Player Piano: America in the Coming Age of Electronics

New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1952. Hardcover. Fine/Near Fine. 12mo - over 6¾ - 7¾" tall. A true first edition of Vonnegut's first novel, with A to copyright page. Green paper boards. 295 pp. Jacket design by George W. Thompson. Dust jacket is age toned and lightly soiled, with some acidification from sticker adhesive to foot of rear cover. Else fine. Ten years after the Second Industrial Revolution the Electronic Age was in full swing. Millions of vacuum tubes hummed, millions of machines clicked as they spewed forth the requisite number of prefabricated houses and ultrasonic dishwashers, the answer to governmental and industrial questions, and impeccably correct selections of books, football teams, and civil servants. Very few people actually worked; the machines picked out potential engineer material and sent it to college, and with this background a young man might hope to go to Pittsburgh eventually -- the equivalent of going to the White House back in the old pre-electronic days. According to the machines' calculations, the people should all have been very happy to have every material comfort with a minimum of physical labor. Human nature being what it is, the people were not happy. Nor was Dr. Paul Proteus, one of the most brilliant engineers in the country and, at 35, manager of the vast Ilium Works. Dr. Proteus had even entertained the heretical idea (one which his Pittsburgh-minded wife disapproved of thoroughly) that the machines had taken away far more than they had given. But it was not until Paul's old friend Ed Finnerty turned up, flaunting his rebellion against the vacuum tubes openly, that Paul's ideas began to crystallize. And almost imperceptibly the revolt against the machines got under way. What happened then makes an unusual and extremely fascinating story -- and a rather frightening preview of the Age of Electronics which is all but upon us now. Many of the seemingly fantastic devices described in Player Piano are already in existence, though not yet in public use. Reminiscent of Huxley's Brave New World or Orwell's Nineteen Eighty-Four, Player Piano is swift-moving, very intriguing, and completely entertaining.