1. HOW DID THE HUMAN CHARACTERS DEVELOP ?
Mariada de Villiers’ background and application for the ‘Life on Mars’ mission is clearly based on Adriana and ‘Mars One’, for which she gave permission. Adriana’s great grandmother was a de Villiers. Her grandparents did live until almost 100 years old. But everything else from the present (2016) onwards is obviously fictitious.
Alexander Zhivago’s background is partly based on a variety of people, and so his initials go from A to Z. But my inspiration for the character came from Alejandra Vargas, hence the similar name and research interests. I have been inspired by her dedication to believe that it may not be long before we can communicate with cetaceans.
Noriko, one of the Martians, is the name of Adriana’s friend in Japan. Konichiwa!
Aziz is the name of a man who trusted and trained me during the anti-apartheid years in London. Viva!
2. WHAT INSPIRED SOME OF THE INCIDENTS?
Adriana has generously passed on her knowledge of Mars and space travel to many people, and there are a few references to this in the story. It was also easy to imagine Adriana as Mariada on Mars and beyond.
On reading about dolphins, I was amazed by the knowledge of the ancient Greeks and Romans, like Aristotle and Ovid, about them; about their evolution on land and in the sea, their intelligence, the belief they are the equals of humans in law, and their love of music. Ovid inspired me to put dolphins on Earth 2, like Jupiter did.
The incident recalled by Alex when he nearly drowned at Keurboomstrand is based mainly on Adriana having had a close shave there, but fortunately not the near death experience described.
The dream of being chased by a lion was my own, but the advice given was not by my dad but by me to children when they tell me about similar dreams. Just hearing that advice seems to help, as I reserve judgement on whether one can actually script one’s dreams. (“Dear brain, Tonight I want one lion chase dream, with full confrontation, but no sticky ending, please.”)
3. WHAT ARE THE MAIN THEMES OF THE STORY ?
I was inspired by a short film I saw in the early 70s, where the viewer goes through a mosquito into the human body, down to the smallest cell, and then back out to the skin and into outer space, through the Solar System and the Milky Way to the furthest galaxies, and then back again. It seemed to show the immense complexity of the inner journey of deep microbiology and the beginning of life, and the outer journey to deep space and the origin of life in the Big Bang. The link between these inner and outer worlds was a smooth continuum, showing that we are an integral part of the universe. Within you and without you, we are one.
That is why the first two Parts refer to ‘Going Out - Mars’ and ‘Coming In - Cetaceans’.
While the plot covers space exploration and research into cetacean languages , and there are various themes related to these pursuits, the main theme is environmentalism and the need for humans to live harmoniously with nature and each other, or face extinction. The search for alternative planets to live on seems fuelled by this fear, but also by our hunger to explore and grow, as shown by Mariada and Alex.
Similar themes relate to mining and technology and whether we are simply going to do the same to other planets as we have done to Earth, including largely to disregard other species.
4. WHAT ARE OTHER THEMES AND REFERENCES ?
Two of the literary and musical references are to a door opening. One of Adriana’s early sentences, at 18 months, was for us to “open the door” as she did not want to sleep. She has always wanted to open doors of perception, experience and opportunity, even if it may seem ‘impossible’.
There are references to voyages at sea or in space, of no return or drowning.
Fear of, exploitation of and communication with animals are constant themes.
The reference to ‘Lord of the Flies’ and ‘Clockwork Orange’ is a reminder of how savage humans can be.
The expression ‘behaving like an animal’ is ironic since it is extremely rare, I understand, for an animal to kill an animal or human out of some obscure malice or greed or for ‘fun’, as we humans do. We should rather admit and rectify our unacceptable behaviours, or be censured by law.
5. MUCH OF THE STORY SEEMS LIKE A FILM. WHY?
Considering that the ‘Mars One’ mission seems largely based on funding through a Reality-TV programme, I saw much of the ‘Life on Mars’ and ‘Life on Earth 2’ missions through a TV camera lens, because that seems the main way the public will see it in future. I would watch a programme like them, and I seldom watch TV. ‘Survivor’ would seem like an image on the wall of the cave, because this would be the real thing.
I hope a local film producer will film it entirely here in South Africa, with South African actors, from the Garden Route on the Southern coast around Knysna and Plettenberg Bay, to Cape Town, to the Richtersveld in the Northern Cape, something like the Saharan or Martian landscape, to Hole in the Wall on the Wild Coast for the Obstacle course selections, to Sani Pass and the top of the Amphitheatre in the Drakensberg in July, for a touch of Antarctica, the Himalayas or Mars, to Kosi Bay near the border with Mozambique, for Earth 2. What a wonderful invention are the fish-traps in the Kosi estuary, made entirely from local natural resources and able to supply many local people with a constant supply of fish. Will future astronauts be able to make something like this? Actors could pretend they can for the film.
I’m not sure how the director will get whales and dolphins to co-operate, certainly not in a dolphinarium anywhere. I suppose technology with special effects will be needed.
I also wonder what the prospect of doing the story as an eComic would be, to condense it into about 25 pages of pictures with dialogue. Loads of work for a graphic designer and script-writer, but would there be reasonable reward?
6. WHY DID YOU WRITE THIS STORY?
I was excited by a lot of new info on space travel and cetacean communication. When the ideas of linking some characters and making a story came to mind, I just started writing. Then the characters came more to life and the dialogues started in my mind. That was fun for a while, as I got quite ‘high’ on the power it gave me to create a quasi-real person. More ethical issues than I had considered also started to arise, and I have probably omitted or not fully ‘unpacked’ a whole lot more.
But when the story reached its present form of a short novel or novella of about 20 000 words, it felt finished. What the aliens may do and say, and what the future is for the twins and the rest of humanity on the two Earths, is another story, possibly.
I hope it helps to get Adriana to take that step onto Mars, and back again onto Earth, and then…who knows?
I also hope it helps to improve Maths and Science at schools, and Geography, History, English, Life Skills, Swimming and Emotional Intelligence!
Talking of taking steps, here is a thought from Taj Mahal’s ‘Take a Giant Step’:
‘Remember the feeling as a child,
When you woke up and morning smiled,
It’s time you felt like that again.
There is just no percentage in remembering the past,
It’s time you learn to live again and love at last.
Come with me, leave your yesterdays behind,
And take a giant step outside your mind.’
Peace and love.
Theo.
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