Arthur C. Clarke

Arthur C. Clarke has died. He's probably best known for writing the book and screenplay 2001: A Space Odyssey. But to science fiction fans, he was one of the Big Three--Clarke, Isaac Asimov and Robert Heinlein. Of them, his work seemed the most soft-spoken--perhaps this is my imagination (rather than his imagination), or perhaps it came from his being British and their being Americans.

One of his most famous works, Rendezvous With Rama, is scheduled to be released as a film next year. I'm looking forward to it, but it's doubtful it will be as iconic as 2001.

He's also famous for one of my favorite quotes: "Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic."

I read a fair number of his books and short stories. I especially liked the latter, but I admit during the years I avidly read sf, he was never high on my list. Still, he was a solid, no-nonsense wide-ranging author of speculative literature, and his work has held up better than all but a handful of my youthful sf enthusiasms.