It&#x27;s a great reading list, but I was also surprised not to find Arthur C. Clarke&#x27;s &quot;Childhood&#x27;s End&quot; in there. I had always assumed his song &quot;Oh! You Pretty Things&quot; was about that book. While the book and the song share themes, they are apparently independent. I did like this passage I found online about the themes though [1]:<p><i>The resonance of “Oh! You Pretty Things” comes from how it uses these Nietzschean SF trappings as a metaphor for how a generation regards its successor with longing, fear and resentment (never more so than with the so-called Greatest Generation and their children the Boomers), or, even closer to home, how a parent can regard his or her children. Once you become a parent, you lose precedence in your own life—your own needs and desires are shunted aside, and you spend years as servant and guide to your replacement, who will go on to have richer experiences and greater opportunities than you ever had (that’s if you’re lucky). More bluntly, once you reproduce, your genetic purpose is fulfilled and all that remains is age, redundancy and death.</i><p>[1] <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;bowiesongs.wordpress.com&#x2F;2010&#x2F;02&#x2F;05&#x2F;oh-you-pretty-things&#x2F;" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;bowiesongs.wordpress.com&#x2F;2010&#x2F;02&#x2F;05&#x2F;oh-you-pretty-th...</a>