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nickdablin 's review for:
2001: A Space Odyssey
by Arthur C. Clarke
2001 is of course a hugely influencial piece of classic science fiction, but how does it hold up when read in 2021? As "hard" sci-fi, the book is breathlessly concerned with the plausibility of its space-faring technology, and there are ideas here that have since seen countless uses across newer science fiction and even science fact. Where the predictive attempt falls apart is in the softer details - reading today, bizarre anachronisms such as "typewriters and girl secretaries" in a futuristic moonbase stick out like a sore thumb. On an even deeper level, the author's wide-eyed optimism about the starbound future of the human race seems, at best, charmingly naïve. All of this serves to make the earlier sections of the book more of a historical curio than an interesting story.
However, this changes when we are introduced to the crew of the Discovery, on its way to Saturn, and the real story begins. Everything prior to this reads like hard science setup which may have wowed in the sixties but seems quaint and tiresomely smug today. Once we get to the Discovery however, compelling character interactions quickly override any lingering struggles we may be having with the cultural and technological anachronisms. These chapters are by far the strongest of the book, and it's a shame that the whole thing feels rather disjointed, episodic in its plotting with only these middle episodes really hitting that page-turning thrill.
The final chapters, while making considerably more sense than the bizarre light show of the film, still feel like someone trying to describe a dream, with both the imagination and tedium that that analogy invokes, and the "unknowable mysteries of the universe" concept doesn't quite hold together.
Altogether it feels like a hodgepodge of ideas thrown enthusiastically into a book and just barely tied together. Some of these ideas are laughable. Some are dated and dull. Some have been copied by latter works so thoroughly that it's impossible to fully comprehend the impact that they may have had when the ideas were fresh.
And yet... some of the ideas are still wholly fascinating and captivating, meaning that despite some of my negative sentiments, I have still come away from the book with a sense of having enjoyed this madcap journey through space and time.
However, this changes when we are introduced to the crew of the Discovery, on its way to Saturn, and the real story begins. Everything prior to this reads like hard science setup which may have wowed in the sixties but seems quaint and tiresomely smug today. Once we get to the Discovery however, compelling character interactions quickly override any lingering struggles we may be having with the cultural and technological anachronisms. These chapters are by far the strongest of the book, and it's a shame that the whole thing feels rather disjointed, episodic in its plotting with only these middle episodes really hitting that page-turning thrill.
The final chapters, while making considerably more sense than the bizarre light show of the film, still feel like someone trying to describe a dream, with both the imagination and tedium that that analogy invokes, and the "unknowable mysteries of the universe" concept doesn't quite hold together.
Altogether it feels like a hodgepodge of ideas thrown enthusiastically into a book and just barely tied together. Some of these ideas are laughable. Some are dated and dull. Some have been copied by latter works so thoroughly that it's impossible to fully comprehend the impact that they may have had when the ideas were fresh.
And yet... some of the ideas are still wholly fascinating and captivating, meaning that despite some of my negative sentiments, I have still come away from the book with a sense of having enjoyed this madcap journey through space and time.