Jurassic Park (novel)

Jurassic Park

First edition cover
Author	Michael Crichton
Cover artist	Chip Kidd
Language	English
Genre	Science fiction
Publisher	Alfred A. Knopf
Publication date	November 20, 1990
Publication place	United States
Media type	Print (hardcover and paperback)
Pages	399
ISBN	0-394-58816-9
OCLC	22511027
Dewey Decimal	813/.54 20
LC Class	PS3553.R48 J87 1990
Followed by	The Lost World

Jurassic Park is a 1990 science fiction novel written by Michael Crichton; it is a cautionary tale about genetic engineering that presents the collapse of a zoological park which showcases genetically recreated dinosaurs to illustrate the mathematical concept of chaos theory and its real-world implications. A sequel titled The Lost World, also written by Crichton, was published in 1995. Two years later, both novels were republished as a single book titled Michael Crichton's Jurassic World.

Jurassic Park received a 1993 film adaptation of the same name directed by Steven Spielberg. The film was a critical and commercial success, becoming the highest-grossing film ever at the time and spawning the Jurassic Park franchise, including multiple film sequels.

Plot

In 1989, strange animal attacks occur throughout Costa Rica. One of the species behind the attacks is believed to be Procompsognathus, an extinct dinosaur. Paleontologist Alan Grant and his paleobotanist colleague Ellie Sattler are contacted to confirm the animal's identity, but are abruptly whisked away by billionaire John Hammond, the founder of bioengineering firm InGen, for a weekend visit to a "biological preserve" he has established on Isla Nublar, near Costa Rica.

The "preserve" is a cover for the construction of Jurassic Park, a theme park showcasing living dinosaurs. Construction is nearly complete; the dinosaurs have been recreated using ancient DNA found in the blood inside insects that were fossilized and preserved in amber. Gaps in the genetic code were filled in with reptilian, avian, or amphibian DNA. All dinosaurs are engineered to be female, to prevent unauthorized breeding.

The recent attacks have made Hammond's investors skittish. Hammond requests that Grant and Sattler tour the park and endorse it ahead of the park's opening. They are joined by mathematician and chaos theorist Ian Malcolm, and a lawyer representing the investors, Donald Gennaro: both of whom are pessimistic about the park. Malcolm, consulted before the park's creation, is emphatic that the park will collapse. Hammond also invites his grandchildren, Tim and Alexis 'Lex' Murphy, to join the tour. The park staff present comprise engineer John Arnold, biotechnologist Henry Wu, game warden Robert Muldoon, PR manager Ed Regis, chief programmer Dennis Nedry, veterinarian Harding, and several laborers. While touring the park, Grant finds a Velociraptor eggshell, seemingly proving Malcolm's assertion that the dinosaurs are breeding against the geneticists' design. Grant deduces that using frog DNA to fill gaps in the dinosaurs' genetic code resulted in an environment that was conducive to dichogamy, causing some of the female dinosaurs to become males and establish a breeding population. The park's automated computer tally failed to include newborns, having been programmed to stop counting once the expected total number of animals was found.

Nedry, disgruntled with Hammond due to the latter's pushing out-of-scope work in developing the park's software systems, commits corporate espionage for Lewis Dodgson: an employee of InGen's rival Biosyn. Activating a backdoor he wrote into the park's software, he disables the security systems and steals frozen embryos for the park's fifteen dinosaur species. Attempting to rendezvous with Dodgson's agent, he becomes lost due to a tropical storm. Without Nedry to reactivate the park's systems, the dinosaurs can roam freely due to electric fences being turned off. He is killed by a Dilophosaurus, and a Tyrannosaurus rex attacks the tour group. Grant saves the children before escaping with them into the jungle, Regis is killed by a juvenile T. rex, and Malcolm is gravely injured but rescued by Muldoon and Gennaro.

The park staff try rebooting the park's computers to reverse Nedry's sabotage but fail to notice that only the auxiliary power generator restarts. Its fuel supply soon runs out, again shutting down the park. The park's intelligent and aggressive Velociraptors escape their enclosure before killing Arnold and Wu. Grant, and the children make their way back to the island's control complex by rafting down a jungle river, narrowly escaping multiple dinosaur attacks. Grant turns on the park's main generators, and Tim reactivates the park's systems. Gennaro recalls a supply boat traveling from the island to the mainland, acting on the suspicions of Grant and the children that dinosaurs are aboard.

Hammond, walking outdoors while contemplating InGen's future, is killed by a pack of Procompsognathus after he falls down a hill and breaks his ankle. Grant, Sattler, Muldoon, and Gennaro find the wild raptor nests and compare hatched eggs with the island's revised population tally, before realizing that raptors are attempting to migrate off the island.

Malcolm supposedly dies from his injuries. Everyone is evacuated by the Costa Rican Air Force, which declared the dinosaurs hazardous and razed the island with napalm. The survivors are detained in a Costa Rican hotel. Weeks later, Grant is visited by Dr. Martin Gutierrez: an American doctor who lives in Costa Rica. Gutierrez informs Grant that an unknown pack of animals has been migrating through the Costa Rican jungle, indicating that dinosaurs have escaped the island and returned to Earth's ecosystem.

Development

Jurassic Park was written by Michael Crichton, pictured in 2002

Crichton began working on the project in 1981, but soon set it aside because there "seemed to be an enormous mania about dinosaurs" at the time, and he was hesitant to "ride a current fashion". He eventually proceeded after concluding that the public's fascination with dinosaurs "was permanent." The novel began as a screenplay, completed by Crichton in 1983, about a graduate student who recreates a pterosaur. According to Crichton, "It was a very different story. It was about the person who did the cloning, operating alone and in secret. It just wasn't satisfactory." He said further, "I just waited to see if I could ever figure out how to make it work. It took quite a few years."

Eventually, given his reasoning that genetic research is expensive and "there is no pressing need to create a dinosaur", Crichton concluded that it would emerge from a "desire to entertain", leading to a wildlife park of extinct animals. From there, Crichton chose to proceed with the story as a novel rather than a screenplay, later explaining "it wasn't clear that anyone would ever make this story into a movie, because it would be very expensive."

The novel was originally told from the point of view of a young boy, who is present at the park as the dinosaurs escape. Crichton had a handful of people who he relied upon to give opinions on his early drafts; the group unanimously "hated" his first draft of Jurassic Park but could not pinpoint why. Crichton wrote two more drafts, which also failed to impress the group. One of the readers then realized that the story would function better if it were told from an adult point of view. Crichton followed this advice and eventually won over the group.

Themes

1917 skeletal diagram of Tyrannosaurus published by Henry Fairfield Osborn, which was the basis of the novel's cover.

Jurassic Park critiques the dystopian potentialities of modern science. Ian Malcolm is the conscience that reminds John Hammond of the immoral and unnatural path that has been taken. The final condition of the park is epitomized by the word "hell", which highlights the nature of Hammond's sacrilegious attempt.

Crichton's novel is another version of Mary Shelley's 1818 novel Frankenstein; or, The Modern Prometheus, where humanity creates something without truly knowing anything about it. Henry Wu is unable to name the things that he creates, which alludes to Victor Frankenstein not knowing what to call his flawed imitation of God's creation. The immorality of these actions lead to human destruction, echoing Frankenstein.

As Dale Speirs notes at p. 18 of "Vanished Worlds: Part 6" in Opuntia 483 (Sept. 2020), Jurassic Park resembles Katharine Metcalf Roof's November 1930 Weird Tales story "A Million Years After", about dinosaurs hatching from millions-of-years-old eggs.

Similar to how his other novels represent science and technology as both hazardous and life-changing, Crichton's novel highlights the hypocrisy and superiority complex of the scientific community that inspired John Hammond to re-create dinosaurs and treat them as commodities, which only lead to eventual catastrophe. Crichton uses the opening of the book to highlight the shift of scientific research from occurring in universities for the betterment of all mankind, to private labs where research is conducted "...in secret...in haste, and for-profit". The similar fears of atomic power from the Cold War are adapted by Crichton onto the anxieties evoked by genetic manipulation.

Reception

The book became a bestseller and Crichton's signature novel, with largely favorable reviews by critics. In a review for The New York Times, Christopher Lehmann-Haupt described it as "a superior specimen of the [Frankenstein] myth" and "easily the best of Mr. Crichton's novels to date". Writing for Entertainment Weekly, Gene Lyons held that the book was "hard to beat for sheer intellectual entertainment" largely because it was "[f]illed with diverting, up-to-date information in easily digestible form". Both Lyons' Entertainment Weekly piece and Andrew Ferguson's review in the Los Angeles Times, however, criticized Crichton's characterization as heavy-handed and his characters as clichéd. Ferguson further complained about Ian Malcolm's "dime-store philosophizing" and predicted that the film adaptation of the book would be "undoubtedly trashy". He conceded that the book's "only real virtue" was "its genuinely interesting discussions of dinosaurs, DNA research, paleontology and chaos theory".

In 1996, it was awarded the Secondary BILBY Award.

Adaptation

The novel eventually led to the Jurassic Park franchise, starting with a 1993 film adaptation directed by Steven Spielberg. It was distributed by Universal Pictures, which acquired the film rights to the novel in 1990. Crichton performed early work on the film's screenplay, with David Koepp eventually taking over.

The film adaptation excised much of the scientific dialogue, with Crichton saying, "I feel very strongly that books should be the best books they can be, and you should not worry about what the movie will do. In movies, a little bit of that kind of dialogue goes a long way. A movie like Jurassic Park is not the format to have extended discussions on the scientific paradigm." The film was a critical and commercial success, leading to a sequel novel by Crichton, titled The Lost World and published in 1995. Spielberg returned to direct the 1997 film adaptation, titled The Lost World: Jurassic Park.

No further novels were written by Crichton, although the film series would continue, with Spielberg involved as executive producer. Jurassic Park III was released in 2001, and the Jurassic World series began in 2015. Although not based directly on the novels, these films do include elements from the novel that were unused in the first film.

See also

• John W. Campbell's 1938 story Who Goes There?, about an alien monster in the Arctic thawed out and revived after 20 million years
• The Cursed Earth, a Judge Dredd storyline by Pat Mills in 2000 AD from 1978 that introduces the idea of a dinosaur theme park, with dinosaurs cloned from DNA
• Westworld, Crichton's earlier 1973 film also about a malfunctioning theme park
• Carnosaur, a 1984 novel with similar themes

Bibliography

• DeSalle, Rob & Lindley, David (1997). The Science of Jurassic Park and The Lost World. Or How to Build a Dinosaur. New York: BasicBooks. ISBN 0-465-07379-4.

External links

• Isla Nublar novel map Archived 2017-09-20 at the Wayback Machine
• Official website
• Jurassic Park title listing at the Internet Speculative Fiction Database
• Jurassic Park Archived 2015-06-17 at the Wayback Machine at the official Michael Crichton website