They're Made Out of Meat
My favorite SF short story is a very short story indeed by Terry Bisson entitled They're Made Out of Meat. The two minutes it takes you to read the whole thing will be the best possible use of your time. Do it. Now. I'll wait here 'til you're done.
Wasn't that fabulous? I've been re-reading that story for years and re-urging all my friends to read it, yet only recently (about a year ago) did I notice the secret of its brevity: it contains not one word of narration. The entire story is pure dialog. Not even a "he said" anywhere.
I meditated on that profundity for a while and finally noticed the story in its original form reads like a play, or a script for a movie. (Or—he said, trembling with excitement—the book for an opera.) Clearly I'm not the first person to have noticed this; someone has made a movie directly from the story:
They're Made Out Of Meat - The funniest movie is here. Find it
So now you ask, why is the Fredösphere talking about a short story that reads like a script, and could easily be made into a work of drama? Why, in short, is he talking about a science-fiction story that is practically begging for operatic treatment?
Keep asking yourself that question. Perhaps one day soon I will answer it.
Labels: Composition, Opera, They're Made Out Of Meat, VideoClip
Umie the Umlaut says, "ask your doctor about the Fredösphere!"
2 Comments:
This might work too:
http://en.wikipedia.org/
wiki/Bears_Discover_Fire
What a wonderful short film. I've read the story, of course, but never imagined it like this. That's the beauty of running something through someone else's mind. I wonder what will come out of the next mind, Fred.
Hmmm.
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