Summary of 2001 A Space Odyssey and Personal Response

Summary Review

The title of this novel is 2001: A Space Odyssey, this amazing book was written by Arthur C. Clarke. Clarke has many degrees that allow him to give depth to the plot. Clarke has also written a lot of books, like the Space Odyssey series, Childhood's End, and many more. There are three major settings in this story. The first takes place on the moon, where the climax begins when TMA-1 is found. The second setting is the Inter-planetary ship Discovery, when it is on its way to one of Jupiter's moons. The last setting is actually a lot mini settings because TMA-2 becomes a star gate, which leads to a variety of wondrous places, like an abandoned spaceport and an inhabited sun.

The main character in the book 2001: A Space Odyssey is David Bowman, captain of the ship Discovery is in his mid twenties has girlfriend on earth. While on board the Discovery Bowman interacts with his ship mate, Coleman, and the supercomputer, HAL.

Like most astronauts, Bowman was a clean freak, even in astounding situations he takes time to straighten out everything. There an allusion every where in this novel, there is even one in Bowman?s name and it ties directly to the title. The first name "David? can be connected to David in the bible, who killed the much stronger Goliath through skill rather than strength, just as Bowman did in beating HAL. The second name, Bowman, can be associated with the legendary hero Ulysses, ?whose skill with the bow is often described in the Odyssey? (Wikipedia, Bowman). Ulysses also blinded the one-eyed Polyphemus with a trick, again similar to Bowman's triumph over HAL, whose "face" is a single camera. This makes a pretty good reason for the name of the book: "2001 A Space Odyssey".

The major con...

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...ly brief glimpses of a person?s life through their eyes.

I thought that this book was awesome and exciting to read. Mainly because it was research and the author?s reasoning of what it would be like in the year 2001 was very close. For example, colonizing the moon will probably happen within my lifetime and wireless newspapers have already happened (both of these were done in the 2001: A Space Odyssey). The character?s train of thought was not erratic (unlike the movie National Treasure) and was very rational. The climax never really ends in this book, but it continues on the rest of the series. I especially liked when the author went back in time three million years to begin the story, because it suggested the idea that our rise in intelligence was not an accident adds to the climax. The story is well thought up and pieces together nicely without any plot holes.