Pablo Capanna’s short story “Acronia” describes a society called Acronia in which humans have every moment of the day scheduled by the Planner. From the outset, “Acronia” seems to mean a world without (‘a-’) time (‘cronos’). Humans have created a society that teaches “only man can do executive-level jobs… and only man needs to occupy his time by working” (Capanna, p. 93). The protagonist, P., has his doubts and through his perspective the reader learns about the unsettling world of Acronia. Through P.’s character, Capanna creates an interactive story in which the reader’s fascination with dystopia and desire to observe revolution leads them to become an active participant in Acronia’s problem: an obsession with time. Only at the end of the story does the reader realize it is a fixation on time, not just the treatment of it, which has caused irrevocable damage to the Acronia’s sense of humanity.  

      In just the first sentence — “He thought he could trace the first symptom back to the break…” (Capanna, p. 93) — Capanna captures the reader’s attention by implying that there is something wrong with P. The first moment when the reader gets a sense of the nature of this ‘illness’ is the same time that Capanna first implies the illness of Acronia. In the close third person voice of P., Capanna describes the societal notion of “a tedium that only intensive work could dispel” (Capanna, p. 93) as well as the idea, subtly doubted by our protagonist, that there are jobs robots can’t do which humans must occupy their time with. It is this doubt that the SF reader latches onto. Suddenly not only are we seeking an explanation for a world ‘without time,’ we are seeking a revolutionary protagonist who will unveil and disrupt the evils of Acronia.   

      Capanna satisfies the reader’s expectations for P. primarily through three moments of “greater awareness.” In each of these, time plays a central role. The first occurs when P. asks a question: “Why don’t clocks in Acronia have hands?” (Capanna, p. 94) The reader discovers that the humans of Acronia do not have a need to measure time. Instead they use the robots to signal changes in activities. The reader is left to wonder: to what extent does measuring time give it meaning and place? Could this lack of attention to time be what is meant by Acronia? A few moments later, P. himself expresses his realization that he has spent his life hiding from time, leading the reader to their own realization that, at least by perception, the object of time is neglected by Acronia.  

     P.’s second moment of revelation follows a long description of the orbits of the lighted platforms. P. observes how they move in coordination like clockwork and wonders how a society run with such precise timing cannot “feel the passage of time” (Capanna, p. 96). According to P., time been abolished by the homogenization of their activities. Not only that, time is actively killed by each member “in generalize universal cowardice” (Capanna, p. 96). This adds to the reader’s hypothesis that whatever is wrong with Acronia must be about time.  

     P’s peculiar dream also begs the reader to critically analyze the state of Acronia. It depicts natural scenes from human history repeated endlessly. Capanna repeatedly uses the phrase “time and again” (Capanna, p. 99) harkening back to P.’s claim that infinite repetition is the abolishment of time. In this, Capanna juxtaposes natural humanity with the suffocating repetition that characterizes this dystopian dome, perhaps implying that Acronia’s relationship with time is not unique. Through this implication, Capanna places a doubt in the reader’s mind about what fuels this dystopia.   

     The evolution of P.’s character comes to a climax when he awakens from this dream and proclaims that he has “already made his decision” (Capanna, p. 100).  Through the lens of the SF reader’s expectations, this decisiveness indicates P.’s identity as the revolutionary. However, from the time that P. makes this proclamation up until he knocks over a stack of papers, all that P. manages to accomplish is to find an old philosophizing robot and to receive a propaganda filled lecture about the “tranquility granted by total occupation” (Capanna, p. 103). In this moment with papers strewn across the floor in disarray, the reader’s high hopes for P. as a revolutionary fall flat.  The words “they had both lost control of the situation” (Capanna, p. 104) signal a shift in the narration of the story, and it becomes apparent that P. does not know any more than the reader.  

     In the absence of a reliable narrator, the reader begins to listen more and more to the robot-turned-philosopher. The robot exclaims at how “humans lost their curiosity to the degree that they didn’t even realize it” (Capanna, p. 106). The reader learns that the Planner is not a time-wielding tyrant, but a servant concerned at the human’s “lack of imagination” (Capanna, p. 106) and cognizant of the sickness that is allowed by their inability to feel wonder.  Though the aged robot does talk about the human’s relationship with time, it underscores that the greatest disaster of Acronia is that humans have lost a curiosity, imagination, and wonder as well as their ability to recognize them.  

     Through the robot’s explanations, it becomes clear that though P. is not the hopeful figure the reader once believed. Through all his great awakenings, P. experiences these human elements but does not realize it. When he becomes lost in a query about Acronia’s measurement of time he is experiencing curiosity; the euphoric freedom he feels following this “distraction” is a result of escaping an oppressive schedule which leaves no time for deep thought. His comparison of Acronia to a timeless hell of endless repetitions follows a moment of awe and wonder at the beauty and precision of the celestial dome. Even his dream, though subconscious, is an example of imagination. P.’s experience of these faculties is hopeful, but only passively. By the end of the story, P. is still unable to understand what is happening and why. He is not the revolutionary the reader was expecting, but through capturing the reader in P.’s experience, Capanna communicates on an even deeper level the danger that is posed to our society. Capanna played with our expectations, exploited them, and then defied them, all to broaden and deepen the impact of the story.   

     From the title alone, Capanna captures the sf audience with textual implication of time. With the reader’s attention already directed toward time, Capanna uses P.’s perspective to further distract the reader from what is truly missing in Acronia: wonder, curiosity, and imagination. Though P. exhibits all of three of these elements, he does so through a filter which superimposes the object of time. While the reader is busy investing in the problem of time and in P.’s promise of unveiling it, Capanna pulls the rug from under our feet by revealing P.’s lack of control and understanding, the incoherency of Acronia’s relationship with time, and the fact that the only hope for Acronia’s humanity is a robot wielding the human weapon of absurdity. This final revelation shows the extent to which the humans of Acronia have fallen, and our own susceptibility to become lost in the same obsession with time.     

Works Cited  

Capanna, Pablo. “Acronia” (1966). Trans. Andrea L. Bell. Ed. Andrea L. Bell and Yolanda Molina-Gavilán. Cosmos Latinos: An Anthology of Science Fiction from Latin America and Spain. Middletown, CT: Wesleyan University Press, 2003. 93-108.