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By Harshini Perera
Michael Crichton the author of `Jurassic Park’ and its sequel `The
Lost World’ was famous in Sri Lanka as well as in other countries. He
was born in Chicago, Illinois on October 23, 1942 to a journalist.
He had a passion for writing when compared to his three siblings, and
were all raised in Roslyn, New York. Crichton, at the tender age of 14
wrote a column to the New York Times. He studied Anthropology as an
undergraduate and went on to become the Henry Russell Shaw Travelling
Fellow from 1964 to 1965 and visiting Lecturer in Anthropology at the
University of Cambridge in the United Kingdom in 1965.
John Lange and Jeffery Hudson were the two pen names under which he
started writing his fiction which belongs mostly to the action genre. He
won Mystery Writers of America’s Edgar Allan Poe Award for Best novel in
1969 under the pen name, Jeffery Hudson for A Case of Need.
 This
is a medical thriller in which a Boston Pathologist, Dr. John Berry,
investigates an apparent illegal abortion conducted by an Obstetrician
friend which caused the early demise of a young woman. It proves a
turning point in Crichton’s future novels, in which technology becomes
the subject matter although this is about medical practice.
His first novel was “Odds On” was released in 1966. Out of his three
novels published in 1969, his second novel, “The Andromeda Strain”
established him as a best selling author. Under the directorship of
Robert Wise this was turned into a film. Crichton’s third novel of 1969
was the “Venom Business” in which smuggling snakes out of Mexico under
the guise of medical research became the subject incorporated thriller.
In 1970 too he published three novels, namely, “Drug of Choice”,
Dealing: Or the Berkeley-to-Boston Forty-Brick Lost-bag Blues’ and Grave
Descend.
In 1985, he published Sphere; a fiction which starts as a science
fiction but later turns in a psychological revelation of the human mind.
It was also adapted into a film, `Sphere’ in 1998 directed by Barry
Levinson.
In 1990 he published the novel, `Jurassic Park’ which was well
presented with the mathematical concept of chaos theory and collapses of
an amusement park. This was adapted into a film in 1993 and became the
highest grossing of $ 914 million which a film ever in film history at
the time has recorded.
In 1995 Crichton published The Lost World as a sequel to `Jurassic
Park’ which was made into a film two years later under the directorship
of Spielberg who was the director of Jurassic Park. The book `Airframe’
published in 1996 continues his overall theme of humans in human-machine
interaction.
Through his next production `Timeline’ in 1999, he directly addressed
the quantum physics and time travel. In 2002, it was `Prey on
nanotechnology’, The book `State of Fear’ in 2004 touched the global
warming and climate change while his final novel `Next’ was printed in
2006.
Apart from fiction he has written many non-fiction articles to serve
the purpose of his own observation in the field. He was renowned not
only as a novelist but has also written and directed several motion
pictures and TV series. ER is an instance for his multi-faceted skills. |
