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"I am first of all not a science fiction writer … I write, I suppose, what the Latin Americans call magic realism."
- Harlan Ellison
 |
| Green Bullet | ||
| A very compact (for 1950) radio transceiver, worn in the ear like a hearing aid. |
In the near future presented in this famous novel, no one reads anymore; everyone gets their ideas and news from clowns and good-looking news morons on huge television screens in their homes. Obviously a very far-fetched scenario.
In addition, books are illegal and "firemen" exist to set fire to homes with books in them. Guy Montag is one such fireman, who loses his faith in the system and wants to know more about the world of ideas that he is missing. He meets Faber, who offers to go with Montag via a small transceiver hidden in his ear.
| "My cowardice is of such a passion, complementing the revolutionary spirit that lives in its shadow, I was forced to design this." He picked up a small green object no larger than a .22 bullet. "It looks like a seashell radio." "And something more! It listens! If you put it in your ear, Montag, I can sit comfortably home, warming my frightened bones, and hear and analyze the firemen's world, find its weaknesses, without danger. I'm the queen bee, safe in the hive. You will be the drone, the traveling ear..." Montag placed the green bullet in his ear |
| Technovelgy from Fahrenheit 451,
by Ray Bradbury. Published by Doubleday in 1953 Additional resources -
|
You might want to compare a very similar treatment (in a literary sense) in Nanotime, by Bart Kosko (see Raisin). Both of these devices carry on the tradition of the wise companion, found in all of the world's literary traditions.
An interesting contrast can be made to the seashell radio from the same novel.
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More Ideas
and Technology from Fahrenheit 451
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and Technology by Ray Bradbury
Tech news articles related to Fahrenheit 451
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| Holobox? Who Doesn't Want A Home Hologram? |
| EBS-260 Handjet Free Hand Dot Matrix Printer |
| CD, DVD Bit Rot And PKD's Civic Notification Distorter |
| Zoom Education Idea Is 100 Years Old |
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'Provision had been made to meet the terrific cold which we knew would be encountered the moment we had passed beyond the atmosphere.'
'You are who we say you are, Dr. Dakin,' Turner said.'
'It's area, and its consequent light-gathering capacity, was many times greater than any rigid mirror...'
'Tell me your torments,' the Padre said, in an elderly voice marked with compassion.
'...a slender-legged tripod surmounted by a spherical body no larger than a football.'
'... making the point that their likenesses, every move they made, were being transmitted.'
'But the stars are only atoms in larger space, and in that larger space the star-atoms could combine to form living matter, thinking matter, couldn't they?'
'...to build up a video picture would require, say, ten million decisions every second. Mike, you're so fast I can't even think about it. But you aren't that fast.'
