This article is missing information about third-party analysis of the story.(December 2023) |
"Harrison Bergeron" | |
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Short story by Kurt Vonnegut | |
Country | United States |
Language | English |
Genre(s) | Dystopia, science fiction, political fiction, satire |
Publication | |
Published in | The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction |
Publication type | Periodical |
Media type | Print (magazine) |
Publication date | 1961 |
"Harrison Bergeron" is a satirical dystopian science-fiction short story by American writer Kurt Vonnegut, first published in October 1961. Originally published in The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction , the story was republished in the author's Welcome to the Monkey House collection in 1968.
In the year 2081, the Constitution dictates that all Americans are fully equal and not allowed to be smarter, better-looking, or more physically able than anyone else. The Handicapper General's agents enforce the equality laws, forcing citizens to wear "handicaps": masks for those who are too beautiful, earpiece radios for the intelligent that broadcast loud noises meant to disrupt thoughts, and heavy weights for the strong or athletic.
George and Hazel Bergeron have a 14-year old son named Harrison. He takes after his father, who is highly intelligent and physically strong. The government removes Harrison from his home. His parents are barely aware because of Hazel's low intelligence and George's mandated handicaps.
George and Hazel watch a ballet on TV. Some dancers are weighed down to counteract their gracefulness and masked to hide their attractiveness. George's thoughts are continually interrupted by the different noises emitted by his handicap radio. Hazel urges George to lie down and rest his "handicap bag", 47 pounds (21 kg) of weights locked around his neck. She suggests taking a few of the weights out of the bag, but George resists because it is against the law.
On TV, a reporter struggles to read a bulletin and hands it to the ballerina wearing the most grotesque mask and heaviest weights. She begins reading in her natural, beautiful voice before switching to a more unpleasant one. Harrison's escape from prison is announced, and a full-body photograph of him is shown. He is seven feet (2.1 m) tall and burdened by three hundred pounds (140 kg) of handicaps.
George recognizes his son for a moment, before having the thought eliminated by his radio. Harrison storms the TV studio in an attempt to overthrow the government. He declares himself Emperor and rips off both his own handicaps and those of a ballerina, whom he chooses as his Empress.
Diana Moon Glampers, the Handicapper General, enters the studio and kills Harrison and the Empress with two shotgun blasts. She threatens the musicians at gunpoint to put on their handicaps again. The TV goes dark. George, who left to get a beer and has returned, asks Hazel why she is crying, to which she replies that something sad happened on television that she cannot remember.
The story has been adapted for the screen at least four times.
In 2005, the story was quoted by attorneys in a brief before the Kansas Supreme Court. Vonnegut was quoted as saying that while he did not mind the story being used in the suit, he disagreed with the lawyers' interpretation of it. [4] U.S. Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia quoted the story in PGA Tour, Inc. v. Martin . [5] A 2013 academic paper criticizing the new hyperandrogenism policies of the International Association of Athletics Federations and the International Olympic Committee was entitled "The Harrison Bergeron Olympics" [6] and several non-academics had similar criticisms. [7] [8]
Kurt Vonnegut was an American writer and humorist known for his satirical and darkly humorous novels. In a career spanning over 50 years, he published fourteen novels, three short-story collections, five plays, and five nonfiction works; further collections have been published after his death.
Cat's Cradle is a satirical postmodern novel, with science fiction elements, by American writer Kurt Vonnegut. Vonnegut's fourth novel, it was first published in 1963, exploring and satirizing issues of science, technology, the purpose of religion, and the arms race, often through the use of morbid humor.
"A Descent into the Maelström" is an 1841 short story by American writer Edgar Allan Poe. In the tale, a man recounts how he survived a shipwreck and a whirlpool. It has been grouped with Poe's tales of ratiocination and also labeled an early form of science fiction.
Slaughterhouse-Five, or, The Children's Crusade: A Duty-Dance with Death is a 1969 semi-autobiographic science fiction-infused anti-war novel by Kurt Vonnegut. It follows the life experiences of Billy Pilgrim, from his early years, to his time as an American soldier and chaplain's assistant during World War II, to the post-war years. Throughout the novel, Billy frequently travels back and forth through time. The protagonist deals with a temporal crisis as a result of his post-war psychological trauma. The text centers on Billy's capture by the German Army and his survival of the Allied firebombing of Dresden as a prisoner of war, an experience that Vonnegut endured as an American serviceman. The work has been called an example of "unmatched moral clarity" and "one of the most enduring anti-war novels of all time".
Between Time and Timbuktu is a television film directed by Fred Barzyk and based on a number of works by Kurt Vonnegut. Produced by National Educational Television and WGBH-TV in Boston, Massachusetts, it was telecast March 13, 1972 as a NET Playhouse special. The television script was also published in book form in 1972, illustrated with photographs by Jill Krementz and stills from the production.
Breakfast of Champions, or Goodbye Blue Monday is a 1973 novel by the American author Kurt Vonnegut. His seventh novel, it is set predominantly in the fictional town of Midland City, Ohio, and focuses on two characters: Dwayne Hoover, a Midland resident, Pontiac dealer and affluent figure in the city, and Kilgore Trout, a widely published but mostly unknown science fiction author. Breakfast of Champions deals with themes of free will, suicide, and race relations, among others. The novel is full of drawings by the author, substituting descriptive language with depictions requiring no translation.
The Sirens of Titan is a comic science fiction novel by Kurt Vonnegut Jr., first published in 1959. His second novel, it involves issues of free will, omniscience, and the overall purpose of human history. Much of the story revolves around a Martian invasion of Earth.
Player Piano is the first novel by American writer Kurt Vonnegut Jr., published in 1952. The novel depicts a dystopia of automation partly inspired by the author's time working at General Electric, describing the negative impact technology can have on quality of life. The story takes place in a near-future society that is almost totally mechanized, eliminating the need for human laborers. The widespread mechanization creates conflict between the wealthy upper class, the engineers and managers, who keep society running, and the lower class, whose skills and purpose in society have been replaced by machines. The book uses irony and sentimentality, which were to become hallmarks developed further in Vonnegut's later works.
God Bless You, Mr. Rosewater, or Pearls Before Swine, Kurt Vonnegut's fifth novel, was published in 1965 by Holt, Rinehart and Winston and as a Dell mass-market paperback in 1970. A piece of postmodern satire, it gave context to Vonnegut's following novel, Slaughterhouse-Five and shared in its success.
Welcome to the Monkey House is a collection of 25 short stories written by Kurt Vonnegut, published by Delacorte in August 1968. The stories range from wartime epics to futuristic thrillers, given with satire and Vonnegut's unique edge. The stories are often intertwined and convey the same underlying messages on human nature and mid-twentieth century society.
Tammy K. Bruce is an American conservative radio host, author, and political commentator. Earlier she had been president of the Los Angeles chapter of the National Organization for Women. She is currently an on-air contributor to Fox News and host of Get Tammy Bruce on Fox Nation.
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PGA Tour, Inc. v. Martin, 532 U.S. 661 (2001), was a decision by the Supreme Court of the United States involving the applicability of the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990 to professional golf tours.
Harrison Bergeron is a 1995 cable science fiction television movie film loosely adapted from Kurt Vonnegut's 1961 dystopian short story of the same name. It was produced for Showtime and first screened on August 13, 1995. It was released to VHS in 1998.
"Welcome to the Monkey House" is a Kurt Vonnegut short story that is part of the collection of the same name. It is alluded to in God Bless You, Mr. Rosewater as one of Kilgore Trout's stories.
2081 is a 2009 science fiction featurette which premiered at the Seattle International Film Festival on May 29, 2009. It is directed and written by Chandler Tuttle, based on the 1961 short story "Harrison Bergeron" by author Kurt Vonnegut. The cast is led by James Cosmo, Julie Hagerty, Patricia Clarkson, and Armie Hammer. The story paints a picture through the use of hyperbole of a future in which a powerful, dictatorial government goes to extreme measures to ensure that absolute equality exists between all individuals.
The Golden Age of Science Fiction is an anthology of science fiction short stories all originally published between 1949 and 1962. The stories were selected and introduced by Kingsley Amis, who also wrote an Editor's Note and a 21-page Introduction. The collection was first published by Hutchinson in 1981 and was released in paperback by Penguin in 1983.
Facial Justice is a dystopian novel by L. P. Hartley, published in 1960. The novel depicts a post-apocalyptic society that has sought to banish privilege and envy, to the extent that people will even have their faces surgically altered in order to appear neither too beautiful nor too ugly. The novel was included in Anthony Burgess' essay Ninety-nine Novels.
Chandler Tuttle is an American writer and director who currently serves as creative director of the Oslo Freedom Forum. He lives in New York City.
The Starlit Corridor is a 1967 science fiction anthology edited by Roger Mansfield. It was published by Pergamon Press.