is a professional artist (www.staciablake.com). “We’re on good terms,” says Nik. “We’ve made provisional arrangements to met while I’m in Ireland.”
With success came controversy for Hawkwind in the form of the 1973 single ‘Urban Guerrilla’, which the BBC felt was “provocative and dangerous” in light of the IRA’s bombing campaign in Britain.
“It was a sensitive issue,” says Nik. “The BBC didn’t want to play it, the record company distanced themselves from it, and even the bomb squad came ‘round to our house and pulled up the floor boards looking for explosives. We were even stopped going out of the country under the terrorism act and were held up at customs for 24 hours. It was rather inconvenient.”
Ceaseless exploration
Nik was in Hawkwind for two periods (1969 to 1976, 1982 to 1984) and since then has maintained a busy solo career both as a touring musician and recording artist. Over the last 30 years he has embraced big band, jazz, punk rock, ska, Latin, and funk, as well as space rock, through the Nik Turner Band, Galaktikos, Space Ritual, Nik Turner’s Fantastic All-Stars, and Inner City Unit.
There have also been collaborations with other artists and performances at the recent Glastonbury Festival. So what keeps him passionate about playing, performing, and exploring all kinds of different musics?
“I find music to be a form of communication and healing,” he says. “The more I play the more I want to use music to touch people and make them feel good. I am happy to play any style and the saxophone is applicable to many different styles. It’s a privilege to play music for people. That’s what drives me.”
For more information and tickets to Nik Turner’s concert at The Western Hotel, contact 091 - 562834 or email info@thewestern.ie
Thursday, July 28, 2011
What should spaceships look like?
BBC News Magazine: What should spaceships look like?
Generations of schoolchildren, openly, and many adults, perhaps more guardedly, have delighted in fantastical depictions of space travel.
From Star Wars back to 2001: A Space Odyssey and even further back to comic hero Dan Dare and Victorian illustrations for the stories of Jules Verne and HG Wells, the way spaceships should look has been an important issue - before the first rocket booster ever fired.
But the fanciful reputation of sci-fi novels and films aside, the illustration of spacecraft might actually have a realistic place in the design of future vessels.
The line has often been blurred between the realm of the sci-fi artist and the real spacecraft designers.
Often referred to as the father of modern space art, Chesley Bonestell had a significant impact on not only science fiction illustration, but the whole of the American space programme.
German rocket developer and champion of space exploration Dr Wernher von Braun, who was inspired by the works of Verne and Wells, commissioned Bonestell to illustrate his spaceflight concepts in a 1952 issue of Collier's Weekly magazine.
The combination of von Braun's technology and Bonestell's artistic vision made the science come alive for the layman readers. Of course, the tax dollars and votes of those inspired layman readers would be needed to realise ambitious space projects.
The Association of Science Fiction & Fantasy Artists now honours work in the sci-fi and fantasy art industry with its annual Chesley Awards.
Science fiction academic
Harry Lange was a German artist who got his start in military flight manual illustrations and was appointed to lead the future projects section for Nasa. He and his team found themselves illustrating von Braun's ideas to promote his vision of a US space station. Lange ended up as production designer on Stanley Kubrick's 2001.
On the other hand it's hard to imagine the designs of Chris Foss, the subject of a new retrospective book, Hardware: The Definitive SF Works of Chris Foss, easily crossing the line into the real world of space travel. With Picasso as an inspiration, Foss created book covers that pioneered a new style of space art, featuring prominently placed gigantic colourful craft in swirling spacescapes.
Marked with mysterious symbols and complex patterns, his illustrations have breathed life into sci-fi writings of everyone from Isaac Asimov to EE "Doc" Smith and AE van Vogt. Foss was also commissioned to do work for Alien, Superman and Alejandro Jodorowsky's unmade film version of Dune.
Seeing Kubrick's 2001 made a lasting impression on his work, as did the Cold War years and the bleakness of some of the derelict areas of post-war Britain. "People were really looking for a new kind of explosion," says Foss. "Humans want hope. They want something to believe in."
So is it fanciful to imagine Foss's ships - or those of equally florid artists - being like Bonestell's and infiltrating real design?
Perhaps not if a new age of privately-financed space travel needs to rally support in the same way von Braun and Bonestell did.
The end of the space shuttle programme presents a new challenge for spacecraft engineers and designers - one that could even benefit from collaboration with artists.
With government funding constricted, many will be looking to private investors to lead the future of space vessels.
More and more, the aim of companies, such as Boeing, will be to entice consumers to pay for space travel. Just as airlines have done, they will have to appeal to potential passengers - and investors - in order to establish their brands against the competition.
"An enterprising company seeking to attract government and private passengers might achieve success by offering them spaceships that resembled the unique visions of Chris Foss," says science fiction academic Dr Gary Westfahl.
Exotic design might play a part similar to that of airline insignia - from Alaska Airlines' themed craft to Aer Lingus's shamrocks. The goal is to establish brand recognition and visual appeal.
"Foss made his spaceships beautiful not by streamlining them but by adding bright, decorative colours," says Westfahl.
Some might find it strange that a Nasa worker like Lange could make the jump from a deep space project to Hollywood and end up with Oscar nomination for the art direction on The Empire Strikes Back.
But space is a particularly romanticised part of our vision of exploration, says Dr Eric Rabkin, a professor of English at the University of Michigan who specialises in science fiction.
It's because of the unknown, he says. Trains must go where tracks have previously been laid down and planes have to fly where they can ultimately land.
"Ships are inherently romantic because they can go where no one has before. Ships are associated with freedom and conquest," says Rabkin
Generations of schoolchildren, openly, and many adults, perhaps more guardedly, have delighted in fantastical depictions of space travel.
From Star Wars back to 2001: A Space Odyssey and even further back to comic hero Dan Dare and Victorian illustrations for the stories of Jules Verne and HG Wells, the way spaceships should look has been an important issue - before the first rocket booster ever fired.
But the fanciful reputation of sci-fi novels and films aside, the illustration of spacecraft might actually have a realistic place in the design of future vessels.
The line has often been blurred between the realm of the sci-fi artist and the real spacecraft designers.
Often referred to as the father of modern space art, Chesley Bonestell had a significant impact on not only science fiction illustration, but the whole of the American space programme.
German rocket developer and champion of space exploration Dr Wernher von Braun, who was inspired by the works of Verne and Wells, commissioned Bonestell to illustrate his spaceflight concepts in a 1952 issue of Collier's Weekly magazine.
The combination of von Braun's technology and Bonestell's artistic vision made the science come alive for the layman readers. Of course, the tax dollars and votes of those inspired layman readers would be needed to realise ambitious space projects.
The Association of Science Fiction & Fantasy Artists now honours work in the sci-fi and fantasy art industry with its annual Chesley Awards.
Science fiction academic
Harry Lange was a German artist who got his start in military flight manual illustrations and was appointed to lead the future projects section for Nasa. He and his team found themselves illustrating von Braun's ideas to promote his vision of a US space station. Lange ended up as production designer on Stanley Kubrick's 2001.
On the other hand it's hard to imagine the designs of Chris Foss, the subject of a new retrospective book, Hardware: The Definitive SF Works of Chris Foss, easily crossing the line into the real world of space travel. With Picasso as an inspiration, Foss created book covers that pioneered a new style of space art, featuring prominently placed gigantic colourful craft in swirling spacescapes.
Marked with mysterious symbols and complex patterns, his illustrations have breathed life into sci-fi writings of everyone from Isaac Asimov to EE "Doc" Smith and AE van Vogt. Foss was also commissioned to do work for Alien, Superman and Alejandro Jodorowsky's unmade film version of Dune.
Seeing Kubrick's 2001 made a lasting impression on his work, as did the Cold War years and the bleakness of some of the derelict areas of post-war Britain. "People were really looking for a new kind of explosion," says Foss. "Humans want hope. They want something to believe in."
So is it fanciful to imagine Foss's ships - or those of equally florid artists - being like Bonestell's and infiltrating real design?
Perhaps not if a new age of privately-financed space travel needs to rally support in the same way von Braun and Bonestell did.
The end of the space shuttle programme presents a new challenge for spacecraft engineers and designers - one that could even benefit from collaboration with artists.
With government funding constricted, many will be looking to private investors to lead the future of space vessels.
More and more, the aim of companies, such as Boeing, will be to entice consumers to pay for space travel. Just as airlines have done, they will have to appeal to potential passengers - and investors - in order to establish their brands against the competition.
"An enterprising company seeking to attract government and private passengers might achieve success by offering them spaceships that resembled the unique visions of Chris Foss," says science fiction academic Dr Gary Westfahl.
Exotic design might play a part similar to that of airline insignia - from Alaska Airlines' themed craft to Aer Lingus's shamrocks. The goal is to establish brand recognition and visual appeal.
"Foss made his spaceships beautiful not by streamlining them but by adding bright, decorative colours," says Westfahl.
Some might find it strange that a Nasa worker like Lange could make the jump from a deep space project to Hollywood and end up with Oscar nomination for the art direction on The Empire Strikes Back.
But space is a particularly romanticised part of our vision of exploration, says Dr Eric Rabkin, a professor of English at the University of Michigan who specialises in science fiction.
It's because of the unknown, he says. Trains must go where tracks have previously been laid down and planes have to fly where they can ultimately land.
"Ships are inherently romantic because they can go where no one has before. Ships are associated with freedom and conquest," says Rabkin
Sunday, July 24, 2011
Isaac Asimov's father Part 2
Aaron Menahem Asimov, born about 1865. Asimov's grandfather on his father's side
First born son of Mendel Asimov, who was the son of Abraham Ber by his first wife, who was the son of Judah Asimov, Asimov's great, great-great grandfather.
Aaron's first born child was a girl who died in infancy. His second child was a boy, who would become Asimov's father.
Judah Asimov, Isaac Asimov's father.
Judah Asimov was born around December 21, 1896. (Russia at that time used the Julian calendar rather than the Gregorian calenadar, and Jews used their own lunar calendar, anyway).
He entered Hebrew School - in Petrovichi - at the age of 5. There were ten boys in the school, and of course no girls. Judah went to school there until he was 16. After that he received advanced instruction in the Talmud from the rabbi, and that was th extent of his formal education.
In his childhood, there was a Gentile girl of about 12 or 13, who had lived in the house for about 4 years, who took care of him. (Asimov doesn't give any other details). She "spoke Yiddish like a Jew, and even learned all the prayers in perfect Hebrew so she could supervise young Judah at his homework."
Asimov reveals part of his father's character, "It would never occur to him at any time in his life to save another person's face, or to let some small error go if it were unimportant." His father was always right, even when he aws wrong. (Asimov was like this also when he was young, but grew out of it.)
In 1916, Mendel (then in his 70s, Asimov estimates) fell sick. Judah, age 19, was in Borisoglebsk on a business matter, some 450 miles away. By the time he returned to Petrovichi, his grandfather was dead.
As for Asimov's grandmother, this is what his father told him (in letters that he wrote to Asimov at Asimov's request, when Asimov was much older and living in Boston): "She came from a family in which her mother counted for more than her father. Her father was a very simple man but a very honest and pious one. My grandmother, his wife, lived to a great old age, passing, I believe the hundred mark. She had 8 children, 3 girls and 5 boys, with my mother the oldest."
Nowhere, continues Asimov, "does my father tell me his mother's name. I learned it from another source. It was Anna Chaya."
__________
Bibliography
In Memory Yet Green, by Isaac Asimov
First born son of Mendel Asimov, who was the son of Abraham Ber by his first wife, who was the son of Judah Asimov, Asimov's great, great-great grandfather.
Aaron's first born child was a girl who died in infancy. His second child was a boy, who would become Asimov's father.
Judah Asimov, Isaac Asimov's father.
Judah Asimov was born around December 21, 1896. (Russia at that time used the Julian calendar rather than the Gregorian calenadar, and Jews used their own lunar calendar, anyway).
He entered Hebrew School - in Petrovichi - at the age of 5. There were ten boys in the school, and of course no girls. Judah went to school there until he was 16. After that he received advanced instruction in the Talmud from the rabbi, and that was th extent of his formal education.
In his childhood, there was a Gentile girl of about 12 or 13, who had lived in the house for about 4 years, who took care of him. (Asimov doesn't give any other details). She "spoke Yiddish like a Jew, and even learned all the prayers in perfect Hebrew so she could supervise young Judah at his homework."
Asimov reveals part of his father's character, "It would never occur to him at any time in his life to save another person's face, or to let some small error go if it were unimportant." His father was always right, even when he aws wrong. (Asimov was like this also when he was young, but grew out of it.)
In 1916, Mendel (then in his 70s, Asimov estimates) fell sick. Judah, age 19, was in Borisoglebsk on a business matter, some 450 miles away. By the time he returned to Petrovichi, his grandfather was dead.
As for Asimov's grandmother, this is what his father told him (in letters that he wrote to Asimov at Asimov's request, when Asimov was much older and living in Boston): "She came from a family in which her mother counted for more than her father. Her father was a very simple man but a very honest and pious one. My grandmother, his wife, lived to a great old age, passing, I believe the hundred mark. She had 8 children, 3 girls and 5 boys, with my mother the oldest."
Nowhere, continues Asimov, "does my father tell me his mother's name. I learned it from another source. It was Anna Chaya."
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Bibliography
In Memory Yet Green, by Isaac Asimov
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