An Analysis of Android in “Fondly Fahrenheit”

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An Analysis of Android in “Fondly Fahrenheit”
Introduction
Bester’s Fondly Fahrenheit is a dystopian award-winning short story. The story shows a wealthy inhabitant of some fictional planet with a scorching climate. The main character is Vandaleur owning a robot, MA Android. On this planet, it is common to keep Androids for services, which has made them dependent on them without developing individual skills. However, these Androids are similar to human beings as they are made of tissues with blood in the body. Besides, they act like human beings in different situations. For example, they can be serial killers. The plot covers their crime, the owner’s failure to stop or destroy them, and the consequences of their malfunctioning. The author uses these technologically advanced fictional Androids to represent the identity crisis of his age. The sociopolitical scenario of the 1950s Cold War and its impact on the blue-collar is projected through fictional settings, characters, and actions. Also, these multi-aptitude Androids represent the threat posed by technological progress for humanity. Portraying this creature close to reality and instilling humanlike features in them create a sense of reality for the reader while getting entertained through speculations. Also, it impacts the atmosphere and tone of the story leaving the reader in shock by the dangers of sociopolitical crisis in any age and technological development. Android in “Fondly Fahrenheit” draws a blurred line between reality and speculation while representing the identity crisis in the 1950s Cold War and man’s unreliable dependence on machinery in a dystopian future.
The Blurred Line Between Reality and Speculation
Bester’s Android merges speculation and reality through his composition at first. Android is a form of a robot performing on a fictional planet in a dystopian future. The author made it work for his master, Vandaleur, like the robot of his times worked, such as “Unimate,” which lifted heavy weights as its duty (Hockstein et al. 113). However, Android is more a realistic form of robot because it is not machinery but “a chemical creation of synthetic tissue (Bester 3). The organic body of Android is also verifiable by the existence of blood in its chemically composed veins. It is its blood that is found as “bright drops of scarlet blood” under the nails of its first victim (Bester 2). Although the spectators speak about the quality of its blood, that it does not clot, and the pleasure-pain syndrome is not involved in its system, the organic body with blood makes it similar to human beings.
Secondly, Android confuses fictional and non-fictional features of his personality in his verbal expressions. Every time Vandaleur beats it, it claims it is worth, similar to a human being’s assertion of self-pride. It repeatedly says it is “worth fifty-seven thousand dollars on current exchange,” which signifies its arrogance and self-respect in the face of humiliation (Bester 3). Besides, it does not let its master call it machinery because of its chemical and humanlike composition.
Apart from its verbal expr...