Childhood's End
Ratings388
Average rating4
absolutely fucking fascinating but the book would not let me forget it was written by a white british man in the 1950s
Great read. Pretty short and easy, felt much more modern than the 70 years old it is. Hit on really interesting themes. It didn't explore some of them as much as it could have, but overall a thought-provoking experience that was enjoyable start to finish.
I forgot that I actually read this when I was like 16, but it came back to me when I was reading it. It must not have made much of an impression on me back then and I can see why. It's an interesting story but I was so bored of it the whole time. Good ideas, bad writing.
The strengths in Childhood's End come from its three part structure, which offers glimpses of humanity at different stages of its first contact story, as well as the overall philosophical, religious, and scientific questions that Clarke presents through his human, and alien, protagonists.
The first part of three is structurally the best, following the expected first contact plot threads while adding an air of mystery and intrigue. Although it's the shortest, it offers a genuine look into what the story is aiming to explore: what if aliens came to Earth, not to conquer it, but to usher it into an era of peace?
The next two parts do not hold up as well, however. Despite its rather dated approaches to race, especially around black Americans , including a brief section about how the n-word is just a commonplace word, much like "republican or methodist, conservative or liberal," and has lot all its taboo-ness in polite society, that offer nothing for the story other than an awkward commentary, the narrative suffers from pacing issues, leaving much less interesting characters to follow for the remainder of the story. By the time one part of the story gets interesting, it falls off in favor of moving on to a different perspective.
The ending, while interesting in concept, feels heavy-handed with large chunks of info-dumping that could have been formatted differently through normal exposition or dialogue. The ending leaves the story on a rather somber note, and while I wasn't expecting a happy ending from a story that seemed to be on a downward spiral since its second part, I do wish there was a finality to it.
Of course, it's easy to pick at a classic through a modern lens and a back catalogue of current sci-fi works that have propelled the genre in a streamlined manner. Childhood's End is a classic for a reason. Despite its shortcomings for me, the thought process that went into crafting such a narrative is still admirable, and you can feel its lasting impact in tons of sci-fi stories today.
Story : At first, this book gave me a vibe of Arrival, the movie, and I loved it! After these aliens get familiar with humans, the adventure just begun. Near the end of the book I was wondering why Clarke decided to go with this stroyline, but the final pages explained everything and it was perfect! One of my favorite elements of this book is how the Overlords try to explain our world through our history... interesting approach.
Characters : I want an Overlord... they are so kind and smart. The humans are humans and of course they want to eliminate what is unknown to them, but the aliens are much more intelligent than us. Our main characters are fine, didn't really cared what would happen to them... I liked Jan tho.
Overall : Amazing story about aliens coming on Earth, trying to save us from ourselves... it's funny how in almost every Hollywood movie, they try to destroy us because... I don't know, I can't see the logic in doing that.
At a halfway through book, I've recalled that I've already read this a long time ago, but it seems that I forgot a lot of pieces of the story.
While written quite some years back, it's depicting the reality well enough with the issues we currently face, and I guess improvement we would like to go through in our self-development. The end was sad, definitely, but in a way that you are both satisfied and happy for it. What is the end if not a new beginning?
One heck of a book. It felt a bit like a Möbius strip, where threads of plot turned in on themselves in ways I wasn't anticipating. Allegorical without being preachy. Just a really cool read.
Book takes a weird PhilDickian genre turn near the end that I hated, but makes up for it in the last few chapters. Started as decently hard sci-fi and pivoted jarringly into soft territory.
Very clearly a prime inspiration for Cixin Liu's Remembrance trilogy (modern day masterpiece, best SF series ever, fite me) and I loved seeing the parallels.
Prose is fantastic, characters interesting, and dialogue solid. Immersive and wonderful.
There is a super unfortunate N-bomb dropped in the middle in the most old white-guy way possible. It's weird.
Kurt Vonnegut once said of Arthur C. Clarke's novel Childhood's End that it is one of the few masterpieces of the science fiction genre.
The plot starts as many sci-fi stories start. A fleet of alien UFOs descend from space and park themselves over the major cities on Earth. However, there is no attack. There are no lasers fired, nor any swathes of destruction. The aliens, it seems, are benevolent. They are here to help guide humanity through this stage of potential peril. Remember, Childhood's End was written in 1953, during the height of nuclear tension.
Nobody ever sees the aliens, however, except for one individual. Their plans are kept equally secret, but slowly and with deliberate guidance they build the trust of humankind. By the time they are physically revealed, around the halfway point of the book, it becomes apparent why they were so secretive. They are the very image of the devil - red skin, horns, a pointed tail, and leathery wings. However, since they had shown their goodwill through the years, little was made of their “coincidental” resemblance to an ancient symbol of evil.
The narrative was initially a bit difficult to follow, as it moved around through time, following a different cast of characters at each step (only occasionally revisiting previously introduced characters). The humans are drawn quite flat, but they serve mostly as two dimensional vehicles to tell the larger story... one that culminates in a series of heady revelations.
I particularly like the racial memory (or racial premonition) ideas and the ideas of collective consciousness, and how this might relate to our civilization's coping of life with the Internet - something Clarke certainly could not have imagined in the early 1950's. I enjoyed how he plays with time, whether it's through the narrative that spans about 150 years, or when he describes the effects of near light speed travel and time dilation. Every aspect of this novel is crafted masterfully, so it's easy to understand why many consider it a landmark of its genre... and why it may be one book I return to again in the future.
A fascinatingly speculative view of first contact from the perspective of the 1950's. It would be very easy to poke holes in the narrative, but that is not really fair given when it was written. As ever with works of this era, the things they fail to predict are often more interesting than the things they do predict (in the 21st century computers are still huge and “thousands of meters of film” are still required for recording). Having said that, also as ever, Clarke is startlingly spot on with other predictions (particularly related to entertainment media and its consumption).
As a feat of imagination it is impressive, although the denoument may raise a few eyebrows. In fact, what saved the book for me in the end was, in my edition at least, a fascinating addendum from the author explaining his thinking and how it had changed in the intervening years.
I am tempted to give this 5 stars, however I am not sure I would want to read this a second time (my usual criteria for 5 stars). A very good 4 star novel.
Quizá tenia demasiadas expectativas.
Me ha parecido relativamente aburrido y el tema bastante manoseado.
Claro que no es culpa del autor, posiblemente cuando salió este libro rompió moldes y a mucha gente le exploto la mente con estos conceptos, pero 50 años después se han explorado tanto que no tiene el impacto.
Mientras que la lectura de SF clásica siempre tiene un sabor un tanto arcaico.
No es un mal libro pero vamos que si no te lo lees no pasa nada.
This book has everything that makes me love old sci-fi: A positivist view of humanity, open to the possibility of the truly strange, and progressive social and philosophical ideals underlying the story.
The basic premise is that alien overlords come down to Earth and presume to rule humanity. It turns out that they're much better at running the world than humans and that their motives seem to be altruistic. However, they are very secretive and refuse to reveal why they are so interested in helping humans.
This book is timeless, but it's also a beautiful reflection of popular ideas from the 50s and 60s, when interests in aliens, psychics and the paranormal really became popular. In Clarke's style, the characters are secondary and the plot doesn't follow a standard build-up, but there are so many brilliant concepts squished into this story that build-up really isn't necessary.
This book is very unique compared to modern stories. I recommend this to anyone who is looking to read something “different”.
Executive Summary: Like most classic sci-fi, it's more about ideas than plot/characters. I'm glad I listened to it, but it won't be joining my favorites.Audiobook: Eric Michael Summerer was an alright narrator, nothing special. The audio is a fine option if you're inclined that way, but certainly not a must listen. I mainly got this in audio because it was a daily deal on Audible. Your credits could probably be better spent elsewhere.Full ReviewThis is another one of those books I've owned for awhile that I finally got around to in preparation for the TV adaption coming out later this month.I've never really been a fan of classic Sci-Fi books, so if you are, I'm probably not a good gauge for you. I've read Mr. Clarke in high school ([b:2001: A Space Odyssey 70535 2001 A Space Odyssey (Space Odyssey, #1) Arthur C. Clarke https://d.gr-assets.com/books/1432468943s/70535.jpg 208362] & [b:2010: Odyssey Two 70539 2010 Odyssey Two (Space Odyssey, #2) Arthur C. Clarke https://d.gr-assets.com/books/1388271989s/70539.jpg 615175]) and enjoyed the first one at least.Like many older sci-fi classics, I can appreciate the ideas of the book, but find myself generally bored by the narrative. I never really connected with any of the characters. I tend to prefer character-driven stories, something that I've rarely found in older works.The writing itself is good. I suspect most fans of classic Sci-Fi will enjoy this one more than I did. For me though, I'd probably recommend 2001 over this if you want to read a book by Mr. Clarke.If nothing else, this was a short listen, and I'm glad I finally did. It has me excited to watch the mini-series. I tend to enjoy Sci-Fi a lot more in TV/Movies than I do in books anyways.
LOVED this. It entirely made up for the “top 100 scifi” books that I didn't enjoy. :)
The book is divided in 3 parts I think. The first one showed some promise, I could take the slow build up of the events into the revelation of what does the Overlords really look like and what are their motives. The story was interesting by itself, with a somewhat well defined main character.
Learning about the special powers this alien race, wondering why they wanted peace on Earth and how people resented being forced into having peace was fun.
The second part started off really well. It takes place many years latter, and there are a new cast of characters. There is no main character but that still could be have been fine. The Overlords have revealed themselves and it was time they make their plan known.
It seemed to start building up a dystopian future where there is no war, crime, diseases, anger, envy or anything bad, but mankind have lost its artistic creativity and the desire to explore space or to advance science in any way.
The Overlords have provided them with anything they needed. Any conflicts people had could be resolved by this special television that could see into any time and place in human history. So all of the religions were extinguished when they could actually see the truth of how they got started. Murderers were discouraged to commit crimes because they would certainly be caught.
But this was described in one page and nothing else happened. Although this is a small book, there is too little of a plot. It is mostly filled with mundane events, like talking trivialities at a party.
I stopped listening by the start of part 3, when things should be getting more interesting, but they just didn't.
This was written in 1953, but feels like it could have been written this year – which shows how timeless Clarkes style of science fiction is. The story is familiar if you've watched the movie Independence Day. But what happens if the aliens seem inteligent and malevolent? How long does it take for humans to accept aliens? This relatively short novel was beat out for Retro Hugo Award by Fahrenheit 451.
This was written in 1953, but feels like it could have been written this year – which shows how timeless Clarkes style of science fiction is. The story is familiar if you've watched the movie Independence Day. But what happens if the aliens seem inteligent and malevolent? How long does it take for humans to accept aliens? This relatively short novel was beat out for Retro Hugo Award by Fahrenheit 451.
It's probably sacrilege in some circles to say, but I find Arthur C. Clarke soooo unimaginative. Oh, how I do. Or I did, at least, reading this.
Presented as part of the excellent, British S.F. Masterworks series, the introduction to this book celebrates this as Clarke's best novel. It then goes on to make big promises about how it's not only the bestest Clarke novel ever, it's actually the most mind-blowing SF we mere mortals could ever hope to read. Yea, it is TRANSCENDENTALLY SUBLIME. Big words, intro man! After actually reading it, I can report not being sublimated into a higher state of aesthetic rapture. It was a page-turner, sure; the writing is super clear, it goes down a treat. But I also found it simple-minded, predictable, and really, really unimaginative - i.e. locked into a very narrow, ethnocentric, old timey perspective of the world (let alone the universe!).
In the near future, giant space ships arrive and hover over all the major US cities... or, rather, all the cities Clarke would have considered ‘major' (New York, London, Rome, Paris). The aliens are quickly dubbed ‘Overlords' (heh) and they seem to be wise, powerful, benevolent dictators. At least, they love the UN and the EU, and they want to restructure everything into a super-awesome World Government, and they talk a lot about purging humanity of its old-fashioned superstitions. These superstitions do not, however, include something as simple as women's lib - every female in this story (of which there are 3) is either (1) an infant, or (2) a wife. A wife, I should specify, who does nothing but WIFING (i.e. listening to Husband tell of the day, cooking, entertaining guests, looking sexy, and tending to the baby).
Thanks, Arthur.
The ostensible point - the AWE-INDUCING SUBLIMITY - of this book is meant to be unraveling the mysterious Overlordly mystery. If you're familiar with Clarke's other work though (e.g. 2001), it's not such a big mystery.
And pleeeeease don't call this hard sci-fi. This is not hard sci-fi. This is mansplaining for 300 pages; by which I mean, extended sections full of straightforward exposition (“Then history happened. This meant X. Also, people thought about Y. This was important because of Z.”), interrupted by shorter passages where a (male) character ponders the marvels of it all (again, via telling - ‘He pondered marvels.'' - rather than showing - ‘He gasped, his heart rate bounced.'). I define hard sci-fi as being sci-fi that uses existing or hypothetical science to do something which, at the moment, we can't do, but is really cool. Good hard sci-fi then uses this scientific future to examine something philosophical, and fundamental to humanity's perceptions of whatever (itself, the universe, etc). Examples include: Rudy Rucker's Postsingular (nanotech, wifi, fun), Kim Stanley Robinson's Red Mars (way too much NASA funding), or Cory Doctorow's Down and Out in the Magic Kingdom (post-scarcity economics in a replicator-happy world). Or anything from The Next Generation, really.
I don't call any fiction written by a trained scientist (as Clarke was) ‘hard'. There ain't no science in here. It's all just hand-waving, and sleek designs, and wonder-and-awe, and wives worrying about their (transcendentally?) intelligent children. It's not forward-looking, not by any definition I'd use, and it feels very much a product of its time (and its place, and its gender, and its upbringing).
I can't say I'm surprised. The Golden Age of sci-fi is mostly a good ol' boy's club, where women aren't really allowed (except as objects - cf. Bester) and everything is patterned on a very Euro-centric, post-WW2 worldview. Some of this stuff has a wonderful central idea that is unfortunately ruined by this narrowness (e.g. James Blish's Cities in Flight - awesome idea, but, seriously, Pittsburgh in space!?). That's also why I tend not to read anything before the 1970s New Wave period - and also prefer that period, since writers from then (Le Guin, Pohl) were actively influenced by the existing sociopolitical movements of the 60s and 70s, and so it's a lot more intentionally diverse, and open-minded, and quirky.
Clarke, though... Clarke's writing, his plotting, his ‘big ideas' (at least in this) just made me feel like I was being lectured to by a stodgy old British professor, who can't fathom things beyond his very specific life. Yes, it's a page-turner. I read it almost straight through. But no, I wouldn't recommend it.
It was an ok story. I enjoyed it for the most part, but in the end it just ended up being depressing. Most of the reviews and descriptions of this book talk about humans moving on to their next stage of evolution, but I think that is an inaccurate characterization of the end. Man isn't evolving naturally, it is being re-forged into a tool by the Overmind, and what was left behind was left to go extinct. This didn't seem to me to be any more the natural course of events for Humans any more than it is for the gardener to trim a shrub into the shape of a dolphin.I also got very tired, by the end of the book, of all these characters repeating, that if it wasn't for the Overlords that we would have blown ourselves up with nukes long ago. It just disturbed me how it portrayed the virtually whole of humanity drinking the Kool-Aid of the Overlords within less than a generation.Part of my negative attitude for this may stem from the audio book introduction about how this is one of Clarke's greatest stories and shows how Humans get past being on the brink of self-destruction on earth and move on to a new beginning.