A Brief Tribute to Two Giants: John Young and Ursula Le Guin

In this past month the world has lost two larger than life individuals: John Young, one of our greatest space explorers, and Ursula K. Le Guin, one of our greatest science fiction writers - indeed, one of our greatest writers of any genre. Admittedly, neither death could be considered a great shock, as they were both in their late 80s (Young was 87, Le Guin was 88). Nevertheless, it's always sad to know that the world has lost one more great individual, and that there is no chance of any more wisdom or knowledge coming from ones who have provided so much in the past.

Not long after Young's death, I posted a short tribute on Facebook, which I am basically just copying here, with a few modifications: John Young had one of the most impressive careers of any space traveler. He was one of only two dozen people who flew to the Moon, one of the dozen people who actually set foot on it, and the only astronaut to fly on Gemini, Apollo, AND the space shuttle (he flew two missions of each type, including the very first space shuttle flight). He was the only person to have piloted four types of spacecraft, as he flew both the Apollo Command Module and the Apollo Lunar Module in addition to Gemini and the Space Shuttle. His total of six spaceflights is still among the highest ever, with only two astronauts having flown seven times and only six others equaling Young's total - in fact, Young actually launched into space seven times if his taking off from the Moon is included, by which count he would be tied for the record. He was one of only three men to fly to the Moon twice; both he and fellow moonwalker Gene Cernan, who died last January, were on Apollo 10, which flew to the Moon without landing just two months before the historic landing by Apollo 11. The Apollo 10 mission holds special significance for me due to its timing (let's just say my mother tells me she listened to news of the mission in the hospital). Sadly, Tom Stafford is now the only member of the crew who is still alive. Only five of the dozen moonwalkers are still alive, as are eight of the additional dozen who flew to the Moon without landing (the command pilots from the six missions with landings, and the crews of the three missions that went to the Moon without a landing). With Young's death, none of the pairs who walked on the Moon together is still intact; there is one man left from five of the six missions with a moon landing. The entire crew of Apollo 14 has died. The only crew with all three members still alive is, ironically, that of Apollo 8, the first mission to fly to the Moon. One of that crew was Jim Lovell, who also flew to the Moon twice, but never landed because of the accident suffered by his second mission, Apollo 13. Charles Duke, who walked on the Moon with Young, is by several months the youngest of the moonwalkers; he'll be 83 in October. Of those who only flew to the Moon without visiting, the youngest, Ken Mattingly, is 81. In another decade or so, there may be only one or two people left who have visited the Moon (unless SpaceX pulls off its planned Moonshot in the next few years). Even so, the legacy of John Young and his fellow Apollo astronauts will live on as long as we keep their memory alive.

As for Ursula Le Guin, she was widely regarded as one of the best writers working in the genres generally known as science fiction and fantasy. Her writing was never flashy and her worlds were not as elaborate as many other fictional ones, and yet they felt very real. Perhaps in part because of her background - her father was an anthropologist while her mother was a writer - she was able to create very convincing societies, even if they were often quite different from any that exist in the real world, such as those in books like The Left Hand of Darkness. She used the genre of speculative fiction to explore many real world issues, including gender relations, war and violence, environmentalism, the contrast between socialism and capitalism, and much more. Yet her books didn't preach; they simply painted a realistic picture and left the reader to draw their own conclusions. There is still much of her work that I haven't read, and a number of books that I've only read once and have now mostly forgotten, but I have enjoyed pretty much everything I've read of hers, from well known classics like her Earthsea books, The Left Hand of Darkness, and The Dispossessed to more recent works like her Annals of the Western Shore (Gifts, Voices and Powers), and I'm sure I'll be coming back to these and others of her books for years to come. The little I've read of her non-fiction prose has also been clear, concise and well-reasoned. I highly recommend her work to all readers, regardless of age - she has written a number of children's books, and the Earthsea books were aimed at young adults - and genre preference - her characters and themes are universal, and one doesn't have to be a fan of science fiction or fantasy to appreciate her work.