ABSTRACT
“The Machine Stops” is set in an undefined future era when people have left the Earth’s surface, perhaps after a catastrophe such as climate upheaval or a deadly pandemic, and live underground, each in a separate room. The Machine functions like a combination of the systems and processes that help people endure today’s enforced isolation: the Web, the Internet and Internet of Things, online ordering and delivery, and telemedicine. Vashti is also linked to many others through the Machine. She knew “several thousand people, in certain directions human intercourse had advanced enormously,” writes Forster. Like every other child in this society, Kuno was raised in a public nursery. He now lives far from his mother on the other side of the Earth, but Vashti still feels connected to him.
