Carl Sagan Books

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Carl Sagan was an American scientist and author who died in 1996. Born to a Ukrainian immigrant and a New York housewife in 1934, Sagan spent his childhood in a modest apartment in Brooklyn. His parents fascinated the young boy because of their widely diverse beliefs.

Sagan’s mother was a practicing Jew. But his father wasn’t religious. It was from his mother that the author inherited his intellectual curiosity. From his father, Sagan acquired the sense of wonder and wild imagination that drove him to feed his curiosity.

A straight-A student whose genius turned his high school classes into an uninspiring bore, Carl Sagan eventually joined the University of Chicago, building upon the work he had done in his high school chemistry club by pursuing a degree in Physics.

Having mastered the nature and structure of molecules on his own by using cardboard cutouts to visualize their structure, Sagan also found an opportunity to participate in his university’s chemistry research, eventually earning a Ph.D. in Astronomy and Astrophysics.

The author’s imagination was always drawn to the stars. He was part of the NASA team that worked on Mariner 2. His interests also took him to the Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory at Harvard from where he studied Venus and Jupiter.

One of his most notable projects involved the production of messages from humankind to extraterrestrial life that were eventually mounted on probes and sent to the outer reaches of the Solar System. Though ridiculed by some, Carl Sagan never stopped championing the belief that alien intelligence existed, either in this galaxy or beyond.

This was the driving factor behind his involvement in projects to probe other worlds. More of an agnostic than an atheist, the author avidly emphasized critical thinking. Eventually described as a popularizer of science who made physics and astronomy more accessible to the layman, Sagan came under fire from some of his peers in the science fraternity who thought that he was more interested furthering his celebrity status than pursuing the true mysteries of science.

This did little to debilitate the author’s efforts in the field of astronomy. Sagan published hundreds of scientific papers and nearly two dozen books, some of which were science fiction. He even earned the awe of Isaac Asimov. The celebrated science fiction writer described Carl Sagan as one of the very few people whose intellect exceeded his own.

Carl Sagan’s death was the result of pneumonia.

Carl Sagan Awards

Sagan received nominations for Locus, Grammy, and John W. Campbell Awards. This was for the novel ‘Contact’.

Carl Sagan Books into Movies

Contact, Sagan’s science fiction novel, became a film, also titled ‘Contact’, in 1997. The author and his wife worked on the story of the Robert Zemeckis-directed adaptation. The movie follows the exploits of a scientist who is determined to prove the existence of alien life despite intense opposition.

Sagan and his wife started working on the movie in 1979. But they encountered numerous obstacles along the way. By the time the movie was released, the author was dead.

Best Carl Sagan Books

Sagan’s fascination with extraterrestrial life was as evident in his fiction as it was in his scientific works, with some of the best books in his bibliography including:

Contact: People have always questioned the existence of extraterrestrial life. But now the proof is here. A Radio signal from space has arrived, and it hails from a destination that isn’t quite as distant as some expected. This signal has been translated, and its message is simple.

Its sender wants humanity to come to the stars, to meet them face to face. To do that, the signal has provided plans for a machine that can take mankind to space. Human beings spent so much time thinking they were alone in the universe. Now everything is about to change.

Cosmos: Cosmos was an immensely popular television show. This book attempts to reproduce the message of the show in literary format. There are thirteen chapters which Carl Sagan uses to explain the history of the world and the universe at large.

He goes back to the very beginning and then charts the course of life through billions upon billions of years, using science and philosophy to explain how modern civilization came to be.

When Does The Next Carl Sagan book come out?

Carl Sagan doesn't seem to have an upcoming book. Their newest book is The Varieties of Scientific Experience and was released on November, 1st 2007. It is the newest book in the Carl Sagan Non-Fiction Books.

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