A Robot Revolution?!

From Act I, R. U. R. (Rossum's Universal Robots) by Karel Čapek. Translation by David Wyllie.

Helena: But do be careful, sir; this little girl has frightful intentions

Domin: Good heavens, Miss Glory, what could that be? Are you thinking of getting married?

Helena: No, no, God forbid! Not in my wildest dreams! I've come here with plans to start a revolution among your horrible robots!

Domin: (jumping up ) A robot revolution?!

Helena: (standing ) Harry, what's wrong?

Domin: Haha, Miss Glory, you'll never manage that! A robot revolution! You might more easily start a revolution among the nails and bobbins in the spinning mill than among our robots! (sitting ) You were a wonderful girl, you know, Helena, you enchanted all of us.

Helena: (sitting beside him ) But I felt so daunted by all of you in those days! I felt like a little girl who'd got lost among ... among ...

Domin: Among what, Helena?

Helena: Among enormous trees. You were so confident, so powerful! And you know, Harry, even after these ten years I've never lost that feeling of ... that anxiety or something. And did you never have any doubts? Not even when everything was going wrong?

Domin: What was going wrong?

Helena: Your plans, Harry. When there was that uprising against the robots by the workers and they started smashing them, and the robots were given weapons to defend themselves and the robots killed so many people. Or when governments started turning robots into soldiers and there was so much war, and all of that. You know.

Domin: (stands and walks up and down ) We were expecting that to happen, Helena. Don't you see, that was just a transitional stage before things would be ... different