R.U.R.

Rossum’s Universal Robots

Karel Čapek 1920

This science fiction play follows a factory that makes artificial workers who eventually rise against humanity. Its robots are made from living material, not metal.

75 pages 1h 28m reading time

The play that brought robots onto the world stage, and one of the most famous science fiction works of the early 20th century.
Imagines a world where people stop working because cheap artificial workers do everything, and asks what is left for humans to live for.
Suggests that beings made only to serve may come to feel, suffer, and want to be free, and that this makes them more than machines.
Gave the world the word "robot," which comes from a Czech word for forced labor and was suggested to Čapek by his brother Josef.
Set the pattern of the machine uprising against its makers, a story told again and again in later science fiction books and films.

First science fiction on TV

In 1938, BBC television in London broadcast part of the play, often called the first science fiction ever shown on TV.
Amateurs got there first

A small amateur theater group in Hradec Králové staged it days before the official premiere at Prague's National Theatre.
A hit in New York

The Theatre Guild staged it on Broadway in 1922, and it drew large and excited audiences.
Spread around the world

Within a few years of its first staging, the play had been translated into many languages.