Childhood's End

Back when I knew them Floyd were science fiction fans, but it was more Ballard and Morcock than Clarke and Asimov. I suspect that, like Yes's Starship troopers, it was more 'Hey, that's a good title' than an attempt to transmute the spirit of the book into music.

Mind you, there were groups who were attempting that, both in fantasy and SY; I would cite Hawkwind…
 
I just finished "Childhood's End" with mixed feelings. I love Arthur C Clarke's ideals and visions of the future. 2001: A Space Odysseus is one of my favorite books.

As I was reading Childhood's End, I grew to like the Overlords more and more. They ushered in a new era of peace, teaching humans to stop hurting each other and abusing their environment, and making the world a utopia. I'm Buddhist, and for a while I saw the Overlords as a sort of boddhisatva who created a Pure Land right here on Earth. But that's where the spiritual references end for me.

The ending was quite a twist. Instead of helping humans reach enlightenment, the Overlords played the role of the Pied Piper, leading the children away! The Overmind comes across as cold and non-compassionate, not something I see as an ideal next stage in evolution. It's like a mental version of Star Trek's Borg, assimilating minds into itself while leaving death and destruction in its wake. The material world is no longer important - the Overlords seemed so concerned with preventing animal cruelty earlier, but once the children are assimilated they don't even leave the Earth to the animals to allow other species to continue to develop. They caused the whole solar system to cease to exist!

The last of the humans no longer lived in peace and prosperity ever since the children were taken. They destroyed themselves in war and desperation as the human race came to a bitter end. Neither the seemingly benevolent Overlords or the Overmind seemed to care - all they were interested in was the children. Yet other than experimenting with their "powers", which were really rather scary, no explanation was given for why the children were "better" than humans.

I felt it was more a way of using humans, then discarding them, rather than helping humans attain their highest potential in the next stage of evolution. I would rather see humans develop the way the Overlords did - with compassion and benevolence, developing technology and travelling to the stars.
 
4 years on one page. LOL

I like Childhood's End. There is a scene I never forget where the older brother goes to the younger brother for help because the younger brother has less to unlearn. That is a curious commentary on education.

But I prefer A Fall of Moondust. I am more into hard Sf than psychic phenomenon.

psik
 
I recently read Childhood's End and have been reading this thread with great interest. It's the first Arthur C. Clarke book I've read and it has definitely made me want to seek out more.

I must say that I do not like the idea of what humanity evolves into in this book. I'm not even sure whether I would regard it as an evolution - it sounds similar to being assimilated by the Borg from Star Trek in that individuality is sacrificed in order to become a part of a greater whole, the exact intent or purpose of which isn't known. Not an idea I'm comfortable with!

That didn't detract from my enjoyment of the book though. It was very good and I've already picked up 2001 from a charity shop just the other day. I'm looking forward to reading it! :)

- G

P.S. I've just seen similar points made earlier in the thread. Great minds and all that! lol
 
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Sirgeeksalot (I love your username!), if you liked Childhood's End up until the ending, I think you will definitely enjoy 2001: A Space Odyssey. It is also about transcendental evolution, but with a much more uplifting idea in the end of where human evolution is headed. It also spans a greater amount of human history, and I like the way the ideas are presented. :)
 
"handful of pages"?

150 pages was the normal NOVEL length back then. They had to use typewriters. No computers with word processing software. Three different sources put it over 200 pages. Maybe that is what is wrong with most of today's writers. They write too much. LOL

Today a 300 page novel is short. And usually they have NOTHING to Say. Intellectually boring.

There is a line from Childhood's End that I never forgot. Two young brothers are going through the change and the older one is constantly going to the younger one to ask questions. Clarke wrote that the younger one had "less to unlearn". I always thought that an interesting comment on CULTURE.

psik
 
There is now a paperback of his complete short stories.
It's as thick as a brick (makes a good door stop (only joking!)) well worth a read.
I read a lot of his stuff (novels & short stories) when I was younger, but a lot has stayed with me over the years.
 
That's interesting to hear, but I share your doubts about how it will be treated Vince. The greatness in the book (imho) comes from the pathos at the end, and this isn't typically what US TV shows do best.
 
Vince W said:
If BBC (maybe ITV) was doing this project I would very excited. Unfortunately SyFy has proven time and again they have no idea what they're doing.
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It might be worth watching.:)
 
Clarke is one of my favourite authors and Childhood's End is definitely one of my favourite works by him. Was it ever actually made into a miniseries? Another of his works, which I just couldn't put down, is The Light of Other Days (with Stephen Baxter). I love his description of going back through the evolution of humanity to the first ancestor.
 
Keith Bliss said:
Clarke is one of my favourite authors and Childhood's End is definitely one of my favourite works by him. Was it ever actually made into a miniseries? Another of his works, which I just couldn't put down, is The Light of Other Days (with Stephen Baxter). I love his description of going back through the evolution of humanity to the first ancestor.
Click to expand...

It never has been adapted . I think they had a Childhoods end film in development back in the early 80's but it never really got going.
 
BAYLOR said:
It never has been adapted . I think they had a Childhoods end film in development back in the early 80's but it never really got going.
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Update: I just found this online: syfy.com/childhoodsend
Really looking forward to this :)
 
It as been done as a serial on BBC Radio 4, this was some years ago.
Since then it has been repeated on the digital Radio 4 Extra.
Don't know if it's on CD or not?
 
I found Childhood's End not that engaging for the first half of the story. Nearing the end it went from "not bad" to awesome rather quickly though, and the end itself was reward enough for any slow parts I had to trudge through at the beginning. And what an end. So incredibly bittersweet. The evolution of the children doesn't really count as an evolutionary triumph for humanity (from our perspective anyway), as they are not really "human", nor will their humanity in any form be carried over to their new existence. The actual end of the real human race is just mentioned in passing, it having happened while Jan was away. That and the fate of the Overlords--all very sad actually.

That cringing sensation the children's sudden evolution gave me raised an interesting point I had not thought of before reading this: a potential evolutionary singularity in our present day will be most likely as incomprehensible as the one in the book. We consider proper evolution when there are gradual changes in adaptation and we can follow that change, while still distinguishing the common factors amongst the "evolvee" that make up our path, all pearls threaded by the same thread, even if the pearls differ. But long and far enough into that path, would there be absolutely ANY resemblance between the first and last pearl? If we were to leapfrog evolution...

Then again, I think any sort of singularity is rushing away from our grasp. I think humans as a species will go the Overlord route. Don't ask me why.
 
It will be interesting to see the Syfy Channel adaptation.:)
 
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