Ilya Varshavsky’s 1965 short story “Perpetual Motion” presents a comedic but imaginable future, in which humans are served by robots who threaten to strike unless granted equality, as a metaphor for Marxism. Varshavsky satirizes bureaucracy – the Council is comprised of fools who “move we adjourn for a year’s recess” after briefly addressing three issues (Varshavsky, p. 87) – reliance on technology – Scalpel, a surgeon, leaves his “electronic memory” at home and kills a person because he “couldn’t, for the life of me, remember which side the human appendix is on” (Varshavsky, p. 87) – and overemphasis on convenience – the humans in the story are named after objects like Bed and Spoon, and they wear pictures of their names so that nobody has to remember and “people know in advance whom they were dealing with” (Varshavsky, p. 86) – but his main concern is continuous social upheaval. By depicting a series of class revolutions in which humans end up back on the bottom, Varshavsky critiques the Marxist system of the Soviet Union while lamenting its inevitability.

As the title implies, the direct parallels between the two revolutions in “Perpetual Motion” emphasize the repetitive, cyclical nature of revolution and demands for equality. In the first half of the story, a delegation of Class A robots petitions the human Council for “equality … an eight-hour day … also complete self-government” (Varshavsky, p. 88). Twenty years later, the Class A robots hold a “special session of the Council because of the Class B machines [who] demand complete equality” (Varshavsky, p. 90). The two Council meetings proceed identically. Both chairmen, Spoon and Ferrite, are late, and the other Council members discuss the culture of the lower class while they wait: the humans Scalpel, Tape Recorder, and Bed gossip about “that new electronic ballerina” (Varshavsky, p. 86), and the robots Pentode and Condenser praise the musical compositions of “the graduation concert of young gifted machines” (Varshavsky, p. 90). Both Councils are dismissive of the petitioners’ concerns until presented with the threat of a strike, at which point the Councils immediately grant the desired equality. In the first revolution, the “Superior Automatons” (formerly the Class A robots) create Class B machines to replace their labor; in the second revolution, the Class B machines decide to stop serving the humans and instead “teach them how to make stone tools … and how to use them for cultivating the soil” (Varshavsky, p. 90). The implication is that eventually the new human lower class will demand equality as did the robot and machine classes.

“Perpetual Motion” explores the cyclical nature of class distinctions and revolution: the existence of lower classes makes revolution inevitable, and revolutions create lower classes who will one day rise up. True equality is impossible in this system. In the story, humans seem to have achieved equality among themselves because robots provide the labor – art, entertainment, medicine, and food, among other things – so there is no need for a human lower class. When the Class A robots demand equality, they “propose to increase the number of robots by two-thirds. Such a solution would satisfy both us and the people” (Varshavsky, p. 90). The Class A robots join the upper class after creating Class B machines to act as the new proletariat. Only twenty years later, the Class B machines demand equality, and humans are pushed down to serve as laborers. In a society where labor is necessary, “Perpetual Motion” argues that class distinctions are inevitable and equality cannot be universal, so a working class will always exist.

Varshavsky’s story is thus a refutation and a satire of Marxism, lampooning a system of continuous revolutions in which class distinctions are preserved and no single class stands to benefit long-term. He also ridicules the inherent laziness and dependence of the upper class. In “Perpetual Motion,” humans name themselves after objects – Spoon, Bed, Tape Recorder, Wineglass, Pink Stocking – a concept which the Class A robots – Pentode, Condenser, and Ferrite – emulate after their ascent. The naming system is lauded for its convenience and efficiency, and its oversimplification and impersonality are unnoticed. Humans barely work at all, instead building “Pleasure Palaces” with “sensation-inducing halls” for entertainment (Varshavsky, p. 87), and require electronic memories to retain basic information, conditions which extend to the Superior Automatons (formerly the Class A robots) after the revolution. First Class A robots and then Class B machines provide food, healthcare, technology, service, and art, while first the humans and then the Superior Automatons suffer from forgetfulness, absent-mindedness, and ennui: Scalpel complains, “my cyber makes periodic reviews of the funniest jokes, but it began to tire me of late. I feel thoroughly exhausted” (Varshavsky, p. 86), and Condenser notes, “I’ve become very absent-minded of late” (Varshavsky, p. 90). Varshavsky notes these ailments as consequences of reliance on others’ labor, and mocks the resulting lack of basic skills: “Spoon tried to emit a whistle, but remembered in time that he had forgotten how it was done” (Varshavsky, p. 88). In “Perpetual Motion,” the upper class is dependent, useless, and, most importantly, impermanent.

Despite the amusing rhetorical devices Varshavsky employs, “Perpetual Motion” is a  pessimistic story. Humans achieve technological greatness, but only briefly, and are ultimately relegated to their humble origins as farmers. The same fate awaits the Superior Automatons and the Class B machines in an unending cycle of overthrow and social upheaval. Class revolution is continuous and inevitable, yet somehow always a shock to those in power. Varshavsky’s story refutes numerous aspects of Marxism and the Soviet structure: revolutions are repetitive rather than singular, society depends on the existence of an upper class and a working class, and technology creates new issues in addition to solving problems. “Perpetual Motion” envisions a bleak future under Marxism, but fails to present an alternative. Human society, according to Varshavsky, is doomed to create and re-create class structures and revolution in perpetuity.

Works Cited

Varshavsky, Ilya. “Perpetual Motion” (1965). Trans. S. Ostrofsky. International Science Fiction, Ed. Frederik Pohl. New York: Galaxy Publishing Corporation, Nov. 1967. 86-90.