Comment about the original story from Sir Arthur’s Collected Stories. They meet weekly in a conference room over New York, in the alien spacecraft hovering there. The alien leader, Supervisor Karellen, only discusses matters through Secretary-General Rikki Stormgren, the representative for the United Nations and Earth, chosen to be their liaison for five years. Even their appearances on Earth are extremely limited, in that they are never seen. Their power is phenomenal, should they decide to use it, though their use of it is remarkably restrained. Since their mysterious arrival, the Overlords have ruled Earth with a benevolent stewardship.

It is also different in that much of the first part of the book is not about the invasion itself, which takes up a couple of paragraphs, but the years afterwards, at the point at which Earth’s ambassador, and only means of communication to the aliens, is due to retire. You perhaps don’t need me to tell you that this was an extremely common story in the Space Age days of the 1950’s (and seems to have been later borrowed by both the TV series V and the film Independence Day.) Interestingly though, this one is different to most tales of the time in that the invasion is a peaceful one on the part of ‘the Overlords’. You may recognise elements of the tale, at least to start, for Childhood’s End is initially a story of an alien invasion of Earth. His most expertly and compellingly handled piece of long fiction a masterclass in Golden Age pacing, mystery and sense of wonder.”

Adam Roberts calls it “Arthur C Clarke’s most perfect novel…. Looking forward, the book 2001: A Space Odyssey (perhaps Sir Arthur’s most famous novel) was fifteen years away from publication.Ĭhildhood’s End is regarded by many critics as one of Sir Arthur’s greatest, if not his best novel. It was published in the 1953, after Prelude to Space, The Sands of Mars and Islands in the Sky, and was followed by Earthlight. Childhood’s End is one of Sir Arthur’s earliest novels – his fourth. The recent announcement of a new TV series of this novel got me to thinking that I should read the original novel again before the series began later this year.Ĭontext first. So returning back to this one was a bit of a treat. It was his books, along with those of HG Wells, Heinlein and Asimov, like so many other readers at the time, that got me started reading science fiction. Some of you may know that Arthur C Clarke is one of my favourite authors.

Childhood's End by Arthur C. Clarke