Space just got stranger with Arthur C. Clarke’s science-fiction classic, Rendezvous with Rama. For this exquisite illustrated Folio edition, novelist John Clute provides an introduction celebrating the author’s remarkable imagination.
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After millennia spent wondering if mankind will ever explore alien worlds, an alien world has come to us … Arthur C. Clarke was one of the great masters of the Golden Age of science fiction, and his work – including the groundbreaking 2001: A Space Odyssey – changed the landscape of the genre for generations. Winning multiple awards, Rendezvous with Rama is one of his most celebrated novels, examining the key questions of humanity’s place in the universe with Clarke’s trademark imagination and scientific rigour. For this illustrated edition, artist Matt Griffin has created a series of dreamy sci-fi visuals washed in saturated bursts of colour, and a magnificent greyscale image of the cityscape of ‘New York’. Rendezvous with Rama is an essential addition to Folio’s acclaimed science-fiction collection.
Production Details
Full bound in printed and blocked cloth
Set in Cartier with Great Lakes as display
248 pages
Integrated title page illustration and 5 full page colour illustrations
Die-cut slipcase
9½˝x 6¼˝
A spectacular edition of a science-fiction classic
John Clute, co-editor of The Science Fiction Encyclopedia, has provided an introduction that examines Arthur C. Clarke’s place in the canon of speculative fiction. Producing flurries of novels and short stories throughout the middle part of the twentieth century, Clarke had a particular talent for spying what might be over the furthest horizon, yet he always built his futures with an eye on humanity’s limitations. Rama, with its sense of wonder, is one of his greatest, demonstrating his unerring ability, as Clute puts it, to ‘wrench our gaze sideways and up, through time and space’. Matt Griffin’s illustrations for the edition are an appropriate mixture of the beautiful and the eerie, while the binding design combines with a die-cut slipcase to pin Rama against the swirling backdrop of unknowable space.
‘Rama is a cosmic egg … it may hatch at any moment’
It is 2031. A vast object, initially thought to be a planet-killing asteroid, has entered the solar system. A closer look reveals a startling mystery: the object, christened Rama, is not a product of nature at all, but an enormous metal cylinder, clearly crafted with purpose and by intelligent beings. Who made the space craft, and why have they set it hurtling towards our sun?
For Commander Norton and the crew of the Endeavour, these are questions that must be answered, and they must do it before Rama spins once more out of our reach. What they discover inside is extraordinary: a world of technological marvels. Will humankind ever be able to comprehend it? Rama is coming, and our world will never be the same again.
About Arthur C. Clarke
Arthur C. Clarke was born in 1917 in Minehead, Somerset. Volunteering for RAF service in 1941, Clarke worked on radar systems during the Second World War, and published an influential paper in 1945 which sketched the potential for orbital communication satellites. His passionate interest in science was allied with an early facility for fiction writing, and he went on to write more than 70 books, including Childhood’s End (1967; Folio Society 2023), 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968; Folio Society 2016), Rendezvous with Rama (1973; Folio Society 2020), Rama II (1989), The Ghost from the Grand Banks (1991) and The Garden of Rama (1991). He became the world’s foremost science-fiction writer and won numerous international awards including the Hugo and Nebula. In 1968 he shared an Academy Award nomination for his collaboration with Stanley Kubrick on the film 2001: A Space Odyssey. He was awarded a knighthood in 1998 and died in 2008 in his adopted home of Sri Lanka.
About John Clute
John Clute was born in 1940 in Toronto, Canada, but has lived and worked in London since 1969. He began writing SF reviews and criticism in the early 1960s; the eighth volume collecting this work is Sticking to the End (2020). As co-editor and now main contributor, he has been involved in The Encyclopedia of Science Fiction since its first print edition in 1979; the online version, eight times the length of the original, continues to expand. His second novel, Appleseed (2001), is SF. He has won various awards, including several Hugos, for his work. The 12,000 volume Clute Library of Science Fiction is now owned and curated by the Telluride Institute in Telluride, Colorado.
About Matt Griffin
Matt Griffin is an award-winning illustrator, author and animator originally from Kells, County Meath, Ireland. With clients including Disney, Lucasfilm, Warner Bros, Universal, Penguin and HarperCollins, he has garnered an international reputation for distinctive and innovative graphic art. He is also the author of The Ayla Trilogy (O’Brien Press), with his debut novel, A Cage of Roots, being named the LAI Children’s Book of the Year 2017 (9–11 category).
Reviews Powered By
Average Score for 122 Review(s)
Clark is an excellent writer, and folio has made a wonderful edition of his Rama series, my wish is that we could get more Rama from folio
Review by
Pesusieni
on 5th November 2024
One of my favourite Arthur C Clarke novels, and beautifully presented. Not 'inexpensive' though!
Review by
David Morgan
on 17th August 2024
A wondeful addition to any bookcase.
Review by
Rik
on 12th June 2024
The quality of this printing is fantastic! Great book too!
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