How SpaceX set off a new race to commercialise space
Ashlee Vance charts the contest in “When the Heavens Went on Sale”
Kwajalein Atoll is as close to the middle of nowhere as you can get. Some 3,000km (1,900 miles) from Papua New Guinea, and almost 4,000km from Honolulu, this tiny speck of land in the middle of the Pacific Ocean became, on September 28th 2008, the unlikely site of an improbable revolution.
This article appeared in the Culture section of the print edition under the headline “Reach for the stars”
Culture May 6th 2023
From the May 6th 2023 edition
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Ovation inflation has spread from Broadway to London’s West End
Why do dud plays get standing ovations?
Are mystics kooks or valuable disrupters?
A realist’s refreshing take on mysticism
Sex and Snow White: how Grimm should children’s books be?
The German authors suggest very, but today trends run the opposite way
Jimmy Lai’s trial is a headline-worthy example of injustice
A new biography aims to keep the public’s attention on the pro-democracy tycoon
Millennials and Gen Z are falling hard for stuffed animals
Plushies are cute, cuddly and costly
Ten years after the Charlie Hebdo attack, satire is under siege
Public support is waning for the right to offend