CÉLINE BALLIEUX

/2015

He wanted to go to Mars on the rocket. He went down to the rocket field in the early morning and yelled in through the wire fence at the men in uniform that he wanted to go to Mars. He told them he was a taxpayer, his name was Pritchard, and he had a right to go to Mars. Wasn't he born right here in Ohio? Wasn't he a good citizen? Then why couldn't he go to Mars? He shook his fits at them and told them that he wanted to get away from the Earth, anybody with any sense wanted to get away from the Earth.

Ray Bradbury - The Martian Chronicles

When obsessives are given their object of desire, what do they feel? It was hard to say, really. In a sense their lives were ending; yet something else, some other life, had finally, finally begun. . . . Filled with so many emotions at once, it was impossible not to be confused; it was an interference pattern, some feelings cancelled, others reinforced. Unbuckling from her chair Maya felt a grin contorting her face, and she saw on the faces around her the same helpless grin.

Kim Stanley Robinson - The Mars Trilogy, Red Mars

In my mind it's part of our genetic code that we should explore, see what is beyond the mountain and I would love to be the first person to step on another planet.

Peggy Whitson, biochemistry researcher, retired Nasa astronaut