Arthur C. Clarke’s last message to the world:
So many of his wishes have already come true.
From the BBC:
“Sir Arthur has left written instructions that his funeral be strictly secular,” his secretary, Nalaka Gunawardene, was quoted as saying by news agency AFP.
She said the author had requested “absolutely no religious rites of any kind”.
…
When asked why he never patented his idea for communication satellites, he said: “I did not get a patent because I never thought it will happen in my lifetime.”
In the 1940s, he maintained man would reach the moon by the year 2000, an idea dismissed at the time.
…
“Sometimes I am asked how I would like to be remembered,” he recalled recently.
“I have had a diverse career as a writer, underwater explorer and space promoter. Of all these, I would like to be remembered as a writer.”
His final book, just completed, will be on shelves this November.
If you want to get the flavor of his thinking, here are some selected quotations.
And here is his 2001 diary. Not from the year, but the movie shoot.
Oh, even better (if wordier):
Clarke debating with George Bernard Shaw whether the sound barrier could be broken.
Gentlemen of letters and science.