Arthur C. Clarke
1979
Awards: Nebula, Hugo
Rating: ★ ★ ★ – –
This novel is not one of Clarke’s best, but I enjoyed it anyway.
The
book follows several intertwining, somewhat-related plot lines which
seem a little bit artificially mashed together. As usual with Clarke,
though, the science in it is realistic and impeccable. And the last half
of the book, which focuses almost completely on only one of the plots,
is pretty exciting.
The
main story takes place in 2069. Humans have established colonies on the
moon and several other planets in our solar system. Vannevar Morgan, an
engineer who has become world-famous for building a bridge across the
Straights of Gibraltar, now wants to build a space elevator.
This would essentially be an incredibly tall tower extending from a
point on Earth’s equator all the way up through the ionosphere to a
space station in geosynchronous orbit. Goods could be brought up and
down the elevator using relatively cheap electricity, and ships could
shuttle those goods between the space station and other planets without
having to waste energy getting in and out of Earth’s atmosphere.
Morgan
needs to build the earth-bound terminal station of the elevator (a) in
the area of greatest gravitational stability and (b) at an elevation
high enough to avoid hurricanes. The best place is one particular
mountain on the fictional island of Taprobane (which Clarke has modeled
after Sri Lanka) in the Indian Ocean. Unfortunately, the location is
already occupied by a 2,000-year-old Buddhist monastery and the monks
are reluctant to leave, to say the least.
Interwoven with this
modern story is the story of the corrupt and ruthless king Kalidasa who
ruled Taprobane 2,000 years ago. He built an enormous pleasure palace,
including elaborate fountains kept filled by water-carrying slaves, next
to the same Buddhist monastery, and his disruptive presence and
decadent lifestyle led to similar quarrels with the monks.
Another
parallel story is that of Starglider, an interstellar probe built by
aliens on a planet 52 light years away, which passes through our solar
system in the early 21st century. Starglider is definitive proof that we
are not alone and forever changes our understanding of our place in the
universe.
Debates about God and religion come up throughout the
book. There is constant tension between those who feel that you should
not challenge the gods (usually represented by the monks) and those who
appear to challenge them (represented primarily by Morgan, Kalidasa, and
Starglider).
The God debate holds promise and the separate plots
are interesting in themselves. The space elevator is particularly
tantalizing because it could, in fact, be built today, if we put our
minds to it (see Kim Stanley Robinson’s exploration of the idea in his Mars trilogy).
Unfortunately, together, the different story lines make for a little
bit of a disconcerting jumble. And the messages Clarke seems to want to
send us about challenging God (if, in fact, that is what we are doing)
are muddled; there are sympathetic and unsympathetic characters on both
sides.
I did, of course, appreciate Clarke’s reference to R. Gabor’s Pharmacological Basis of Religion, published in 2069 by Miskatonic University Press.
One
technical note: If you’re getting this book used or from the library,
avoid the 1979 hardcover edition as it has a few erroneously transposed
paragraphs in key places towards the end.
This review originally appeared on Cheeze Blog.
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