2001: A Space Odyssey

"2001" the movie was a tour de force. Over thirty years after its release, HAL's "eye", HAL's voice, and the monolith are instantly recognizable, even to those who were not born when the movie was first released. Despite this instant recognition, how many people do you know truly understood the movie, especially the end?If you want a deeper understanding of the story, if you want to know why HAL did what he did, if you just want to know what that ending was about, or if you want to showoff for your friends by "knowing" what all that weird stuff was about, then I recommend you read this book. Even if you have read it before, I would encourage you to read the book again this year, because it is the year 2001."2001" is actually three relatively independent stories tied together by the mystery of the monoliths. The story begins several million years ago at the dawn of mankind. Actually, we are still little more than apes, and our ancestors are on the verge of extinction. The story follows one ape-man named Moon-Watcher and his interactions with an alien artifact. The story then jumps forward to modern times (which was roughly 35 years into the future when Clarke wrote the story), and we follow the story of Dr. Heywood Floyd and the discovery of an ancient alien artifact buried on the moon. Finally, we move a little further into time as Dave Bowman, Frank Pool, and their AI system named HAL voyage to Saturn (Jupiter in the movie).I both enjoyed and was saddened by Clarke's vision for our present day. In only a dozen years we went from the very first satellite (Sputnik) to putting men on the Moon. Now, over thirty years after that first moon landing, mankind cannot even escape low earth orbit. So, while Clarke's vision of our future three decades out missed the mark , I would argue the failure was ours and not his. Nevertheless, I found reading a vision of our present day that was written over thirty years ago exciting.The book, like the movie, is not exactly fast paced. It focuses heavily on the "science" in "science fiction," and the characters are never developed very much, and for these reasons I did not give it a full five stars. However, I still strongly recommend you read the book. It is, after all, 2001.

I promised myself that I would read this book before the end of 2001, and I did. I enjoy reading books set at specific dates in the future to see how much the author got right. The worst I can say about Clarke's vision of 2001 is that he failed to foresee the downfall of the USSR (even the CIA was unable to do that). OK, so he sees us as having regular flights to the Moon and a colony on the Moon. We have the technology to do so today--we just do not have the collective political will. Many of his predictions, however, feel right, even if they are not dead on. He has some great ideas for how to overcome the challenges of space, especially the lack of gravity (great when you realize that we had not yet flown a man to the moon when the book was first published). For instance, he describes a space toilet that spins to create an artificial gravity using centrifugal force so that you can get your business to fall in the right place (makes me wonder what the Shuttle astronauts do now).Aside from all the predicting-the-future stuff, it is a great story, some premium science-fiction. I was completely swept up by the idea that some extra-terrestrial life monkeyed (so to speak) with our species millions of years ago to start us down the road to intelligent life--and then set up a signaling device to let them know when we had arrived (the monolith on the Moon, for those of you who remember the movie). Clarke also does an excellent job of describing what it must be like to travel within our own solar system for the first time--the feeling of leaving our sun, our life-giver behind. And speaking of the movie, the book explains a lot that you do not quite get in the movie, so that is a bonus. It also raises some other questions not presented in the movie at all. While each stands alone as its own piece of work, the book and the movie really should be considered companion works.I removed a star from my rating because this book never reaches the depth and complexity of truely great science fiction. It just scratches the surface of a deeper story that you know is there. I assume that the sequels explore these themes more completely. Further, while the conflict between David Bowman and HAL is what most people remember from the movie, it actually plays a smaller role in the book, to the point where I did not get the sense of menace from HAL that I remember feeling from the movie. I actually felt sorry for HAL.Overall, though, a great book, and this edition has an entertaining memoir of Stanley Kubrick, his partner in making the film.

One of the best sci-fi series ever written.

Sir Arthur C. Clarke will definitely be missed. I actually read the Novel much later than when I watched the movie adaptation. After reading it, I was able to understand what the movie was trying to convey.

Perhaps the greatest of all sci-fi writers, this is one of Clark's greatest works. A wonderful look at what happens when we trust AI more than we trust people, and more besides that. True science fiction!

This still holds up as a thinking person's story. And how well it blends with the movie is magic.

If only the movie had been this clear and understandable… we wouldn’t have been so confused, frustrated, and angry for all this time!

I'm not a fan of the "aliens make ape-men evolve into humans" idea. Sounds too much like Ancient Aliens, though I understand this book was written long before the farcical History Channel TV show. Despite that, I do really like the way the aliens are presented in this book. They aren't guides, they're curious scientists conducting very long-running experiments.The characters (especially HAL) are good, the plot is interesting, and the pacing is fantastic. This book is an absolute page turner.Arthur C. Clarke is in good form here. Sometimes his writing is pretty dry, but in this book the writing is exceptional. Just pretend it takes place in an alternate universe where humans didn't stop developing manned spaceflight tech in the 1970's.

It's really tough to top the mystical aura of the 2001 movie. A lot of unexplained scenes really add to the strange atmosphere. Clarke answers questions I never particularly cared to receive an answer for in this novelization of the film. But happily, those answers do nothing to mar the film's reputation, and the additional clarity and coherence is a nice touch. I particularly enjoyed the slight fleshing out of the Moonwatcher and Heywood Floyd characters and the smattering of legitimate scientific facts sprinkled throughout the text, including an interesting one about the academic history behind the composition of Saturn's rings.Even so, this quality work doesn't end up in my list of top favorite books ever, and I feel like some of the writing after Bowman passes through the star gate goes on a bit long. Although the actual approach to the star gate is a beautiful work of the imagination and far superior to the comparable scene in the movie.The movie in my opinion is definitely a must-see, but I wouldn't say the novel is a must-read. However, it is a nice companion piece that I believe very few who attempt it will regret.

The narrative refers to several historical researchers by name. It is compelling to know that Arthur C. Clarke was their contemporary and likely was acquainted with them. This book diverges from some specific plot points we know to be in the movie. This is remarked upon in the introduction. This is notable because the script and the book were written concurrently.I found it amusing that the narrator has a speaking style that, like the movie and the book are from some remove chronologically.As usual, the book has much more detail than the movie.A contemporary book and film, The Andromeda Strain is perhaps THE only movie interpretation that is practically a match, word for word.Not just for fans or students — 2001 ASO Is something we should all experience.

I feel wholly inadequate to judge a book as classic as this. I can only describe my personal experience.I don't care about descriptions of sceneries. Perhaps I have gotten too used to the modern- day space visualizations that descriptions of Jupiter, no matter how masterfully done, will not blow my mind. (I just found out that this book was initially a screenplay, which makes sense.) I wish there were more plots and ideas than pretty much just the one -- astronauts out to find the "Gods" who bred us. For this reason, I find the writing and plot dry at times. I quite enjoyed chapter 1 and the mutiny chapter. During others I find myself bored, thinking, just make something happen already.This book no doubt blew minds when it was published in the 60s. But now it's an interesting literary artifact rather than an enthralling scifi -- akin to an old car that looks cool but you won't rely on it for a roadtrip. Overall I enjoyed it. But, I will think twice before reading 50-year-old scifi again.

That was pretty damn good.There's plenty of good things to say about this book, but one of the best ones I feel is Clarke's ability to convey the sheer (nearly) unimaginable magnitude of space and time. Reading this novel, it was as if I could feel the breathtaking, monumental things that were happening and being seen.The descriptions were heavy and thorough, just the way I like it, and I was kept guessing the entire way. Although I knew what has going to happen with Hal, that was the only thing I saw coming and only then because the book purposefully foreshadowed it.Really good read. The ending dragged on a bit, and I found myself saying "Come on, come on..." but I expected that. For such a colossal subject, I actually find it appropriate that the ending was equally colossal. I was expecting a cliffhanger, or something inexplicably insignificant, but Clark ended it well.Good read all the way through. Character development took a backseat to scenery descriptions, but I'm alright with that in this case. The focus of this book was on the science and space travel, and it did it beautifully. No doubts in my mind why this is a classic. I should have read this one long ago.

I am very pleased to find the book is the 50th anniversary edition, beautiful cover design and in excellent condition for a paperback.The novel is very well written. Clarke's prose gives you a pleasant feeling of simple elegance. It flows from the ape-man to the last page when the Star Child suddenly arrives above the planet Earth. Though it is not highly dramatic but it has the potentiality of intense sensations upon the reader. Who would have imagined that a super computer is capable of murder? That is eye-opening for me to find out the internal logic.The scant activity for the scientists in the second part of the story is about Frank going out to fix an extra-vehicular part that has gone wrong, which turns out to be operational. It is most chilling because there are only two people in the spaceship. The extra-vehicular maintenance will have become an over-used part of sci-fi movies.Other than the detailed description of other-worldly objects in the story, the philosophical discussion is laudable. The omnipotent narrator is trying to give a summary of what lies behind the word "god" by presenting what Bowman sees in deep space. It is almost ironic for me to find out when he sleeps in his own mortal death, a super-power baby is born and he detonates a cargo of inflammable objects. The ending is written with such perfect artistic detachment.

After remembering the movie, which I watched when I was very young, and did not understand at all, and having a very boring summer, I decided to order this book to revisit a story that I oftentimes remembered, but did not ever understand. However, I got the book, and never got around to reading it until the end of July, where I read in small increments, and finished in October.Being something I often remembered, reading this story reconnected me to many things I “subconsciously” stored from when I watched the movie, such as the transformation of one of the main characters, David Bowman, into the Starchild, which was a transformation, as well as name, I remembered for a while, but not quite sure where it came from. However, after finally finishing the book, I would say this book definitely improved upon my childhood’s loose interpretation of the story, and surpassed my expectations in just about every way. Going back to the transformation of Bowman into the Starchild, a good example of this book’s excellence, Bowman, who has been one of the main characters throughout the story, ends the story with one last act of characterization that ties his whole character together, becoming the Starchild, which is a very good end to his story after finally defeating the evergrowingly sentient AI that has control over his ship, as well as receiving the true purpose of the mission that was given to him shortly before his transformation. All in all, I would recommend this book to anybody, of any age group, so long as character deaths, and possibly even seriously deep thought of our universe, is okay, that is looking for a piece to read that is truly enjoyable, and promotes thinking, as well as people, like myself, who enjoy science fiction and space exploration.

I saw the movie, 2001: A Space Odyssey, in 1968 when I was 12 years old. It was as incomprehensible to me as a child, as it was to most adults then. Even so, it was soon considered a classic science fiction film and I have spent most of life not really understanding why. I had heard that the book was much better, but I never got around to reading it until recently. It is, indeed, much better and I think there are several reasons why.For one thing, the novel was written by Arthur C. Clarke, one of the best SF writers ever. But even so, this novel was written under special circumstances because the story was meant to be a movie from the start--a collaboration between Mr. Clarke and film producer Stanley Kubrick. That collaboration is described by Mr. Clarke in his Foreword to the edition of the novel that I read. He says Mr. Kubrick suggested they start with a novel from which they would derive the screenplay because "...a screenplay has to specify everything in excruciating detail, [and] it is almost as tedious to read as to write."This is more or less the way it worked out, though toward the end novel and screenplay were being written simultaneously, with feedback in both directions.That dynamic shows in the book. Though the narrative is engaging, owing to Mr. Clarke's skills, there are sections that seem to be explanatory for the sake of the film. Some of these take the point-of-view of the aliens in general--not of a particular alien character (e.g., chapter 37: "Experiment"). At one point, the narrative even takes the POV of the big monolith Bowman finds on Japetus. And then there are sections that are descriptions of various views in space of suns and moons and planets. They are well-done and intellectually informed, but with only a scant connection to the plot or a character. All these sections seem to be for informing the film producers and for the sake of writing the screenplay. They are informative for the novel reader because they fill in the holes left by the film's ambiguous images, but they lessen the novel's storytelling. They don't lessen it by much, though, mostly because Mr. Clarke was the author.So the book answers the questions raised by the movie. For instance, it makes clear that the monoliths were tools used by ancient and god-like aliens to influence the evolution of other life-forms. Used on our non-human ancestors of three million years past, it exerted only a small nudge to launch them on the path to the tool-making that promoted the explosion of their intelligence. Understanding that, makes sense of the film's initial scenes of the ape-men and that image of the tossed bone morphing into the space shuttle.We also better understand why the mission to Jupiter (actually, Saturn in the book) was undertaken. I don't recall whether the movie made it clear that the monolith found on Earth's moon sent a high-powered electromagnetic signal to Jupiter (in the book, it went to Saturn's moon, Japetus) and so prompted the human journey there. It is clear in the book. And the book does contain the sudden shift in narrative from the monolith's signal blasting out into space, to the spaceship, Discovery, as it passes through the asteroid belt. In the book as in the movie, this struck me as too sudden a shift, leaving out a needed bridge. It drops, too suddenly, the POV of Heywood Floyd, whom we had been following since the three million year scene-shift from the group of ape-men. It just doesn't feel right.Actually, the book did offer a bit of a bridge with chapter Fourteen. There, we see, from the POV of several deep space probes, the flight of the monolith's signal across the solar system. Even a human at the Goddard Space Center is noted, though unnamed, as picking up the signal from the various probes. Then Mr. Clarke sums up the technical observation and dramatic turning point with some smooth, descriptive prose:...it was as clear and unmistakable as a vapor trail across a cloudless sky, or a single line of footprints over a field of virgin snow. Some immaterial pattern of energy, throwing off a spray of radiation like the wake of a racing speedboat, had leaped from the face of the Moon, and was heading out toward the stars.The part about the "mutiny" of the HAL 9000 computer in the book is pretty much in sync with what was presented in the movie. The book didn't contain the "lip reading" scene, though, which I thought was a nice touch by Mr. Kubrick. And then HAL's murder of the hibernating crew and attempted murder of Bowman are handled a bit differently, but retains Bowman's surviving for a few minutes in a vacuum without his helmet, and his "lobotomy" of HAL.The last part of the story, though, is where the book is way easier to follow than the film. This concerns Bowman's investigation of the big monolith he found on the Saturn moon of Japetus and his subsequent capture by it, transport across the galaxy (the monolith is a "star gate"), and finally his transformation into the "Star-Chil...

The Kindle version of this book was cleanly formatted without any noticeable typos, making this a pleasant reading experience in portrait mode. I did notice there were some issues with not allowing for columns for reading in landscape mode on my iPad, but I prefer portrait mode to reading and it was fine with that.Onto the actual book:Having seen the film 2001: A Space Odyssey many years ago and being blown away by how powerful it was, and also a bit scared by it. I loved the way it told a story without necessarily explaining everything, and really allowing one's own imagination to fill in some of the gaps. Knowing that there was also a novel, I had always wanted to read it, but never got around to it...upon seeing this Kindle version on sale, I decided to give it a go.First of all, it was very interesting reading Arthur C. Clarke's introduction at the beginning. Sometimes I don't like reading such introductions because they either somewhat spoil the book you're about to read or don't add a whole lot, but this one was an interesting read for someone who had seen the film but not yet read the novel. I didn't realize that both the screenplay and book were written at the same time...making this a very unique pair as typically one comes before the other...so although this isn't a novel that simply came before a film like many are, or a novelization of a film that had been made (which is typically not worth the time of day to read), it is a novel written by a fantastic science fiction writer inspired by the collaboration of writing the screenplay with Stanley Kubrick.Much of the book is very similar to the movie, but the way it is written adds many details without being bogged down...this is a very fast-paced read. The writing is focused on the big picture more so than the characters, but the main characters involved in each individual section get fleshed out well enough that it is very gripping to read.Being written before we'd ever even landed on the moon, it's amazing how well this story stands the test of time. I enjoy stories involving space travel and a lot of times the era something is written can occasionally take you out of the story by laughable concepts or dated science. The feeling I got from this reading was that it explained things in a way that don't date the technology being discussed in any way that ruins the overall story. Although 2001 is 14 years before the writing of this review and clearly many of the breakthroughs and events leading up to this specific story haven't taken place yet or are different than actual history, it is fascinating on some of the things that are part of our reality now...beyond that, this is full of what ifs related to our own existence within a vast universe.I definitely recommend this reading, whether or not you've seen the film and whether or not you plan to read the rest of the series. I likely will at some point, but this book is great as a stand-alone title.

What could possibly be said about one of the greatest stories ever to hit the sci-fi genre that hasn't already been said? 2001: A Space Odyssey exists within its own a zeitgeist--a thermonuclear catalyst that made the small-"e" enterprise of SF not only respectable to a mainstream audience, but at its best, turned it into both high art and metaphysical rumination on the nature of existence. Of course, the title is most often intoned with reverence at the magnum opus that Clarke collaborated with Stanley Kubrick to bring to the screen over the course of four years. However, despite the obvious plot differences between book and movie (made more as a function of limitations of Douglas Trumbull to create a convincing looking Saturn on film--an oversight he rectified a few years later in his own film Silent Running), at its best, the book sizzles with self-referential assurance of itself in being both a product of its Cold War-era historical period, and of more fundamentally elegant truths about evolution and transcendence, of alien superintelligence and its intentions, inscrutable and confounding, much like reading the mind of a God in a labcoat. Throughout its pages, the story suggests intention, motivation, and purpose while leaving interpretations quite open. The book is a juggernaut in the field---it serves as a high water mark for classical sci-fi and solidifies Clarke's place (alongside Childhood's End and Rendezvous With Rama) in the "Big Three" pantheon of 20th-century science fiction writers (alongside Asimov and Heinlen). Anyone with even a passing interest in sci-fi or speculative fiction should consider this novel required reading. Much like the movie on which it is based, the book at its best is poetry etched into the fabric of the stars.

I am beyond words.This book was so amazing and I am glad I didn't go for the movie first (watched it as a kid years ago, but the first scene with the apes kind of freaked me out and I never really got it)Well, started the book and couldn't put it down and to think that it was written in 1968 and it isn't even outdated at all (actually, didn't they discover a few years ago that appendix is actually useful for something after all?)I loved the theories put forward on space travel, a lot of astrophysics theories and concepts neatly summarized for us laymen. I was fascinated.I was equally fascinated by the way the book was written, there were just a few active characters, very little dialogue and yet the action and the descriptions esp. towards the end left me breathless while I read it late into the night.So iPads were predicted in 1968:“Here he was, far out in space, speeding away from Earth at thousands of miles an hour, yet in a few milliseconds he could see the headlines of any newspaper he pleased.“(That very word “newspaper,” of course, was an anachronistic hangover into the age of electronics.) The text was updated automatically on every hour; even if one read only the English versions, one could spend an entire lifetime doing nothing but absorbing the everchanging flow of information from the news satellites.”And his 2001 world was far more advanced than we are even now.How is such a vision even possible.And, in one of my favorite movies, Independence Day (don't judge me), there is a scene that kind of never made sense, when Jeff Goldblum's character is about to fly to the alien mothership in the alien space ship, he opens his Mac laptop and the voice goes "Good morning, Dave." It struck me as a bit weird, I mean, that wasn't state of the art technology in 1996 (when the movie came out) - but only now do I see the joke! Only now does it make sense. Jeff Goldblum's character (David) would have loved 2001: A Space Odyssey.Anyway, I am off to read the rest of the Odyssey books.

"2001: A Space Odyssey" begins with a man-ape named Moon-Watcher millions of years ago and leaps forward through time to the present day when Dr. Heywood Floyd is sent to the Moon owing to a secretive and rumored "disease" that is believed to have inflicted the "American" portion of the colony; (the other end occupied by the Soviet Union). From there we move ahead a few years to doctors David Bowman and Francis Poole who are on a mission to reach Saturn.What they and we as the reader discover transcends theirs and our everyday lives, Jupiter and its swirling clouds and Saturn and its particle rings and the inevitable problems with Hal (the A.I. goes haywire theme has become so cliché vis a vis Terminator, Matrix and countless other stories. But can it all be traced back to Mr. Clarke and this story from 1968? Is Mr. Clarke the one to blame for Matrix Revolutions and Terminator III and IV?), the tumbling adventure through the Star Gate, the "star child" and the return to Earth.The theme that struck most for me was that of evolution:"There were other thinkers, Bowman also found, who held even more exotic views. They did not believe that really advanced beings would possess organic bodies at all. Sooner or later, as their scientific knowledge progressed, they would get rid of the fragile, disease-and-accident-prone homes that Nature had given them, and which doomed them to inevitable death. They would replace their natural bodies as they wore out-- or perhaps even before that-- by constructions of metal and plastic, and would thus achieve immortality. The brain might linger for a little while as the last remnant of the organic body, directing its mechanical limbs and observing the universe through its electronic senses-- senses far finer and subtler than those that blind evolution could ever develop."Even on Earth, the first steps in this direction had been taken. There were millions of men, doomed in earlier ages, who now lived active and happy lives thanks to artificial limbs, kidneys, lungs, and hearts. To this process there could be only one conclusion-- however far off it might be. And eventually even the brain might go. As the seat of consciousness, it was not essential; the development of electronic intelligence had proved that. The conflict between mind and machine might be resolved at last in the eternal truce of complete symbiosis..."But was even this the end? A few mystically inclined biologists went still further. They speculated, taking their cues from the beliefs of many religions, that mind would eventually free itself from matter. The robot body, like the flesh-and-blood one, would be no more than a stepping-stone to something which, long ago, men had called "spirit." And if there was anything beyond that, its name could only be God."The bottom line: Although "2001: A Space Odyssey" is an easy read, there isn't enough time in a review such as this to delve into its varied and important messages and meanings. Mr. Clarke's admonition seems to be that humans are evolving, improving as we had millions of years ago to this day and the future will likely be more of the same (advancement and war), foreshadowed with this nugget of repetitive prose (from the Moon-Watcher to the Star Child):"Then he waited, marshaling his thoughts and brooding over his still untested powers. For though he was master of the world, he was not quite sure what to do next."But he would think of something."-Raeden Zen