"Bookworm, Run!" is a

science fiction Science fiction (often shortened to sci-fi or abbreviated SF) is a genre of speculative fiction that deals with imaginative and futuristic concepts. These concepts may include information technology and robotics, biological manipulations, space ...

short story A short story is a piece of prose fiction. It can typically be read in a single sitting and focuses on a self-contained incident or series of linked incidents, with the intent of evoking a single effect or mood. The short story is one of the old ...

by American writer

Vernor Vinge Vernor Steffen Vinge (; October 2, 1944 – March 20, 2024) was an American science fiction author and professor. He taught mathematics and computer science at San Diego State University. He was the first wide-scale popularizer of the technolo ...

. His second published work of fiction, it appeared in '' Analog Science Fiction Science Fact'' in 1966, and was reprinted in '' True Names... and Other Dangers'' in 1987, and in 2001's '' The Collected Stories of Vernor Vinge''. As with many of Vinge's later works, "Bookworm, Run!" deals with

intelligence amplification Intelligence amplification (IA) (also referred to as cognitive augmentation, machine augmented intelligence and enhanced intelligence) is the use of information technology in augmenting human intelligence. The idea was first proposed in the 1950 ...

: Norman Simmons, the

bookworm A bookworm or bibliophile is an individual who loves and frequently reads or collects books. Bibliophilia or bibliophilism is the love of books. Bibliophiles may have large, specialized book collections. They may highly value old editions, aut ...

of the title, is a surgically altered

chimpanzee The chimpanzee (; ''Pan troglodytes''), also simply known as the chimp, is a species of Hominidae, great ape native to the forests and savannahs of tropical Africa. It has four confirmed subspecies and a fifth proposed one. When its close rel ...

with human-equivalent intelligence.

Plot summary

As part of an experiment, Norman's brain has been given a wireless link to an enormous

database In computing, a database is an organized collection of data or a type of data store based on the use of a database management system (DBMS), the software that interacts with end users, applications, and the database itself to capture and a ...

. By accident, he is given access to the United States Government's main database. Seeking knowledge for its own sake, Norman asks for ''all'' the data stored within; one of the first facts he consciously realizes from his direct-brain download is that, by accessing classified data, he has just committed a federal crime with severe penalties. Norman uses his new knowledge of the layout of the facility he inhabits to escape, and then correlates several seemingly unrelated facts to (correctly) deduce not only that there must be

Soviet The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR), commonly known as the Soviet Union, was a List of former transcontinental countries#Since 1700, transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 until Dissolution of the Soviet ...

spies living in town, but who they are; he makes his way to the agents, hoping that they will help him reach Canada and escape the US Army. As Norman nears the limit of the wireless link's range, he and the agents are captured; the Soviets' memories are surgically read and erased. Within the agents' memories is the revelation that the Soviet Union has performed similar intelligence-amplification experiments, but on a

dog The dog (''Canis familiaris'' or ''Canis lupus familiaris'') is a domesticated descendant of the gray wolf. Also called the domestic dog, it was selectively bred from a population of wolves during the Late Pleistocene by hunter-gatherers. ...

instead of a chimpanzee, foreshadowing a new

arms race An arms race occurs when two or more groups compete in military superiority. It consists of a competition between two or more State (polity), states to have superior armed forces, concerning production of weapons, the growth of a military, and ...

Reception

Algis Budrys Algirdas Jonas "Algis" Budrys (January 9, 1931 – June 9, 2008) was a Lithuanian-American science fiction author, copy editing, editor and critic. He was also known under the pen names Frank Mason, Alger Rome in collaboration with Jerome ...

said that despite being a "collection of mismatched plot cliches ... it's a memorable story", comparing its protagonist to that of "

Flowers for Algernon ''Flowers for Algernon'' is a short story by American author Daniel Keyes, which he later expanded into a novel and adapted for film and other media. The short story, written in 1958 and first published in the April 1959 issue of ''The Magazin ...

". ''

Publishers Weekly ''Publishers Weekly'' (''PW'') is an American weekly trade news magazine targeted at publishers, librarians, booksellers, and literary agents. Published continuously since 1872, it has carried the tagline, "The International News Magazine of ...

'', assessing the 2001 reprint, declared the story to be "quite dated";THE COLLECTED STORIES OF VERNOR VINGE (review)
, in ''

''; published December 17, 2001; retrieved November 24, 2015 similarly, the 1988 ''Science Fiction & Fantasy Book Review Annual'', assessing the 1987 reprint, stated that it was "an early story that reads like one".Science Fiction & Fantasy Book Review Annual
edited by Robert A. Collins and Robert Latham; published 1988 by

Greenwood Publishing Group Greenwood Publishing Group, Inc. (GPG) was an educational and academic publisher (middle school through university level) which was part of ABC-Clio. Since 2021, ABC-Clio and its suite of imprints, including GPG, are collectively imprints of ...

Sequel

Vinge said that the "important"

sequel A sequel is a work of literature, film, theatre, television, music, or video game that continues the story of, or expands upon, some earlier work. In the common context of a narrative work of fiction, a sequel portrays events set in the same ...

to ''Bookworm'' would have featured the first

human Humans (''Homo sapiens'') or modern humans are the most common and widespread species of primate, and the last surviving species of the genus ''Homo''. They are Hominidae, great apes characterized by their Prehistory of nakedness and clothing ...

with amplified intelligence; however, when he attempted to sell such a story to

John W. Campbell John Wood Campbell Jr. (June 8, 1910 – July 11, 1971) was an American science fiction writer and editor. He was editor of ''Astounding Science Fiction'' (later called ''Analog Science Fiction and Fact'') from late 1937 until his death and wa ...

, Campbell rejected it with the explanation "You can't write this story. Neither can anyone else."

Footnotes

External links

*{{ISFDB title, id=44131 1966 short stories Short stories by Vernor Vinge Works originally published in Analog Science Fiction and Fact