Space Myths Part I: How China is Taking its Mythos to the Stars
China is currently well into its age of space exploration. With the launch and landing of its Mars exploration programme Tienwen1 earlier in the year, and the docking of its first manned spacecraft, the Shenzhou12, this new frontier is at not only the forefront of China’s consciousness, but the world’s. A glance at the names of China’s space projects, and you’ll see that rather than paying tribute to the proletariat struggle, as programs did in the 1960s and 1970s, the country is now invoking its ancient scholars and scientists who mapped out the stars, and its mystical beings whom they thought lived in the skies. In part one of this series, I look at China’s manned space programme, space station and lunar exploration programme.
Posted in Culture and tagged china, Chinese, culture, lunar, mythology, mythos, myths, Shenzhou, space, space station, spacecraft