By Tristyn Kelly
NASA. Apollo 11. https://www.nasa.gov/mission/apollo-11/. Accessed 29 Apr. 2024.
The Premise
There was once a time when two of the most powerful countries in the entire world shared the same national goal to ascend above the clouds to push the limits of human-made technology (the closest thing we have to magic) and embark firsthand on a search into the highest unknown. Through the analysis of the primary characters and their respective actions towards the period known as the Space Race, a close resemblance to the narrative Fairy Tale Jack and the Beanstalk is revealed; themes of risk versus reward, a remarkable number of Propp Functions, and of course the duality in motivation behind the drive to explore above and beyond.
“Why go to the moon?”
Leading with the perspective of the United States president during the most predominant years of the race, John F. Kennedy’s speech ‘Why go to the moon?’ starts with setting the context for the period as he states, “We meet in an hour of change and challenge, in a decade of hope and fear, in an age of both knowledge and ignorance; the greater our knowledge increases the greater our ignorance unfolds.” (Rice University) Kennedy explores the duality between knowledge and ignorance; by casting light on a new subject of the physical world, a greater shadow emerges and outlines the unknown aspects around that subject. This statement is a pretext for the gruelingly exponential pace of technological advancement. Each new discovery comes with its own list of desired rewards and unknown risks. The United States is one of the world’s countries that consistently chooses to take risks with the reasoning entirely related to the high significance of the reward. Further, the US makes these choices spontaneously as noted by President Kennedy when he stated, “We will have literally reached the stars, before midnight tonight; this is a breathtaking pace, and such a pace cannot help, but create new wail, as it dispels old; new ignorance, new problems, new dangers, surely the opening vistas of space promise high cost and hardships, as well as high reward.” (Rice University) In a similar decision-making process to Jack, President Kennedy explains that he is fully aware of the risks involved, now informed by multiple disastrous failed rocket launches such as Vanguard TV3, and chooses to proceed at an accelerated pace because the reward is that great. (NASA)
Kennedy presses on to state, “The United States was not built by those who waited and rested and wish to look behind them; this country was conquered by those who move forward,” (Rice University) with applause from the audience throughout. This statement is somewhat aggressively charged; while audience members may have learned otherwise in their history classes, the United States as we know it was stolen from Native Americans and the history of this injustice and the discrimination that followed was purposefully erased and considered incorrect in most high schools at this point. Kennedy himself as a president most likely fully understood this context and chose to use the word ‘conquered’ showing full support to the narrative of the US being built on stolen land and financially reinforced through ill-gotten funds. Similar aggressive undertones are used to describe Jack’s status when arriving at the giant’s house as being “as hungry as a hunter.” (Jacobs 7) The idea of hunting as the action of overwhelming one’s prey (conquering unsuspecting natives), and then consuming and benefiting from that prey (killing some and turning others into slaves) is shared between the two narratives. Kennedy explains that the US must now conquer a new frontier only this time, in a direct race with another country. He states, “It is one of the greatest adventures of all time and no nation which expects to be the leader of other nations can expect to stay behind in this race for space.” From Kennedy’s perspective, the significance of this race is primarily based on the need for national political dominance on a new plateau. The desire to make one’s nation the leader of others is paralleled by the wish to digest the given rights of others for greater power to oneself. Similarly, Jack steals the various treasures of the giant in an attempt to gain power for himself. By outsmarting the giant and making off with what he can carry, Jack proves his dominance over the giant and is only satisfied with his power once he’s stolen every prized possession of the giant and stands proudly above his corpse. Kennedy’s vision of the country as the leader of this new medium of territory requires the nation to not only make it there but be the first; this rules out the prospect of any other nation taking dominance over the recently discovered plateau.
Internal Government
To cross-examine the government’s external perspective with that of an internal entity, the CIA touches on the matter in declassified official documents regarding the Space Race and their early support towards the Earth Satellite Project as they state, “The importance of this program in connection with psychological warfare. The announcement of the US program for launching an earth satellite as part of the International Geophysical Year has already caused favorable reactions abroad. It is essential that this initial success not be discounted by failure to actually launch a satellite within the time limit, or by the Soviets to anticipate it with a launching of their own due to our failure to press ahead vigorously.” (Central Intelligence Agency) The specific use of the space program as psychological warfare is far from the potential and type of political advantage the US seeks to gain given in Kennedy’s speech. The competitive themes in language are shared between the CIA’s document and Kennedy’s speech, but the CIA’s statements regarding the collaborative direction of space which Kennedy reflected full national commitment to is mentioned in a clouded and politically ambiguous manner. From the same document the CIA states, “CIA would be a principal user and beneficiary of the data collected by such means: d. From a national point of view, the launching of the satellite under the auspices of an international, cooperative scientific effort will enable progress to be made toward more sophisticated and instrumented satellites without necessarily involving a test of the principle of ‘Freedom of Space,’ the implications of which for the United States are as yet undetermined.” (Central Intelligence Agency) In other words, full support of the first primary space exploration project conducted by the US will receive full support so long as the concept that all nations are allowed equal rights in space is not trialed. The CIA encourages scientific collaboration as it could only benefit the US but not the political collaboration created by nationality being irrelevant when something or someone is 300,000 feet above the Earth’s surface(NASA/JPL). It is the differing rhetoric behind the CIA’s internal argument towards space exploration and the external argument given by the President of the United States to his people that leads to the misleading nature of the government’s reasoning behind taking the risk and racing to the moon. The reasoning fed to the public was primarily based on the prospects of discovery and the drive to lead the charge into space so that the US could influence the future of the realm and shape it towards political collaboration and “freedom.” The reasoning commonly understood by the internal government was to gain political leverage on new territory and reinforce the fear cast on the enemies that reside on Earth. The weaponized potential of the advanced technology needed to explore space is only mentioned in a statement that lasts about six seconds in the twenty-two-minute speech by Kennedy; every CIA document regarding the reasoning behind early funding or support for space exploration contains at least two paragraphs mentioning the application of either the rocket itself or a satellite delivered by a rocket being used for military purposes. Both sides display the yearning for advancement, only the president makes it seem like we merely seek to explore and push our capabilities while the CIA shows the true motivation is to take total dominance over both the sky and the ground. Jack too initially states himself to the giant’s wife as an explorer disadvantaged by lack of supper the night before. While the giant’s unsuspecting wife does not know Jack has a much greater appetite than simply food, we as the readers are fully informed of Jack’s deeper desire for treasure and purpose; these of course stem from his and his mother’s financial need and his uselessness as a common worker since getting denied by all in town. While the themes of the overall stories parallel each other, taking a closer look at the defining plot points of a fairy and applying them to the main events of the Space Race alludes further connection between the two narratives.
Propp Functions
Breaking down the space race into Vladimir Propp’s 31 Functions reveals the era’s close resemblance to the narrative of a fairy tale. Dwight D. Eisenhower, the 34th president, spent the majority of his second term from 1957 to 1961 easing the tensions with the Soviet Union as the Cold War began to heat up (The White House). Once his term is over, we see our first Propp Function Absentation. Eisenhower leaves the house and Kennedy enters with interdiction from the previous president who tried to avoid the idea of space travel as a race. Kennedy sees it as the greatest adventure the nation has ever embarked on and violates the interdiction by proceeding to invest more funding and resources towards winning the race (Rice University). Reconnaissance from both sides is littered throughout the Cold War with CIA documents explicitly stating that the use of satellite technology for espionage would be the primary interest of the CIA regarding their investment in the program (Central Intelligence Agency). Paralleling the US as the hero and the USSR as the villain (purely because the US ends up as the ‘victor’ in the end), the Soviet space program stayed entirely private about their discoveries and initially stated that they had no interest in an expedition to the moon when in reality they had an entire division for it. Additionally, trickery is played out by USSR news sources both to the nation’s and world’s public eye by changing the name of failed missions to something unrelated to their intended goal like when Venera 1VANo.1, a rocket intended to orbit Venus failed and was renamed Sputnik 7, announced as a heavy satellite test mission (Wade). With the context set a cross-examination of the primary Propp functions used in Jack & the Beanstalk and those of the Space Race will show greater relation between the tale and the era respectively. The first function examined is lack. In Jack’s case, he lacks both the financials his mother requires and the ability to produce such financials through manual labor. His lack drives him to seek alternative ways of helping his mother and gaining her approval such as his ascension to the sky. For the United States, the nation is disadvantaged by a lack of development towards space exploration in comparison to the competition. This drives the government and its space agencies to increase the pace of advancement. Spatial transference between two kingdoms or guidance is the next primary function present in both stories. For Jack, the beanstalk promises adventures to the skyworld where treasure and danger await. For the US government, rockets that bring their nation’s people into space mean political leverage but also the risk of total publicized failure. Finally, the last Propp function shared by the two stories is pursuit or chase. Jack is chased down the beanstalk by the giant at the end of his story and takes his victory by severing his connection to the skyworld, sending the giant toppling down. This is where the two stories differ immensely in plot. The chase for the first-place position on the moon as a symbol of political dominance between capitalism and communism was the core and strongest motivating factor that drove both sides throughout the course of the space race. Even after the tragedies of the Apollo 1 rocket explosion killing its entire crew and Soyuz 1 when a Russian astronaut plummeted to his death after his parachute malfunctioned on reentry, neither side relented in their struggle (Royal Museums Greenwich). From my perspective, the Space Race ended with an unrecognized arrival as the US put the first human on the moon and accomplished what the government saw as the primary win condition of the race. While the United States and its leaders certainly went through what they stated was the most important goal, nothing new was discovered from this feat. No new horizons were expanded and to an extent, the US returned with unfounded claims. Kennedy explained that making it to the first moon would allow some kind of authority over the cosmic body and that we would use this authority to make the new frontier one that is democratic and collaborative. Through actions such as David Scott on Apollo 15 delivering the Fallen Astronauts tribute for the recognition of both US and USSR crew members who died pursuing the stars, the difficult task of actually uniting two of the most powerful and politically competitive nations is made possible (Royal Museums Greenwich). On July 15 1975 the true victory for both sides was achieved when Tom Stafford and Alexei Leonov handshake aboard the Apollo-Soyuz inside the airlock chamber; two rockets, one American and one Russian, mated in a wedding-like cosmic celebration of internationality. The Space Race is a story for the ages and rises far beyond the simplicities of a fairy tale like Jack & the Beanstalk, but in the drive towards the sky, in pursuit of something that means much more than its literal value, and the choice to take the risk for the reward are all certainly shared attributes between the two narratives.
To boldly go
The Space Race is a story for the ages and rises far beyond the simplicities of a fairy tale like Jack & the Beanstalk, but in the drive towards the sky, in pursuit of something that means much more than its literal value, and the choice to take the risk for the reward are all certainly shared attributes between the two narratives. After the United States got a man on the moon, the nation never set up camp or established a long stay in space until plans for the international space station were released nearly thirty years later. While the plots differ heavily, the themes at the end of the story of the space race do parallel those of Jack and the Beanstalk as the main stalk Jack had access to is now cut and he does not seek another magic bean. The US still expends tremendous amounts of money towards space exploration but the public and political attention received by both sides of the space race has yet to be reached since. The dangers of one side having superior intercontinental ballistic missile technology are still present, as is the desire to have technological dominance in space. What we lack now is the adventure Kennedy spoke about at Rice University regarding why we intended to join the Space Race. Nationality aside, this was the first time humanity ever put one of its own on something we all see every night no matter where you live. In that achievement, there is a certain, almost magical, intense motivation based purely on curiosity.
Works Sited
Central Intelligence Agency. “CIA FINANCIAL SUPPORT FOR EARTH SATELLITE PROJECT.” FOIA, CIA, 7 Sept. 2017, https://www.cia.gov/readingroom/document/0002287889. Accessed 14 Apr. 2024.
NASA. “NASA – NSSDCA – Spacecraft.” Wayback Machine, NASA, https://web.archive.org/web/20231003175643/https://nssdc.gsfc.nasa.gov/nmc/spacecraft/display.action?id=VAGT3. Accessed 29 Apr. 2024.
NASA/JPL. “Educator Guide: How Far Away Is Space?” NASA/JPL Edu, 30 Sept. 2021, https://www.jpl.nasa.gov/edu/teach/activity/how-far-away-is-space/. Accessed 29 Apr. 2024.
Rice University. “‘Why Go to the Moon?’ – John F. Kennedy at Rice University.” YouTube, Video, 12 Sept. 2018, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QXqlziZV63k&t=1124s. Accessed 28 Apr. 2024.
Royal Museums Greenwich. “Space Race Timeline.” Royal Observatory, Royal Museums Greenwich, https://www.rmg.co.uk/stories/topics/space-race-timeline. Accessed 14 Apr. 2024.
Tatar, Maria. The Classic Fairy Tales (Norton Critical Editions). 2nd ed., W. W. Norton & Company, 2017, p. 368.
The White House. “Dwight D. Eisenhower.” The White House, 12 Jan. 2021, https://www.whitehouse.gov/about-the-white-house/presidents/dwight-d-eisenhower/. Accessed 28 Apr. 2024.
Universal Studios. “Navy’s Satellite. Vanguard Fails in Second Launching.” Internet Archive, Video, 29 June 1958, https://archive.org/details/1958-02-06_Navys_Satellite. Accessed 14 Apr. 2024.Wade, Mark. “Venera 1VA.” Astronautix, 7 Jan. 2010, https://web.archive.org/web/20100909085012/http://www.astronautix.com/craft/venra1va.htm. Accessed 28 Apr. 2024.
