If I Forget Thee, O Earth . . . | Author Biography

Clarke was born on December 16, 1917, in Minehead, Somersetshire, England. Like many children in his generation, Clarke first discovered science fiction through Amazing Stories, one of the popular science fiction pulp magazines—so-called because they were printed on cheap, wood-pulp paper. Clarke moved on to reading books by H. G. Wells, Olaf Stapledon, and other British science fiction writers, and he wrote stories for a school magazine as a teenager. In 1936, he could no longer afford his education and dropped out to work as a government auditor. At the same time, he became...

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