Usually, death as a theme in a work of literature would involve, you know, someone dying—or maybe two someones. Or maybe it's a book about war and there are lots and lots of people dying all over the place. But even that much mortality is not enough mortality for R.U.R. Nope. R.U.R. says, "Hah" to your single corpses, and even to your larger mounds of bodies. Because R.U.R. is a play in which every single person on earth dies—the whole human race: pfft. That is a lot of death, there, Shmoopers. Pound for pound, you could even say that this short little play has more mortality than any other work of literature ever. Unless you wrote a death haiku:
"Everybody dies/ All the world is dead. Yep. Dead./ Dead. Dead. Dead. Dead. Dead."
So, that's maybe as much death in less space. But still, even after the haiku, you have to admit that there is a lot of death going on in R.U.R.
Questions About Death
- If you made R.U.R. into a film, would you show more deaths? Why or why not?
- Do individual deaths matter in R.U.R.? Or is it only the death of the species which is seen as really tragic? What parts of the play give you your answer?
- Are robots more mortal or less mortal than humans? How might Čapek answer this question?
Chew on This
The death of everybody on Earth in R.U.R.is a tragedy.
Slow your roll—the death of everybody on earth in R.U.R. leads to a better and brighter world.