I started reading some of The Martian Chronicles and honestly I'm hooked. I only stopped reading because I had other homework. It's a page turner for me because it's actually kind of freaky and scary and it's the kind of feeling where I just have to know more. The stories of the different expeditions are frightening, and bothered me. But I couldn't stop. I'm still not far enough to know what has happened to the first expedition, but considering how the two following it turned out, I'm guessing pretty bad. The stories are set in the very early two thousands, so I think it's funny that the author thought we would have achieved sending mankind onto Mars. Maybe this book is what's holding us back.
I think it's interesting how the Martians think. They don't even call it the planet Mars, they call it Tyrr. All their names are just consonants, so it's kinda hard to pronounce it in my head. At one point they say that the children curl up with their spiders and honestly that's terrifying. It also mentions how they feed flowers, which sounds awesome. The Martians speak telepathically, which is how they're able to understand english, which is kind of confusing. When the Earth men land how are they not questioning the fact that they use their mouths to speak? There were also a lot of descriptions of things that I couldn't really wrap my head around because of how strange they sounded.
I think this book helps perpetuate the fear that space wants to kill us, but what if space doesn't really care? In Slaughterhouse Five, Billy Pilgrim tries to scare the aliens (I cannot remember their names) by telling them that humans should be feared and that they probably destroyed the universe. However the aliens are just like "no actually it was one of us lol sorry", like humans are a joke. Maybe we are a joke, I mean the Martians speak TELEPATHICALLY. That's freaking cool. Science on Earth can't even do that. I definitely believe we're not the only ones in the universe, because come on space is freaking huge, but we envision ourselves as the best. We're so self centered. But the Martians are the same way. They say that life on Earth can't exist because there's too much oxygen. If only we could see everyone else perphaps we wouldn't think this way.
"Maybe we are a joke" Amazing!
ReplyDeleteBut I agree with how Human centric we are. Like when scientist decide that life can't exist on a planet because it doesn't have water on it. Like you don't know that aliens life. Life finds a way.
"You don't know that alien's life!" :-D
Delete"Maybe we are a joke"--I LOVE that. Have you gotten to "And the Moon Be Still as Bright" yet? Humans are certainly big and blundery and loud--unsophisticated jokes in that sense. I like to write about how "humans" as opposed to "aliens" in sci fi often translates into "Americans" vs. "the rest of the world"--and Bradbury's humans, with their penchant for destruction in the name of progress, certainly are stereotypical Americans.
ReplyDeleteI was thinking of you when reading Asimov today, beacause I, Robot is every sci fi stereotype that you said you aren't overly fond of and because so much of Golden Age sci fi is like that. Bradbury is a little different. I'm glad you like it!