The Machine Stops Discussion Questions!

“The Machine Stops” by E.M.
Forster
(Reading and Discussion Prompts)
As you read the short story, focus on, take notes on, and prepare to discuss the following topics:
• What dystopian characteristics are present within the story?

Society is an illusion of a perfect utopian world
-“There were buttons and switches everywhere—buttons to call for food for music, for clothing. There was the
hot bath button…There was a button that produced literature and there were of Course the buttons by which she
communicated with her friends.”(3)
- “Few traveled in these days, for, thanks to the advance of science, the earth was exactly alike all over.”(4)
Citizens live in a dehumanized state

- “The sight of her room, flooded with radiance and studded with electric buttons, revived her.”(3)
- “I see something like you in this plate, but I do not see you. I hear something like you through this telephone,
but I do not hear you…Pay me a visit so that we can meet face to face.”(2)
- The room though it contained nothing, was in touch with all that she cared for in the world.”(3)
- “One other passenger was in the lift, the first fellow creature she had seen face to face for months.” (4)
- “People never touched one another. The custom had become obsolete, owing to the Machine.”(5)
- “Avenge the Machine!…Kill the man!”(15)
Citizens conform to uniform expectations—individuality and dissent are bad

- “The clumsy system of public gatherings had be long since abandoned, neither Vasthi nor her audience stirred
from their rooms.”(3)
- “When the air-ship had been built, the desire to look direct at things still lingered in the world.”(5)
- “She knew that he was fated. If he did not die today he would die tomorrow. There was not room for such a
person in the world. She was ashamed at having borne such a son, she who had always been so respectable
and so full of ideas.”(9)
Citizens are perceived to be under constant surveillance

- “Its hum penetrates our blood, and may even guide our thoughts.”(8)
- “She touched the isolation knob, so that no one else could speak to her.”(1)
- “Buried deep in the hive was her own room.”(5)
-
Information, ideas, and freedom are restricted

- “It is contrary to the spirit of the age…Do you mean by that, contrary to the Machine?”(2)
- “I have found out a way of my own.’ The phrase conveyed no meaning to her.”(7)
- “For Kuno had lately asked to be a father, and his request had been refused by the Committee. His was not a
type that the Machine desired to hand on.”(8)
- “We created the machine, to do our will, but we cannot make it do our will now. It has robbed us of the sense
of space and of the touch, it has blurred every human relations and narrowed down love to a carnal act”(10)
Propaganda is a source of control

- “the Book of the Machine. In it were instructions against every possible contingency”(3)
- The Machine develops, but not on our lies. The Machine proceeds, but not to our goal.”(10)
- We only exist as the blood corpuscles that course through its arteries, and if it could work without us, it would
let us die.”(10)
A figure or concept is worshipped

- “You talk as if a God had made the Machine…I believe that you pray to it when you are unhappy.”(2)
- Thrice she kissed it, thrice inclined her head, thrice she felt the delirium of acquiescence, her ritual
performed”(3)
- “It has paralyzed our bodies and our wills and now compels us to worship it.”(10)
Citizens have a fear of the outside world

- The surface of the earth is only dust and mud, no advantage. No life remains on it, and you would need a
respirator, or the cold of the outer air would kill you. One dies immediately in the outer air.”(2)
- “Vashti was seized with the terrors of direct experience.”(4)
• What parallels can be made to Fahrenheit 451?

The authorities try to prevent “first-hand ideas” (12) Both stories try to keep their communities safe by keeping
them away from individuality. First hand ideas, “are but the physical impressions produced by love and
fear.”(12) The main characters of the story are also people who have been living by the guidelines of their
community, while they “meet” a younger free-spirited character, like for Vashti it being Kuno and for Montag it
being Clarisse. Both Vashti and Montag have their contradictions once they are exposed to the truth, that being
Kuno being right about the Machine breaking down, or Montag becoming attached to the books and not turning
them into flames.
• What forms of Dystopian controls (Corporate, Bureaucratic, Technological, Philosophical) regulate

members of this society?
The Machine acts as a sort of guideline, “in it were instructions against every possible contingency”(3) The
Central Committee published the book but people like Vashti would perform a “ritual”(3) with the book and
almost treat the Machine as a god. By having all the buttons in their rooms, they never have to make contact
with anyone ever again, “The room, though it contained nothing, was in touch with all that she cared for in the
world.”(3) it dehumanizes the humans by keeping them so enclosed to their rooms, which makes them
unfamiliar with human contact and real relationships, as if they had to leave their rooms to achieve things.
• What are examples of The Other, Ideological Imperialism, and Double Consciousness in the text?
When Kuno confronts his mother by saying, “You are beginning to worship the Machine, You think its
irreligious of me to have found out a way of my own.” His mother responds angrily, “I worship nothing! I am
most advanced I don’t think you irreligious, for there is no such religion left. All the fear and the superstition
that existed once have been destroyed by the Machine.”(7) Vashti has a double consciousness where every time
she is confronted with the truth that she worships the Machine like a god, she denies it because the real “facts”
are in her mind that Religion has been erased, when in fact she is treating the Machine like a religion in the
present. Ideological Imperialism can be seen when all the people exclaim, “The Machine feeds us and clothes us
and houses us; through it we speak to one another, through it we see one another, in it we have our being. The
Machine is the friend of ideas and the enemy of superstition: the Machine is omnipotent, eternal; blessed is the
Machine.”(13) The Soteriological view of these people is that the Machine has saved them, and has given them
a perfect life, where everything they want is handed right to them, with the “pleasure” of never having to leave
their room. This Ideological Imperialism is enforced through the way that no one will ever disagree with what
the book has to say. If one person does start to realize that this isn’t what life should really be like they will be
considered an outcast.
• What parallels can be made to other texts we have read this year?
In a way, homelessness and being released are one in the same. They both end in death. We can also see how
when Vashti tells Kuno that “It will end in homelessness” and he responds with, “I wish it would”(11) we can
compare that to how Rosemary requested and accepted her release. Jonas can also be compared because both
Kuno and Jonas want to escape from this dystopian community that they have been apart of for their whole
lives, both were willing to risk their lives to find out the truth, “I did not fear that I might tread upon a live rail
and be killed. I feared something far more intangible—doing what was not contemplated by the Machine.”(8)
Characters like Jonas and Kuno can’t stand to live with the fact that their lives have no individuality, no real
meaning outside of what their authority has told them.
• How does the futuristic world that Forster created over 110 years ago relate to life in 2020?
Since we’ve been in quarantine for almost a year now, there are some things that are too obvious not to point
out. The separation of contact between humans outside of their families has been severed, for those who follow
the guidelines. We live in a time now where we rely on our screens to give us the most contact with people
without actually being with the people. Kids are being taught through the screens just like how the people in the
story listened to the lectures on all the different things. Whenever someone wanted to go outside in the story
they needed to wear a respirator because the air could kill them, today people have to go out wearing masks so
that they don’t bring COVID into their homes.

The Machine Stops Discussion Questions!

Uploaded by

Copyright:

Available Formats

The Machine Stops Discussion Questions!

Uploaded by

Document Information

Copyright

Available Formats

Share this document

Share or Embed Document

Sharing Options

Did you find this document useful?

Is this content inappropriate?

Copyright:

Available Formats

The Machine Stops Discussion Questions!

Uploaded by

Copyright:

Available Formats

What dystopian characteristics are present within the story?

What parallels can be made to Fahrenheit 451?

“The Machine Stops” by E.M.

• What dystopian characteristics are present within the story?

Citizens live in a dehumanized state

Citizens conform to uniform expectations—individuality and dissent are bad

Citizens are perceived to be under constant surveillance

Information, ideas, and freedom are restricted

Propaganda is a source of control

A figure or concept is worshipped

Citizens have a fear of the outside world

• What parallels can be made to Fahrenheit 451?

• What forms of Dystopian controls (Corporate, Bureaucratic, Technological, Philosophical) regulate

You might also like