Where no man has gone before
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"Where no man has gone before" is a saying used in the introductory sequence of all but one of the episodes of the original Star Trek science fiction television series. The complete line, "To boldly go where no man has gone before", refers to the mission of the original starship Enterprise. The complete introductory sequence, read by Captain Kirk, is:
| Space, the final frontier. These are the voyages of the starship Enterprise. Its five-year mission: To explore strange new worlds. To seek out new life and new civilizations. To boldly go where no man has gone before. |
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[edit] Usage in Star Trek
[edit] Fictional backstory
The quote has been used numerous times by various characters of Star Trek, and has in fact been given a complete backstory within the show. It is shown to become corrupted as time passes in the series, and to be willingly changed to reflect the political climate of the various time-periods covered in the Star Trek universe.
The backstory states that the phrase, and in fact the entire mission statement of the Enterprise, originates from a speech given by Zefram Cochrane at the dedication of the Warp 5 Complex in 2119, and shown in the episode "Broken Bow":
| On this site, a powerful engine will be built. An engine that will someday help us to travel a 100 times faster than we can today. Imagine it. Thousands of inhabited planets at our fingertips. And we'll be able to explore those strange, new worlds. And seek out new life and new civilizations. This engine will let us go boldly where no man has gone before. |
In the fictional timeline, the quote became corrupted by the use of the split infinitive "to boldly go." It became both the mission and the motto of Kirk's Enterprise. It appeared on a plaque on the side of the bridge, although it was impossible to make out in normal episodes. Following the events of Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country, which dealt with cross-species racism, the word "man" was changed to the gender- and race-neutral "one" by Kirk:
| Captain's log, stardate 9529.1. This is the final cruise of the starship Enterprise under my command. This ship and her history will shortly become the care of another crew. To them and their posterity will we commit our future. They will continue the voyages we have begun and journey to all the undiscovered countries, boldly going where no man... where no one has gone before. |
The new quote "where no one has gone before" was then adopted as the mission and motto of the following starships Enterprise. It can be seen on the golden plaque on the side of bridge of the Enterprise-D.
[edit] Real usage
The second pilot episode of Star Trek was called "Where No Man Has Gone Before". It was also the only episode of the series not to feature Kirk's speech in the introductory sequence. The speech was also absent from the previous pilot, "The Cage", although that episode is not always considered part of the original series. This makes "The Cage" the only episode related to the original series not to feature the quote in any way.
The gender-neutral version of the quote, "where no one has gone before", was first included in the introductory sequence of Star Trek: The Next Generation. It was read by the Enterprise's new captain, Jean-Luc Picard, at the beginning of every episode of that series. A first-season episode of that series was also called "Where No One Has Gone Before". It is worth noting that, despite the similar names, the plot of this episode bears no connection to that of "Where No Man Has Gone Before".
[edit] Origin of the quote
Although Star Trek creator Gene Roddenberry never explained how he came up with the quote, some [1] suggest it was taken from a White House booklet published in 1958. The Introduction to Outer Space, produced in an effort to garner support for the national space programme in the wake of the Sputnik flight, read on its first page:
| The first of these factors is the compelling urge of man to explore and to discover, the thrust of curiosity that leads men to try to go where no one has gone before. Most of the surface of the earth has now been explored and men now turn on the exploration of outer space as their next objective. [2] |
[edit] Usage in popular culture
- The phrase was used by NASA in the title of their 1989 publication Where No Man Has Gone Before: A History of Apollo Lunar Exploration Missions [3].
- An episode of the Futurama TV series that involved Star Trek was called "Where No Fan Has Gone Before". The episode involves the characters of Futurama meeting the cast of the original series of Star Trek, and contains numerous references to events that took place in the episodes of Star Trek.
- A futuristic level in the videogame Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Turtles in Time is called "Starbase: Where No Turtle Has Gone Before".
- The character of Garth says the line in the movie Wayne's World.
- British humorist and science-fiction author Douglas Adams parodied the split infinitive "to boldly go" in his series The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, describing the long-lost heroic age of the Galactic Empire, when bold adventurers dared "to boldly split infinitives that no man had split before".
[edit] See also
[edit] References
- ^ Dwaybe A. Day, "Boldly going: Star Trek and spaceflight", in The Space Review, 28 November 2005. URL accessed on 15 August 2006.
- ^ The White House, "Introduction to Outer Space", U.S. Government Printing Office, Washington D.C., 26 March 1958. URL accessed on 15 August 2006.
- ^ W. David Compton, "Where No Man Has Gone Before: A History of Apollo Lunar Exploration Missions", NASA Special Publication-4214, NASA History Series, 1989. URL accessed on 15 August 2006.
