June 4: Jurassic Park

A few weeks ago I finished reading "Jurassic Park" by Michael Crichton after being recommended it by a friend. I absolutely loved it; it's very different from the movie (which was a delightful staple of my childhood), and delves much deeper into the science and ethics behind cloning dinosaurs. I very much enjoyed Ian Malcolm's diatribes on everything from chaos theory to evolution. In fact, every line of text that I highlighted while reading was a quote from Malcolm. 

• "You can never predict certain phenomena at all, life is inherently unpredictable" (p. 178). 
• "The history of evolution is that life escapes all barriers. Life breaks free. Life expands to new territories. Painfully, perhaps even dangerously. But life finds a way." (pp. 178-179). 
• "Life is actually a series of encounters in which one event may change those that follow in a wholly unpredictable" (p. 191). [...This reminds me the theory of the multiverse.]
• "Scientists are actually preoccupied with accomplishment. So they are focused on whether they can do something. They never stop to ask if they should do something." (p. 318). 
• "Even pure scientific discovery is an aggressive, penetrative act. It takes big equipment, and it literally changes the world afterward. Particle accelerators scar the land, and leave radioactive byproducts. Astronauts leave trash on the moon. There is always some proof that scientists were there, making their discoveries. Discovery is always a rape of the natural world. Always." (p. 318). 
• "When oxygen was first produced as a waste product by certain plant cells—say, around three billion years ago—it created a crisis for all other life on our planet. Those plant cells were polluting the environment with a deadly poison." (pp. 412-413). 
• "We haven’t got the power to destroy the planet—or to save it. But we might have the power to save ourselves." (p. 413)

[All quotes from Crichton, Michael. Jurassic Park: A Novel. Random House Publishing Group. Kindle Edition.]

After reading the book, I told my husband that I needed to watch the movie again while the book was fresh in my mind, because I was interested in comparing the two. I hadn't seen the movie in many years, and it was delightful to watch it again, especially after having read the book. It was interesting to see all the differences. (Caution: movie spoilers ahead, in case you haven't seen the movie or read the book!)

While reading the book, I immediately noticed that the ages of Lex and Tim were flipped for the movie. In both forms, Tim is obsessed with dinosaurs and Lex is a sports nut who doesn't care for dinosaurs, but in the book, he is the computer whiz and the older of the two siblings (while Lex is the older computer whiz in the movie). I googled this, and apparently the reason for the age change was for casting (as I had predicted); Steven Spielberg has promised Arianna Richards a role in one of his films, and she happened to be older than her book counterpart.

Dr. Alan Grant and Ellie Sattler are not in a romantic relationship in the book, and Grant likes children in the movie (in fact, he LOVES that Tim has read his book and knows all about him and dinosaurs).

There are also a LOT more deaths in the book than in the movie. In the book, the scientist Henry Wu has a much bigger role (and he dies), technically Malcom dies (though he apparently isn't actually dead and comes back in the book sequel), and Hammond dies, as well as pretty much every other staffer on the island (unlike in the movie when most of the staff left on a boat before the fateful night), but interestingly, Gennaro does NOT die!

Hammond is definitely the villain of the book, but he is portrayed as likeable in the movie. He has NO redeeming qualities in the book; he is egotistical and rigid and won't listen to the very wise advice of his colleagues and employees. He cuts all the wrong corners, and definitely cares only about fame, recognition, and money. An especially poignant scene in the book is when Henry Wu suggests they alter the DNA of the dinosaurs to make them tamer, more domesticated, better suited to be "zoo animals" and Hammonds resolutely (and frustratingly) refuses. 

A huge plot point in the book is the fact that dinosaurs have already escaped to nearby islands and to mainland Costa Rica (in fact, the book's first chapters have anecdotes about these mysterious dinosaur appearances and related violence/deaths). And when Lex is up in the tree in the park, she spots velociraptors on the supply ship that was leaving the island, which becomes a huge motivating factor in Lex, Tim, and Grant getting back to the visitor center ASAP so they can alert the authorities to prevent the ship from docking on the mainland and allowing the raptors to escape. (All of that is missing from the movie, but from what I understand, some of this appears in the movie sequel). 

At the end of the book, after the survivors are rescued, the Costa Rican Air Force bomb the island to completely level it and destroy everything on it, and the survivors are basically imprisoned on the mainland during an investigation into what happened, making the end definitely not so cheery as the celebratory end of the movie. (Movie: Yay, we all escaped and everything's gonna be fine! Book: The island is destroyed, most of us died, and those of us who survived can't go home!)

I very much enjoyed both the book and the movie, and I am hurrying through the reading of the "Lost World" so I can watch that movie (which I don't think I've actually ever seen.... or if I have, it was many many years ago and I do not remember any of it). I also need to rewatch Jurassic World, which has a bit more connection to the book.

With delight (and dinosaurs on my mind),

♥Jamie