Chapter 10, Ship of Fools Summary

The passengers on Universe consist of Dr. Floyd, five other famous or near-famous people, the crew, and five young scientists. The famous or near-famous people are Victor Willis, a popular science journalist, Yva Merlin, an actress, Dimitri Mihailovich, a classical music composer, Clifford Greenberg, an astronaut, and Margaret M'Bala, a fiction author. Her fellow passengers christened her Maggie M.

Chapter 10, Ship of Fools Analysis

The novel, Ship of Fools, was written by Katherine Anne Porter (1890-1980) and published in 1962. This was her only novel, and she is better known for her short stories, essays and journalism. However, the ship-of-fools parallel works at a couple of levels. Porter's book is highly critical of political ideology, a suggestion that some kind of disastrous action might evolve from the Universe's flight to Haley's comet. The second, more obscure reference is...