Odyssey

Characters

1. moon watcher- moon watcher is a character in the beginning of the book that is a kind of "monkey man" apparently the author thinks that humans evolved from monkeys. moon watcher has many human characteristics, he hunts for food, defends himself against anything that might cause him harm, and he has human curiosity.

1. Dr. heywood Floyd- Dr. Floyd is the scientist in the beginning that is sent to a place in space that has been quarantined because of a mysterious illness. reporters and friends keep asking him what he knows about the illnes, which is basically nothing. It is his first time going there so he's basically in awe of the situation.

1. stewardess- The stewardess on the space ship was rather shy at first. Dr. Floyd was the only one on the plane and yet she still went through with talking on the radio for the flight instructions. he kind of embarrassed her because after she was done talking on the radio he smiled and said 'thank you". when all of the announcements were done she leaned over to Dr. Floyd and said that her husband was working at the space station where the quarantine was happening and she asked if he knew anything about it. He told her no, and she smiled and walked away.

1. hal- The computer system in the ship is called "hal" . The computer obviously controls everything on the ship including contact with earth. hal has a brain that was generated to be just like a human brain, which should have told them right there that it was a bad idea, how can anyone know for sure that the computer wouldnt turn against them if they have human intelligence and basically a personality of their own.

1. Frank poole Frank Poole is one of the men on the ship. On his birthday, his family sent him messages from earth. During that, hal told him that the transmitter that helps them communicate with earth, was messing up and he needed to go outside of the ship to fix it. That is basically what he trained for at nasa, so it didnt bother him all that much.

Settings

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1. The setting in the begging is basically in prehistoric times. I didnt quite get if there were dinosaurs in the same area as the monkeys, I would guess that, that is around the same time. The only other animal you hear about besidesa the monkeys are cheetahs which try to kill the monkey groups, they spend their entire lives trying to fight off cheetah attacks.

2. The setting later on in the book is in 2001. The book was written in 1968, their version of the future was having trips to space be something that people do everyday. It isnt something that only a select few people get to do. The book is extremely unrealistic. I'm not sure if the author really thought that this was going to happen by the year 2001 or he just wanted to play around with it, because he knew that it would never happen

Important Events

1. THe first important event was in the begging of the book when the monkeys first started getting interested in space travel, well in a way. They obviously didnt have the intelligence to think about actually going into space, but they were curious as to what was in the sky, what that big round thing in the sky above them was.

1. The next big event was when Dr. Floyd was first put on the mission to go, They told him about the mysterious illness that people were getting in space and they asked him whether or not he could help out with the problem. apparently he said that he could because he was on a space ship heading towards the quarantined place. people throughout the book keep asking him what he thinks it could be that is making everyone sick, or if he already knows. Dr. Floyd tries to dodge the question but it seems like on every page of the book ,someone different is asking about it, including one of his good friends Dimitri.

Themes

1. I think by the end of the book the theme is going to be "dont trust machines" like dont think that just because something is supposidely made to make your life easier, that it really is going to make it that way. People put too much of their time, money, and trust into things like machines and yes they make the people who made them some good money at the time, but pretty soon,those "developments of the future" are going to put everyone, including themselves out of jobs. but people dont think about that stuff to begine with, it is just a get rich quick thing that people think will make them set for life, but when that money runs out and they have nothing left to spend and they need a job, what then?

Quotes

1. "Hey heywood, it is a small universe" Dr. Floyd friend dimitri said that to him. I think that quote is the author trying to be funny, because obviously the universe is not small. Dimitri seems to have a pretty good sense of humor, apart from Dr. Floyd who doesnt seem to have one at all.

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Background information

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Editorial Reviews -

symbolism

The cheetah in the beginning of the book symbolized fear, like earlier times that is what they worried about. The robots symbolized fear later on in the book, they are our future cheetahs sort of speak, robots to us symbolize what cheetahs meant to the monkies, fear.

Questions (Ask questions about this novel below)

I'm not quite sure if people live on the earth or if they live on some other planet. It really doesnt say in the book so far, maybe it will later. I think probably they do still live on the earth but they just have the option to travel other places in space, like when someone flies on an airplane here, but in a space shuttle.

Contributors to this page include:

• Roberta Tooley

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