Olaf Stapledon | |
|---|---|
 Stapledon | |
| Born | (1886-05-10)10 May 1886 |
| Died | 6 September 1950(1950-09-06) (aged 64) Caldy, Cheshire, England |
| Occupation | Novelist,philosopher |
| Genre | Science fiction,philosophy |
| Notable works | Star Maker,Last and First Men,Odd John |
William Olaf Stapledon (10 May 1886 – 6 September 1950) was an Englishphilosopher andauthor ofscience fiction.[1][2] In 2014, he was inducted into theScience Fiction and Fantasy Hall of Fame.
Stapledon was born inCheshire, but he lived inPort Said, Egypt throughout hisearly childhood. Following his college studies, he worked in shipping offices inLiverpool and Port Said from 1910 to 1912. During theFirst World War, he served as aconscientious objector.[2] Stapledon became an ambulance driver with theFriends' Ambulance Unit in France and Belgium from July 1915 to January 1919; he was awarded theCroix de Guerre for bravery.[3] His wartime experiences influenced hispacifist beliefs.[4] Stapledon was awarded aPhD degree inphilosophy from theUniversity of Liverpool in 1925 and used his doctoral thesis as the basis for his first published prose book,A Modern Theory of Ethics (1929).[3] However, he soon turned to fiction in the hope of presenting his ideas to a wider public.[5]
Ideas such as asupermind composed of many individual consciousnesses form a recurring theme in his work.Star Maker contains the first known description of what are now calledDyson spheres.Freeman Dyson credits the novel with giving him the idea, even stating in an interview that "Stapledon sphere" would be a more appropriate name.[6]Last and First Men features early descriptions ofgenetic engineering[7] andterraforming.Sirius describes a dog whose intelligence is increased to the level of a human being's. Stapledon's work also refers to then-contemporary intellectual fashions (e.g. the belief inextrasensory perception). Stapledon is considered one of the forerunners of the contemporarytranshumanist movement.[8]
Stapledon was born inSeacombe,Wallasey, onthe Wirral Peninsula in Cheshire, the only son of William Clibbett Stapledon and Emmeline Miller. The first six years of his life were spent with his parents atPort Said, Egypt. He was educated atAbbotsholme School inDerbyshire andBalliol College, Oxford, where he acquired aBA degree inModern History (Second Class) in 1909, promoted to anMA degree in 1913.[9][10] After a brief stint as a teacher atManchester Grammar School he worked in shipping offices inLiverpool andPort Said from 1910 to 1912. From 1912 to 1915 Stapledon worked with the Liverpool branch of theWorkers' Educational Association.[2]
During theFirst World War he served as aconscientious objector.[2] Stapledon became an ambulance driver with theFriends' Ambulance Unit in France and Belgium from July 1915 to January 1919; he was awarded theCroix de Guerre for bravery.[3] His wartime experiences influenced his pacifist beliefs and advocacy of a World Government.[11] On 16 July 1919 he married Agnes Zena Miller (1894–1984), an Australian cousin.[2] They had first met in 1903, and later maintained a correspondence throughout the war. They had a daughter, Mary Sydney Stapledon (1920–2008), and a son, John David Stapledon (1923–2014). In 1920 they moved toWest Kirby.
Stapledon was awarded aPhD degree inphilosophy from theUniversity of Liverpool in 1925 and used his doctoral thesis as the basis for his first published prose book,A Modern Theory of Ethics (1929).[3] However, he soon turned to fiction in the hope of presenting his ideas to a wider public. The relative success ofLast and First Men (1930) prompted him to become a full-time writer. He wrote a sequel,Last Men in London, and followed it up with many more books of both fiction and philosophy.[12] Stapledon was a member of theAristotelian Society.[13]
As a pacifist Stapledon was involved in a number of peace-advocacy organisations, such as thePeace Pledge Union.[14] In August 1939 he addressed a meeting of theWomen's International League for Peace and Freedom.[15] For the duration of theSecond World War Stapledon abandoned his pacifism and supported the war effort.[3] In 1940 the Stapledon family built and moved into a new house on Simon's Field, inCaldy, in Wirral. During the war Stapledon became a public advocate ofJ.B. Priestley andRichard Acland's left-wingCommon Wealth Party,[3] as well as the Britishinternationalist groupFederal Union.[16] He supported implementing the recommendations of theBeveridge Report[17] and spoke at the first public meeting of theLeft Book Club's "Readers' and Writers' Group".[18]
Other organizations which Stapledon was involved with include theH.G. Wells Society,League of Nations Union, the1941 Committee, theProgressive League and theBritish Interplanetary Society.[19][20]
Some commentators have called Stapledon a Marxist, although Stapledon distanced himself from the label stating that "I am not a Marxist, but I have learned much from Marxists, and I am not anti-Marxist",[21] though he did refer to himself as a socialist.[22] He held membership of the Merseyside branch of theFabian Society.[23]
After 1945 Stapledon travelled widely on lecture tours. Arthur C. Clarke, as Chairman of the British Interplanetary Society, invited him to give a talk on the social and biological aspects of space exploration.[24] He also travelled internationally, visiting the Netherlands,Sweden and France, and in 1948 he spoke at theWorld Congress of Intellectuals for Peace inWrocław, Poland. He attended the Conference for World Peace held in New York City in 1949, the only Briton to be granted a visa to do so. In 1950 he became involved with theanti-apartheid movement. After a week of lectures in Paris, he cancelled a projected trip toYugoslavia and returned to his home in Caldy, where he died very suddenly of a heart attack.[3]
Stapledon was cremated atLandican Crematorium. His widow and their children scattered his ashes on the sandy cliffs overlooking theDee Estuary, a favourite spot of his that features in more than one of his books. Stapledon Wood, on the south-east side ofCaldy Hill, is named after him.[25]
Stapledon's fiction often presents the strivings of some intelligence that is beaten down by an indifferent universe and its inhabitants who, through no fault of their own, fail to comprehend its lofty yearnings. It is filled with protagonists who are tormented by the conflict between their "higher" and "lower" impulses.[2]
Stapledon's writings directly influencedArthur C. Clarke,[26]Brian Aldiss,[27]Stanisław Lem,Bertrand Russell,[28]John Gloag,[29]Naomi Mitchison,[30]C. S. Lewis,[31]Vernor Vinge,[32]John Maynard Smith[33] and indirectly influenced many others, contributing many ideas to the world of science fiction. Clarke wrote:[24]
In 1930 I came under the spell of a considerably more literate influence, when I discovered W. Olaf Stapledon's just-publishedLast and First Men in the Minehead Public Library. No book before or since ever had such and impact on my imagination; the Stapledonian vistas of millions and hundreds of millions of years, the rise and fall of civilizations and entire races of men, changed my whole outlook on the universe and has influenced much of my writing ever since.
Ideas such as asupermind composed of many individual consciousnesses forms a recurring theme in his work.Star Maker contains the first known description of what are now calledDyson spheres.Freeman Dyson credits the novel with giving him the idea, even stating in an interview that "Stapledon sphere" would be a more appropriate name.[34]Last and First Men features early descriptions ofgenetic engineering[35] andterraforming.Sirius describes a dog whose intelligence is increased to the level of a human being's. Stapledon's work also refers to then-contemporary intellectual fashions (e.g. the belief inextrasensory perception).
Last and First Men, a "future history" of 18 successive species of humanity, andStar Maker, an outline history of the Universe, were highly acclaimed by figures as diverse asJorge Luis Borges,J. B. Priestley,Bertrand Russell,Algernon Blackwood,[36]Hugh Walpole,Arnold Bennett,Virginia Woolf (Stapledon maintained a correspondence with Woolf) andWinston Churchill.[37] In contrast, Stapledon's philosophy repelledC. S. Lewis, whoseCosmic Trilogy was written partly in response to what Lewis saw as amorality, although Lewis admired Stapledon's inventiveness and described him as "a corking good writer".[38] In fact Stapledon was anagnostic who was hostile toreligious institutions,[39] but not to religious yearnings, a fact that set him at odds withH. G. Wells in their correspondence.[40]
Together with his philosophy lectureship at the University of Liverpool, which now houses the Olaf Stapledon archive, Stapledon lectured inEnglish literature,industrial history andpsychology. He wrote many non-fiction books on political and ethical subjects, in which he advocated the growth of "spiritual values", which he defined as those values expressive of a yearning for greater awareness of the self in a larger context ("personality-in-community").[2] Stapledon himself named his spiritual values as intelligence, love and creative action.[41] His philosophy was strongly influenced bySpinoza.[42]
Stapledon is considered one of the forerunners of the contemporarytranshumanist movement.[43]
Film producer and directorGeorge Pal bought the rights toOdd John and in 1966Castle of Frankenstein magazine reported thatDavid McCallum would play the title role.[44]
In 2017 a multimedia adaptation ofLast and First Men by Oscar-nominated Icelandic composerJóhann Jóhannsson was released, featuring narration byTilda Swinton and a live score performed by the BBC Philharmonic.[45]
In 2019,Justin McDonald andKate Hodgson wrote, produced, and starred in a short film adaptation of Stapledon's "A Modern Magician." Directed by Mark Heller, the film also featured the voice ofBrian Cox. It was the first-ever live-action adaptation of any of Stapledon's literary works.
Stapledon's writings greatly influenced not only key players in our own story on pluralism, such as Arthur C. Clarke and Stanislaw Lem, but also figures as diverse as Jorge Luis Borges, Bertrand Russell, Tom Wintringham, Virginia Woolf, and Winston Churchill.
In a lecture to the New Renascence School in London, he reiterated the central paradox of his own spiritual life: "Agnosticism, far from destroying religion, is the gateway to live religion." ...In a 1949 anthology on religion, Olaf gave simple, precise expression to a problem he had wrestled with all his life: the emotional inadequacy of atheism and the intellectual unacceptability of theism. Spirit, for him, meant a character of aspiration, not a substance attributed to souls or deities.
