[ExI] fwd Lending library arrives on Mars

[John Grigg]

Damien Broderick wrote:
At 7:53 p.m. Sunday, the Phoenix landed on Mars on a plateau called Vasitas
Borealis, a few miles from the Martian polar ice cap.

On board is a disc containing my name [and that of about 299,999 others],
but more importantly, also on the disc are a series of Mars images from US
comic strips, pulps, animation, and fiction; the work of many talented
earth-bound writers and artists.

Included is a Winsor McCay 1910 Little Nemo featuring an airship powered by
a giant bird ferrying Nemo and friends to Mars, and a poster from the 1936
Flash Gordon serial.

Comic books are represented by the Wally Wood cover to Weird Science #17
[01-02/1953] [see http://www.comics.org/coverview.lasso?id=10232&zoom=4 ],
and an Adam Hughes Martian Manhunter, .

Other artists represented include Chuck Jones [Marvin Martian], Allan
Anderson [for a Leigh Brackett novel], Ed Emschwiller, Chesley Bonestell,
Frank Kelley Freas, Richard Powers, Michael Whelan, Don Dixon, Alex
Schomburg, Vincent di Fate and Frank R Paul..

A healthy representation of Martian literature, led by H G Wells War of the
World, are included as well. If there are real Martians equipped with
universal translators, they can revel in the works of Brian Aldiss, Poul
Anderson, Edwin Arnold [Gullivar of Mars], Isaac Asimov, Greg Bear, J G
Ballard, Greg Benford, Otto Binder, Ben Bova, Leigh Brackett, Ray Bradbury,
Frederic Brown, Edgar Rice Burroughs, Arthur C Clarke [pity he didn't live
to see this], Chip Delany, August Derleth, Philip Dick, Harry Harrison, Fred
Hoyle, Otis Adelbert Kline, Michael Moorcock, C L Moore, Larry Niven, H Beam
Piper, Fred Pohl, Kim Stanley Robinson, Carl Sagan, Ted Sturgeon, A E van
Vogt, Kurt Vonnegut, Jack Williamson, Roger Zelazny and many, many others.
>>>

This is all very cool!  I predict when humans are well established on
Mars, that a museum based on the Phoenix Lander disc will be built.
And in time even an amusement park (which will just have to include
robotic John Carter of Mars-style green, four-armed Martian warriors)
will be erected.

Sadly, I already envision the various Martian environmentalist and
pro-development factions squaring off, as to whether we should
terraform the Red Planet.  Kim Stanley Robinson showed us the way...

John