Please help me understand this obscure science fiction story

April 29, 2008 5:56 PM

Question about obscure science fiction short story, "Allegory," by William T. Powers, which was reprinted in Groff Conklin's 13 GREAT STORIES OF SCIENCE FICTION. The question is: what is this story an allegory of? To put it another way, is there some real-world or historical event that this story is a comment on?

I am not quite so naive as not to understand that the story is *generally* an allegory about someone whose religion or ideology is resistant to scientific/technological progress, and as a consequence finds their continuing adjustment to reality to be quite painful. Nonetheless I wonder if there is some more concrete allegorical correspondence. The conclusion of the story is particularly puzzling (in my opinion societies do not generally involuntarily confine their smartest citizens, although I am open to the possibility that I am just misunderstanding the story).

This story has haunted me ever since I first read it as a teenager. I have pondered over it and I am still haunted by the title.

posted by Mr. Justice to writing & language (8 comments total)

One qualification -- I should have posted something more like "in my opinion societies at the level of social advancement depicted in the story do not generally involuntarily confine their smartest citizens." This qualification should perhaps make it clear what I find most puzzling about the story.
posted by Mr. Justice at 6:04 PM on April 29

Based solely on what you have said, mightn't it be the treatment of the intelligentsia in the Soviet Union?
posted by Clyde Mnestra at 6:15 PM on April 29

Does a story titled Allegory necessarily have to be an allegory? Might not a tale similarly titled Nonfiction contain exclusively fiction?
posted by Quarter Pincher at 7:15 PM on April 29

Web research reveals it was originally published in 1953, and reprinted into your anthology in 1962. This would support a reading that has it being targeted at the Soviet Union.

Could you recap the plot for people who haven't read it?
posted by LobsterMitten at 9:16 PM on April 29

Right now, I'm listening to it courtesy Archive.org [mp3].
posted by dhartung at 12:19 AM on April 30

Ah, yes, that story. Anybody who's knocked around sf for a while has probably encountered it.

Spoilerrific recap:
Protagonist works in government computing center processing various applications. Rejects an application for using an anti-gravity device out of hand. Man shows up in office, with a floating briefcase. Still not convinced it isn't an illusion, he tries to persuade the inventor that the device is impossible. The man persists, so he escalates the question to more than one department. They all say it's impossible, because the computers say it's impossible -- or at least that it will disturb the precisely organized computer-managed society by introducing a new element, and upset the security and stability that the citizens crave. The man, dejected after eighteen years of work, debates him briefly about the nature of the impossibility. The computers say it's so, but how does he know so? The man leaves, expecting to be swept into a psychological ward for believing in such things. The protagonist is troubled by the circular logic of his system, and after several sleepless nights, himself is checked into a psych ward. He sees the man, happily at work at an enormous laboratory, who says "Welcome to the loony bin!"

societies do not generally involuntarily confine their smartest citizens, although I am open to the possibility that I am just misunderstanding the story

See, here's a key issue with your interpretation. The society has to have a way to identify the smartest citizens. How do you suppose they do that?
posted by dhartung at 1:06 AM on April 30

I seems that you expect the story to be an allegorical reference to an event or other work. That might not be the case. Aesop's fables are considered to be allegorical but refer only to common moral or social dilemmas.
posted by bdc34 at 7:39 AM on April 30

I have not yet had time to listen to the audio version. But now, based on the recap, I don't think it has anything to do with the Soviet Union. The allegory personifies a rigid notion of rationality and acceptability -- the strictures of a society that abhors revolutionary ideas and creativity -- as a computer and more broadly as an advanced computer-managed society. I think that's an allegory. Leading into a standard the inmates-are-the-sane-ones ending. But this is just guesswork.
posted by Clyde Mnestra at 1:01 PM on April 30