Clarke wrote this novel while Stanley Kubrick created the film, the two collaborating on both projects. The novel is much more detailed and intimate, and definitely easier to comprehend. Even though history has disproved its "predictions," it's still loaded with exciting and awe-inspiring science fiction. --Brooks Peck

Product Description
A deluxe hardcover edition of the science fiction classic...now with a new introduction by Arthur C. Clarke!

It has been over thirty years since the publication of 2001: A Space Odyssey, the science fiction classic that changed the way we looked at the stars--and ourselves. From the savannas of Africa at the dawn of mankind to the rings of Saturn as man ventures to the outer rim of our solar system, Arthur C. Clarke takes us on a journey unlike any other.

This allegory about humanity's exploration of the universe, and the universe's reaction to humanity, was the basis for Stanley Kubrick's immortal film, and lives on as a hallmark achievement in storytelling.

* Special hardcover edition for the new millennium
* New introduction by Arthur C. Clarke
* Winner of the Science Fiction Writers' Grand Master Award for Life Achievement
* Basis of Stanley Kubrick's 1968 movie--chosen by American Film Institute as one of the 100 best films of all time
* 2001's unforgettable character, HAL the computer, has been revived in Macintosh's TV spots

"Full of poetry, scientific imagination, and typical Clarke wit."--The New Yorker

"Breathtaking."--Saturday Review

"Brain-boggling."--Life

"A mind-bender."--Time

Special Millennial Edition

I read this book for the first time, shortly after I saw the movie. This was when it first came out. While Stanley Kubrick's film is a masterpiece on it's own, the book does a great deal to fill in the inevitable blanks in the movie. The movie is unlike anything you have ever seen, very short on dialog, extremely visual. Hence my recommendation that you read the book, then see the movie. It will make more sense. By the way, the movie was among the first real attempts at visual realism with the subject of sci-fi (sorry fellow Star Wars fans, these guys did it first). So well did it succeed, so powerful and detailed were the production values, that it set the standard for sci-fi movies that came after. But, that's a different review.

The book seeks to offer an answer to a few of the most intriguing and fundamental questions of all time; "Who are we, how did we get to be what we are, what will become of us?". It begins with the establishment of a connection between our ape-ancestors and an elemental survival dilemma. How do we survive? The means must exist, yet, we are hopelessly weaker and outnumbered by our ecological competitors. An outside force supplies the seed of an idea and in so doing, launches us toward a chain of events in the unforeseeable future. It is up to us to accept the idea, process it, integrate it into our thinking, and apply it to our problem.

As the future unfolds, mankind's natural desire to explore leads us to a discovery that will end forever the question of our uniqueness in the universe. It is a discovery that is as impossible for us to understand as it was our survival problem millennia ago. Once again, we must grope in the dark, fearful, yet fascinated. Once again, the seed of an answer is supplied. We are riveted by our curiosity and incapable of stepping back from the urge to discover the next fragment of this trail of crumbs being left for us.

The story reaches it's full height with yet another discovery. This is the climactic scene where the chain reaction set off back in the distant past leads to a doorway unlike any other we have stepped through. This is what fans still refer to as the "Ultimate Trip" sequence.

If you traveled millions of miles and millions of years, if you found yourself at a door that was clearly created by someone or something well beyond your understanding, if it were impossible to go back but terrifying to go on, if you knew that to step through this door would lead to unpredictable consequences, and if you had no one but yourself to talk to, would you step across the threshold?

The dialog is minimalist, but, descriptive in the way only a scientist like Clarke can make it. The dry, dispassionate, scientific, narrative makes the conclusion so much more startling. As you put yourself in the cockpit with the main character, David Bowman, himself a scientist-explorer, and watch the limits of your knowledge stretch and shatter into so many motes of dust, like the dust of the ages from which you came, you will know the imprisonment of fascination, the power of knowledge, and the awe of understanding.

Record your final log entry, tighten your harness, check your oxygen. In "2001", you will have to make this choice.


A superb book, far better than the movie   June 21, 2000
 14 out of 20 found this review helpful

Kubrick's movie was groundbreaking, original and did a lot to establish space movies as a genre. But, like most post-Strangelove Kubrick, it did so at the expense of a narrative. In the book, Clarke takes care of such mundane matters as givign the reader an idea of what's going on. Indeed, the book is more visionary than the movie in many ways. Clarke's brief discussion of the aliens' history -- from biological creatures, to robotic intelligences, to something far greater -- is the sort of thing Ray Kurzweil writes happily about (and Bill Joy writes unhappily about) today. But Clarke wrote it over 30 years ago. As usual, he was ahead of his time.


Engrossing   July 1, 2000
 10 out of 10 found this review helpful

When I saw the movie 2001, I was completely confused. I understood the basic plot line but didn't understand any of the nuances. I found the end especially baffling.

Reading the book cleared up my confusion and answered my questions (and created a few more). The premise of the book is excellent. Instead of having a typical face-to-face run-in with aliens, the characters in the book come upon evidence of alien intelligence: a black monolith which pre-dates modern history. As they try to discover who left the monolith, questions are answered and many more questions arise. The storyline was unique, and although the characters were underdeveloped they were believable. The imagery in the book was wonderful: I could picture Jupiter, Saturn, and the moons of the planets as Clarke described them. I found it amazing how accurate his descriptions were considering what we know now about these heavenly bodies compared to what they knew at the time the book was written.

I would recommend this book to science fiction fans who aren't interested in violence. This doesn't have any of the wars or combat that many SF books have. I would also recommend it to technical-oriented people who have an interest in learning more about astronomy.


Evolution of Man   May 29, 2002
 10 out of 11 found this review helpful

I have seen the Stanley Kubrick film of the same title hundreds of times before I decided to read the book. As the opening credits in the film state, "Screenplay by Stanley Kubrick and Arthur C. Clarke". Because the movie and the book were written simultaneously, I never thought the book would be much different. Once I began reading, however, I was stunned at how wrong I was, where in fact there was more than I dreamed of. What the movie could not convey, or maybe even did not want to convey was exposed in the writing. Clarke writes with clarity and passion; not just for writing, but also science as a means of expressing ones own existence. That existence being the ultimate question of man's relationship with the universe and the environment he has created for himself. The book is existential as well as mystical: scientific as well as theological: revaltory as well as inquisitive. The story follows the same track as the movie, yet with inner dialogue of the apes on Earth and their first meeting with the Black Monolith, describing how the impact of this clean, smooth, black mystery impacted their means of survival through the use of weaponry and tools. Following some 2001 years later into deep space towards Jupiter we meet H.A.L., another enigma that similarly impacts man and his ability to control his fate or destiny. For anyone who has seen the movie, the book will not surprise you as far as the generic structure of the story, yet Clarke's handling of the subject completely unknown at the time is simply startling.

Published in 1968 (a year before landing on the moon), Clarke dedicates this book to Stanley Kubrick. Likewise, Kubrick made a similar gesture with his film. This new edition includes some thoughts on the year 2001, as well as a small write-up on his relationship with Stanley. Highly reccomended.