Arms Out of Mind
- ARMS OUT OF MIND - A black ink and black color pencil drawing on an 11 x 14 size coquille board. It appears in the book, "Far Future Calling" by Olaf Stapledon, published by Oswald Train in 1979
Stapledon wrote four science fiction novels, the first of which appeared in 1930; "Last and First Men," followed by, "Starmaker," "Odd John," and "Sirius". Reading Stapledon is a mind-bending experience, it is likely that after Stapledon's books were published, most of the inventive ideas that show up in the works of science fiction writers who came after him, probably had their genesis in his novels.
In fact, Stapledon's imagination is so incredibly immense and impressive in scope, it is hard to find any other science fiction writer to compare to him. Not Wells, not Verne, not Clarke, no one!
I will say this about what he wrote concerning man and his destiny in the far future; In his story of mankind, over time, the human race meets and adapts to all kinds of disasters that produce new environments to which men continue to adapt. And each adaptation produces meaningful changes to the very nature of who and what a "man" is. In the very far future, somewhere in deep space, men no longer look like, speak like, think like, or are even motivated to behave like, men of today . . .
So, who are they? Are they even "human" any more? I don't think so, all things we call "human" about ourselves they have probably eliminated from their consciousness. I cannot "relate" to Stapledon's man of the future.
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