Space Odyssey

What Hacker News says

1. ggmJan 2025
   I enjoyed this book about him and Stanley Kubrick.

   Space Odyssey: Stanley Kubrick, Arthur C. Clarke, and the Making of a Masterpiece by Michael Benson

   "Glide Path" which is a somewhat fictionalised personal account of his wartime experiences working on ground controlled descent & landing is entertaining.

   He did make several quite interesting predictions, but as you note some preposterous ones as well.

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2. gshubert17Dec 2018
   Agree that Benson's book _Space Odyssey_ is great.

   I just finished _Space Odyssey_ and was appalled by the way Kubrick treated Arthur C. Clarke, excluding him from receiving a percentage of the proceeds and delaying the publication of his book until after the much-delayed film was released and lying to him about his reasons.

   Kubrick also abused Dan Richter, who did the choreography for the "Dawn of Man" sequence and played "Moonwalker", the leader of the hominids. Kubrick insisted he could only give Richter one credit. "I'm the only one with more than one credit," Kubrick said, according to Richter. Kubrick gave Richter the choice of a starring credit or the choreography credit. Richter chose the starring credit.

   Kubrick also messed with Doug Trumbull (effects), Stuart Freeborn (makeup), Gyorgy Ligetti (music), and many others.

   I understand many of the people who worked with Kubrick looked back on all they learned and how they grew professionally while working for him. But I don't understand why he seemed to be such a jerk.

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3. GlassOuroborosDec 2016
   While I cannot recommend any particular books, I can recommend that you look into the "Hard Science Fiction" genre. They are very realistic, yet still have a cool aspect of fiction. The Wikipedia page for Hard Science Fiction has a list of good books in the genre.

   Besides that, off the top of my head, I would say books by Isaac Asimov (Foundation series) or Arthur C. Clarke (Space Odyssey series).

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4. pndyDec 2025
   Arthur C. Clarke explored this cultural shock as well in the final book of the Space Odyssey series:

   https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/3001:_The_Final_Odyssey?useski...

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5. subscribedMay 2025
   Oh, an alternative storyline in Clarke's 2001 Space Odyssey.
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6. pndySep 2023
   I'm pretty sure that Clarke stated somewhere in the preface that each story in the Space Odyssey series doesn't necessary happens in the same universe and thus that's why there's a difference between places in books

   Nevertheless, Jupiter as the biggest planet within our star system being forced to collapse into a small sun feel extremely right

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