The Sounds Of America: 'Pale Blue Dot'
1A
NPR
4.3 • 4.5K Ratings
🗓️ 23 April 2023
⏱️ 17 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
In this edition of "The Sounds of America," we speak about a recording from astrophysicist and author Carl Sagan. He was committed to making science more accessible through his speaking engagements, his media projects (such as the television series "Cosmos"), and his popular science books.
In 1994, Sagan published a book called "Pale Blue Dot: A Vision of the Human Future in Space." It was inspired by a photograph of Earth taken from so far away in space that the planet looks like a pale blue dot. Sagan voiced the audiobook of Pale Blue Dot himself. And this recording has been selected for the 2023 National Recording Registry.
Want to add a recording you think should be added to the National Recording Registry? Your nomination must meet three conditions; there needs to be an existing physical copy of the recording, it has to be at least ten years old, and it has to have had some significant impact on American culture. Just send the library an email recregistry@loc.gov.The Sounds of America is produced by Jennie Cataldo for Accompany Studios.
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | You're listening to the 1A podcast. |
| 0:09.7 | I'm Jen White. |
| 0:11.3 | Last week we kicked off this year's Sounds of America series with Carla Hayden, America's |
| 0:15.9 | 14th Librarian of Congress. |
| 0:18.6 | Every year 25 audio recordings are added to the national recording registry at the Library |
| 0:23.5 | of Congress. |
| 0:24.5 | Today, we spotlight one of them. |
| 0:26.8 | A spoken word treasure from astrophysicist and author Carl Sagan. |
| 0:32.0 | To begin our story, we hear from someone who knew Carl Sagan very well. |
| 0:38.1 | My name is Annie Drian and it was the greatest honor of my life to think and to write and |
| 0:48.5 | to build a family with Carl Sagan. |
| 0:53.4 | And I got to be the creative director of the Voyager Interstellar message and any unfolding |
| 1:02.3 | of the project was the unfolding of our great love for each other. |
| 1:08.1 | A true love. |
| 1:12.2 | In the late summer of 1977, two unmanned spacecraft Voyager 1 and 2 lifted off from Cape |
| 1:19.2 | Canal Roller Top Titan's Centaur Rockets. |
| 1:24.8 | Traveling uninterrupted through interstellar space, the Voyagers will endure forever. |
| 1:29.6 | Long after everything man has ever built, has crumbled into dust. |
| 1:34.4 | It's hard now to recapture the feeling back in the late 60s and early 70s when we were |
| 1:41.0 | doing something for the first time in history when we were exploring the planets for the first |
| 1:45.7 | time. |
| 1:47.3 | I'm John Lomburg, I'm an artist and I worked closely with Carl Sagan on most of his media |
... |
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