Clarke, Arthur C(harles) (1917–2008)
English science fiction and non-fiction writer. He originated the plan for a system of communications satellites in geostationary orbit in 1945. His works include the short story ‘The Sentinel’ (1951; filmed in 1968 by Stanley Kubrick as 2001: A Space Odyssey and adapted as a novel of the same name in 1968), and the novels Childhood's End (1953), A Fall of Moondust (1961), Rendezvous with Rama (1972), 2010: Odyssey Two (1982), and 3001: The Final Odyssey (1997). His popular-science books generally concern space exploration; his fiction is marked by an optimistic belief in the potential of science and technology.
His non-fiction works include Interplanetary Flight (1950) and The Exploration of Space (1951); his science fiction includes the novel Prelude to Space (1951), The Sands of Mars (1951), Islands in the Sky (1952), Childhood's End (1953), Earthlight (1955), and the short-story collections Tales from the White Hart (1957), and Of Time and Stars (1972).
| Clarke was born in Minehead, Somerset, served in the Royal Air Force during World War II as a radar instructor, and then studied physics at King's College, London. He became chair of the British Interplanetary Society in 1946, the year his first story was published. In 1956 he moved to Sri Lanka. |
