April 18, 2025, 1:53pm
By now you’ve for sure seen the footage of the latest Blue Origin flight, this one passengered by Katy Perry, Gayle King, Lauren Sánchez, among others. The flight technically crossed the Kármán Line into space, on a rocket courtesy of Jeff Amazon. And despite having its own mission patch, the high-flying ride is getting pretty universally panned as an out-of-touch stunt. What the passengers have been saying about their trip after the fact hasn’t been particularly inspiring either.
It got me wondering who would be worth hearing about space travel from. If you could take a classic author along on a space ride, who would it be? Would they want to go? And would what they wrote about their trip be interesting?
I put together a little four-quadrant chart on who would go, and if they’d be worth reading. If you want to play along at home, here’s a blank grid you can fill out!
(Click for a bigger, zoomable image!)
