Sciencfikcio & Esperanto / Esperanto in science fiction (5)

Reported via Locus Online, 21 January 2003:

Los Angeles Times, January 6, 2003
Another article about Mr. Sci-fi, Forrest J Ackerman.

During a chat with a visitor Ackerman suddenly leans forward. In a mishmash of what sounds like French, Spanish and Italian that is somehow comprehensible to any liberal arts graduate, he tells a visitor her eyes are beautiful, her height striking. He is speaking Esperanto. "In the 20s and 30s, some science fiction stories of the future mentioned that everyone would one day speak Esperanto," he says. "For me it was like time travel. It was like going 100 years into the future. And if I could bring back a bottle of something, I would be thrilled. At least I could bring back the language everyone would be speaking."

Something about Ackerman's snippet of Esperanto seems to capture the soul of science fiction, and of Ackerman himself. It speaks to a utopian vision cherished by people who fantasize about a world where Martians and Klingons and humans can all speak the same language and get along. It is the view of an optimist, the view of a man whose slogan is "Save humanity with science and sanity."