Childhood's End
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Template:Otheruses1 Image:Childhood 68.jpg Childhood's End is a science fiction novel by Arthur C. Clarke. It was originally published in 1953, and a version with a new first chapter was released in 1990 due to the anachronistic nature of the opening chapter (the first attempts to launch rockets into orbit by both the Americans and Russians are in progress but aborted suddenly when aliens arrive, with a sense of the death of a dream).
Childhood's End deals with humanity's transformation and integration into an interplanetary hive mind. The book also touches on the issues of the Occult, man's inability to live in a utopian society, cruelty to animals, as well as the cliché of being the last man on Earth.
In the 1953 edition, the one known to most readers, the book opens with enormous alien spaceships appearing one day over all of Earth's major cities. The aliens, who become known as the Overlords, quickly make radio contact and announce their benign intentions and desire to help mankind. The Overlords quickly end the arms race and colonialism. They also arrange person-to-person (though not face-to-face) meetings to be conducted between Secretary General of the United Nations Stormgren and the Overlord leader Karellen, albeit through a one-way mirror so that Stormgren cannot see Karellen. They promise to reveal themselves in fifty years, after which mankind will have lost its prejudice and become comfortable in their presence.
Mankind enters a golden age of the greatest peace and prosperity ever known, but at some expense of creativity and freedom, and not all people on Earth are content with the bargain, nor accept the longterm benign intentions of the Overlords. Although Stormgren survives being kidnapped by some subversives suspicious of the Overlords, Stormgren secretly harbours a lingering curiosity about the real nature of the Overlords. He smuggles a device onboard Karellen's vessel to glimpse behind the screen, but later tells questioners that the device failed to work; there are hints that Stormgren merely agrees with the Overlords that mankind is not yet ready for what it revealed.
True to their word, fifty years after their arrival, the Overlords appear in person. They have all the classical appearance of devils — dark skin, leathery wings, pointed tails, horns, etc.
The Overlords, after a hundred years on Earth, reveal their true purpose. They are in service to a corporate being of pure energy known as the Overmind. It is their purpose to nursemaid humanity's emergence into a higher plane of existence that would become part of the Overmind. The fact that they appear as devils in human folklore is explained by developing the concept of a racial memory that is not limited by humanity's concept of linear time, hence the fear of these creatures was based on a instinctive foreknowledge that their coming would herald the end of our species.
One day, humanity's children start displaying telepathic and telekinetic abilities. These children soon become distant from their parents, and the Overlords quarantine all of them to the continent of Australia. Following the quarantine, no more normal children are born. Humanity ages and dies off; all the while their children change more and more in their evolution to become part of the Overmind.
Jan Rodricks is the last living human being, and he will witness the final transformation. He had stowed away on an Overlord supply ship in a successful attempt to travel to the Overworld home planet, which he had correctly guessed orbits a star located in the Carina constellation. Due to the relativistic nature of time, by the time he has completed the 40-lightyear round trip, he has lived longer in Earth time than any other human. Upon his return to Earth from the Overlords' homeworld, humanity has died out. He stays behind to witness the final transformation while the Overlords depart and Earth itself dissolves away. Humanity's offspring have evolved to a higher plane of existence, and the childhood of mankind has come to an end.
Similar themes in other literature
The idea of humanity reaching an end point through transformation to a higher form of existence is reminiscent of the belief held by some Christians in the "Rapture" and has been used in a number of science fiction works written since Childhood's End. Examples would be Blood Music by Greg Bear, the Vernor Vinge novels, incorporating the "Singularity", and Ian Banks' "Culture" novels and the "Sublimation" that advanced civilizations may undergo.
Childhood's End in other media
The BBC produced a two-hour radio dramatisation of the novel, which was originally broadcast on BBC Radio 4 in November 1997.
A screenplay of the novel has been sold and traded throughout the movie industry for years, but has never been produced.
The book's dramatic opening scene, in which the spaceships appear over Earth’s major cities, was echoed (some might say “stolen”) by the opening scenes of both the American TV movie V and the movie Independence Day.
The final scenes of the book, in which Earth's children gather in Australia and become the hivemind entity inspired the cover of the Led Zeppelin album Houses of the Holy. It is also believed that the end of the novel also inspired the Human Instrumentality Project in Neon Genesis Evangelion.
The lyrics in David Bowie's "Oh! You Pretty Things" from the album Hunky Dory recall the evolution of man as presented in Childhood's End and were likely influenced by the novel.
The novel also inspired a song of the same name by Pink Floyd on the album Obscured by Clouds.
Iron Maiden also has a song entitled "Childhood's End" on the album Fear of the Dark, however it is uncertain whether or not the song was inspired by the book.
"Childhood's End" was the name of a Stargate Atlantis episode. However, the episode does not contain shared plot elements short of children.
Stargate SG-1 and Stargate Atlantis have the recurring theme of human evolution to a higher plane of existence as energy beings (referred to as "ascension" in the series). The ascended beings actively and passively help other humans ascend.
The 1998 console role playing game, Xenogears contained a character named Krelian. The role of this character was to force the evolution of humans so they may ultimately become part of a man-made god. The name of this character in the original Japanese release was, in fact, Karalen.
The popular computer game StarCraft features a hive-minded alien race called the Zerg, a race which not only is ruled by a being called the "Overmind," but features lesser supervising creatures called "Overlords." The terrans in the Starcraft backstory also have emerging psychic powers, and the actions of the Xel'Naga are similar to those of the Overlords in Childhood's End.
An Overlord is illustrated in Wayne Douglas Barlowe's bestiary, Barlowe's Guide to Extraterrestrials. The Overlord is in fact on the cover, in the upper left position.
The song "Watcher of the Skies" by Genesis was inspired by the novel (as was Peter Gabriel's bat-winged stage costume).
The song "A Childlike Faith in Childhood's End" by Van der Graaf Generator was inspired by the novel (but no bat-wings for Peter Hammill).