Tomorrow, July 20, 2010, are held here in Colombia's 200 years of independence. It would be something like the birthday of our country, but more exactly what happened two centuries ago was the beginning of pregnancy independence, with a heated discussion about the loan of a vase.
Much has been said and done on this memorable event, as in many other Latin American countries are to meet their 200, also nowadays. However, all of what I've heard is focused on the past. We have encroached on all sides with the old images of our heroes, old yellowed and damaged documents, historical accounts of what happened there in the nineteenth century and during the 200 years of existence of our republic.
There has been (or has been, I've heard) efforts to look ahead. What do they mean for Colombia the next 200 years? Under what conditions are going to be our descendants in the year 2210? No wonder in our short-term culture for which it is imperative to obtain results in the first five years and, if possible, in the first year and plan for 20 years means to speculate on the long term.
United States celebrated its 200 years in 1976. In preparation for that date, an editor of Philadelphia called Naomi Gordon had the idea to call several writers to write stories, all with the title "The Bicentennial Man." The argument was free and at the discretion of each author and the stories be included in an anthology to be published in 1976, the bicentenary year. For various reasons the project could not be completed and the anthology was not to be published (If it rains here, there does not it clears).
However, Gordon had contacted Isaac Asimov in January 1975 he wrote a story about robots. Asimov's Bicentennial Man was a robot named Andrew Martin who fought throughout his life to become a human being and be accepted as such in a society where robots were considered little more than an appliance.
The story (or rather a short novel or what they call a novella between Anglophones, they are so precise in their definitions, or a longer text that "Novelletten" but shorter than a "novel" ) was published by the publishing house Del Rey in 1976 and won the Nebula and Hugo awards to following year. It was also the basis for a novel called "The Positronic Man" , written in 1993 by Asimov in collaboration with writer Robert Silverberg. Some readers may remember more easily the film of the same name starring Robin Williams in 1999, which did not seem as bad as many believe, at least was more faithful to the original the blockbuster "I, Robot" starring Will , 2004 Smith.
Back in 1810, although it is accepted by many as the first science fiction novel itself was "Frankenstein or The Modern Prometheus", published by Mary Shelley in 1818, I find googling around a former army officer Prussian named Julius von Voss in 1810 published a novel called "Ein Roman aus dem Jahrhundert einundzwangsigsten" , which translated from German means "A Novel of the Twenty-First Century." At least 200 years ago there was someone who was thinking in the long term. If any of you have any idea about where this story gets, she would give me a Senorita.
(mostly based on "Opus 200" by Isaac Asimov)
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