Understand (story)

"Understand" is a science fiction novelette by American writer Ted Chiang, published in 1991. It was nominated for the 1992 Hugo Award for Best Novelette, and won the 1992 Asimov’s Reader Poll.

The story has been recorded by Rhashan Stone and broadcast as a four-part series on BBC Radio 7.

Plot

The story follows a man who is given an experimental drug to heal brain damage caused by anoxia after he nearly drowns. The drug regenerates his damaged neurons and has the unintended side effect of exponentially improving his intellect and motor skills. As he gets smarter and smarter, he is pursued by several government agencies. Eventually he receives a message from another super-intelligent test subject and enters into conflict with him.

See also

• Superintelligence
• Transhumanism
• Flowers for Algernon

Footnotes

External links

• Understand title listing at the Internet Speculative Fiction Database
• Understand audiobook in the Internet Archive

1. Story of Your Life
2. Stories of Your Life and Others
3. Exhalation: Stories
4. Arrival (film)
5. Frame story
6. Understand (disambiguation)
7. The Great Silence (story)
8. Exhalation (short story)
9. Omphalos (story)
10. Tower of Babylon (story)
11. Ted Chiang
12. This Is Me... Now: A Love Story
13. Bastar: The Naxal Story
14. My Generation/Understand
15. Queen Charlotte: A Bridgerton Story
16. William Labov
17. Toy Story
18. List of Toy Story characters
19. The Egg (Weir short story)
20. The English Understand Wool