Here’s something I didn’t know: CS Lewis and Arthur C. Clarke conducted a friendly correspondence/debate about the moral significance of space travel. Clarke apparently first wrote to Lewis in 1943 to object to Lewis’ characterization of space-travel scientists in the Silent Planet series. Lewis responded, and the two exchanged brief letters on the subject over the years, with Lewis maintaining that space travel would be a catastrophe and Clarke arguing the opposite. From Narnia to a Space Odyssey compiles this correspondence.
Judging by the Kuro5hin review linked above, and looking at reader reviews on the book’s Amazon page, it sounds as though the Lewis/Clarke correspondence is too skimpy to make for a satisfying exploration of the space-travel topic. Nevertheless, it’s fun to see a side of Lewis that is sometimes overlooked in favor of his more famous Narnia and theological books.
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August 27, 2007 at 18:36
I read the space trilogy way back in college. I haven’t read all the Lewis “classics,” but when I learned he did a sci-fi series, I jumped at the opportunity.
I remember the books as a fascinating (if at times difficult) read, but I admit being unaware of the debate which ensued with Clarke.
We have already experienced how many wonderful advances in human achievement have been accompanied by unfortunate (but perhaps not unpredictale) side effects caused by our sin nature.
I think that message (and the message of redemption) came through loud and clear in the space triology.
While many are enjoyable, sci-fi works by humanistic authors have a different message…
August 27, 2007 at 22:35
I was not aware of a sci-fi series by Lewis and will have to add them to my must read list. I also will sit down and read the correspondence as well.
August 28, 2007 at 03:18
We should ALL, right now, send an email to whoever directed “The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe” and tell them that next they have to do the space trilogy, whether they like it or not, or find somebody else who will. And then we have to contact our congressmen and tell them to make a law to this effect. If Hollywood really does want Christians to come and see their films, let them prove it by making one out of this series. I’m not the big sci-fi fanatic that some people are, but the Space Trilogy has to rank right up there with the greats of the genre.
August 28, 2007 at 14:12
As a fan of Clarke, Asimov, Heinlein, Simak, I suspect that Lewis is correct, in spite of Clarke’s undoubted good intentions. Of course the same could be said of European interest in America, and we are no more likely to find other planets inhabited by benign vegetarian philosophers than the Americas were.
More important, I suspect that there is a reason the distances of space are so vast. I don’t think we are likely to ever cross them. The speed of light is a very ominous barrier (remember the whole universe began with the command “Let there be light”? It is fundamental to the entire creation.) All science fiction concerning space travel, some of which is very good for examining human character, relies on some semi-magical deus ex machina or machina ex deus to carry us the distances required at the speeds required, or to circumvent the 3D/4D universe. Nice reading, but probably impossible—most likely by design.
August 29, 2007 at 19:09
Funny thing about space travel, what do we have to show for it? I believe we all would be better served if we actually knew a little bit about THIS planet before we go gallivanting through the galaxy allowing God’s creation to just confound scientists even more. Don’t get me wrong, I have an explorer’s spirit as much as any man but we have plenty to keep us occupied far past our generation right here on planet Earth. So, I would probably side with Lewis on this one. Too much manpower, resources, money and intellectual focus has been aimed at the stars with only a little data, a few pictures and a lot of back slapping to show for it. The PBS series called “Blue Planet” is one of the most telling sagas of how mis-guided our attention has become. The main scientist in the show states that each time they go into “deep” water or to the ocean floor, they come back with dozens of new species of ocean life and have even found new ecosystems at the bottom of the sea. This comes at the whopping exploration of about 1% of the ocean floor! So, if we don’t really know or understand much about our own planet, how are we to really understand what we find on other planets? And what’s the point? By the way, I highly recommend the “Blue Planet” series.
August 30, 2007 at 17:17
JayBee,
I do not believe that a modern film could do justice to the space trilogy. The first one, “Out of the Silent Planet,” would be alright; “Perelandra” would be to very difficult to rate(since most of it is a dialogue between two naked men and one naked woman), and “That Hideous Strength” even the most die-hard C.S. Lewis fans find difficult to read. It combines the apocolypse with the legend of King Arthur, and, althogh it has some good metaphors, it would be difficult to direct without a narrator since much of it takes place in a many peoples’ minds.