Clarke, Arthur C

Clarke, Arthur C.

British Science Fiction Writer 1917-

Born at Minehead, Somerset, United Kingdom, on December 17, 1917, Arthur C. Clarke was fascinated by science fiction and astronomy at an early age. In the 1930s he joined the British Interplanetary Society. After enlisting in the Royal Air Force in 1941, he became a radar instructor and participated in the development of ground-controlled landings of aircraft under zero-visibility conditions.

In 1945 the technical journal Wireless World published Clarke's article "Extra-Terrestrial Relays," which proposed the use of three broadcast satellites in equatorial orbit to provide worldwide communication. Clarke chose an orbital altitude of 35,786 kilometers (22,300 miles) because at that distance the angular velocity of Earth's rotation would match that of the satellite. As a result, the satellite would remained fixed in the sky. Twenty years later, Early Bird was launched, the first of the commercial satellites that provide global communications networks for telephone, television, and high-speed digital communication, including the Internet.

After World War II, Clarke obtained a bachelor of science degree in physics and mathematics at King's College, London. In 1954 he became enchanted by underwater scuba diving, which simulated weightlessness in spaceflight. In 1969 Clarke moved to Sri Lanka.

Clarke has written eighty books on science and technology, along with their sociological consequences.^* He collaborated with the director Stanley Kubrick on the film 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968), which was based on his short story "The Sentinel." Clarke has received many honors and awards, including knighthood, the Franklin Institute Gold Medal, the UNESCO-Kalinga Prize, honorary fellow memberships and awards from major scientific and astronautical organizations, and a nomination for the Nobel Peace Prize in 1994.

Among Clarke's works are the following books:

Nonfiction

• Ascent to Orbit, a Scientific Autobiography: The Technical Writings of Arthur C. Clarke. New York: John Wiley & Sons, 1984.
• Astounding Days: A Science Fictional Autobiography. New York: Bantam, 1989.
• The Exploration of Space. New York: Harper, 1951.
• Greetings, Carbon-Based Bipeds!: Collected Essays, 1934-1998. New York: St. Martin's Press, 1999.
• How the World Was One: Beyond the Global Village. New York: Bantam, 1992.
• The Making of a Moon: The Story of the Earth Satellite Program. New York: Harper, 1957.
• Profiles of the Future: An Inquiry into the Limits of the Possible. New York: Harper, 1962.
• The Promise of Space. New York: Harper, 1968.
• Voices from the Sky: Previews of the Coming Space Age. New York:Harper, 1965.

Fiction

• Childhood's End. New York: Ballantine, 1953.
• The Fountains of Paradise. New York: Harcourt, 1979.
• The Hammer of God. New York: Bantam, 1993.
• Islands in the Sky. Philadelphia: Winston, 1952.
• Rendezvous with Rama. New York: Harcourt, 1973.
• The Sands of Mars. London: Sidgwick & Jackson, 1951.
• 2001: A Space Odyssey. New York: New American Library, 1968.
• 2010: Odyssey Two. New York: Ballantine, 1982.
• 2061: Odyssey Three. New York: Ballantine, 1988.
• 3001: Final Odyssey. New York: Ballantine, 1997.

see also Careers in Writing, Photography, and Filmmaking (volume 1); Communications Satellite Industry (volume 1); Entertainment (volume 1); Science Fiction (volume 4).

Frederick C. Durant III

Bibliography

Clute, John, and Peter Nicholls, eds. Encyclopedia of Science Fiction. New York: St.Martin's Press, 1995.

McAleer, Neil. Arthur C. Clarke: The Authorized Biography. Chicago: Contemporary Books, 1992.

^*Clarke once said that his chief aim was an old science fiction cliché: "The search for wonder."