Rendezvous with Rama

This book is pure science fiction story. I enjoyed this better than the other which I read before this book, because I like to see science fiction movies and I've been interested in science.

This book was written by Arthur C. Clarke who is the most famous science fiction writers of the twentieth centuries. I think his most popular story is 2001: A Space Odyssey written in 1968. The story was written for a movie directed by Stanley Kubrick. I was impressed to see the movie when I was in high school. The movie has been one of my favorite movies even now. I think this story should become movie too. If it is possible, I would like to see the movie, Rendezvous with Rama, directed by Stanley Kubrick. But Arthur and Stanley were already dead. My hope is impossible.

I found a common point between Rendezvous with Rama and 2001: A Space Odyssey. A huge geometrical shape is used for the most important object in each story. A cylinder is used for the shape of big space ship called Rama in Rendezvous with Rama. Then a rectangular box is used for the shape of mysterious huge object called Monolith in 2001: A Space Odyssey. I think that these primitive geometrical shapes are effective in expressing mysteriousness and symbolizing wonder. The purposes of these huge objects aren't written actually.

Points for Understanding

3-1. 'The number three must be important to the Ramans,' Norton tells himself. What things, described in this chapter and in chapter two, have made him think this?

There were three upright cylinders standing on the ends of Rama. There were three airlocks into Rama. There were three ladders leading away from Hub, the centre of a wheel and the ladders are 120 degrees apart. There were three very long stairways lead on from the ladders, our towards the cylinder wall.

3-2. Norton and his crew have used flares to photograph the interior of Rama. They have photographed something that looks like an island in a sea. They have named this place New York. Why?

Because the shapes look like the buildings that people used to call skyscrapers in New York.

3-3. Doctor Perera says that Rama has been travelling for at least 200,000 years. How does he know this?

He know this from tracking path back through space and he know its speed.