Hopeful Breakthroughs: Youth power in "Childhood's End", from Arthur C. Clarke's novel to TV drama (via David Bowie)

Arthur C. Clarke’s Childhood’s End (1953) describes a future phase of human history benevolently led to global peace and wealth by the superior technology of the alien Overlords; this golden age prepares the conditions whereby earth’s children can accede to a higher level of existence composed of pure energy, thus bringing humanity as we know it to its end. Verging on the brink between utopia and dystopia, this sci-fi classic has been interpreted in many ways, in the lights of its implications on good and evil, man’s spiritual yearning, the uniqueness and limitations of humanity, the adaptability of human values to future changes. This paper intends to read the novel through the lens of the post-war generational break, as an anticipation of the 1960s youth protest. In addition, it focuses on how the novel was re-interpreted by two later artistic products from the peculiar perspectives of their respective cultural contexts: David Bowie’s 1971 song “Oh! You Pretty Things” and the 2015 TV series Childhood’s End