"Repent, Harlequin!" Said the Ticktockman

Harlan Ellison was not identified as a New Wave science fiction writer at the outset of the movement, but today, critics see his work—especially his 1967 collection Dangerous Visions, in which “‘Repent, Harlequin!’ Said the Ticktockman” appears—as influential to that genre.

New Wave science fiction was, in many respects, a reaction to Golden Age science fiction, which often wasn’t received as serious literature. Golden Age science fiction (1938-1960) was often criticized for utilizing the same plots and character tropes. By the mid-1960s, “too many writers were working with the same few traditional sf themes, and both the style and content of sf were becoming generally overpredictable” (Nicholls, Peter, and David Langford. “New Wave.” The Encyclopedia of Science Fiction. SFE Ltd/Ansible Editions, 1 May 2023).

New Wave authors, in an attempt to legitimize genre fiction as literature, put a greater emphasis on literary experimentation, using Modernist and Postmodernist narrative strategies. In “‘Repent, Harlequin!’ Said the Ticktockman,” Ellison employs a nonchronological format, delivers some of the narrative exposition in stream of consciousness, creates new words like “commex” and “mineez,” and uses unusual syntax like “[t]imewise, it was jangle.” He creates situations that seem almost surreal in their playfulness, like the juxtaposition of millions of colorful jellybeans raining down on the regimented factory workers as they change shifts.

The New Wave response to Golden Age science fiction went further than stylistic differences. Golden Age science fiction focused on the horizons of space and robotics, idealizing humans of the future as a triumphant race who would use science to conquer their environment and worlds beyond. In contrast, New Wave science fiction emphasized psychology and the social sciences, and had a darker, often dystopian, outlook. By and large, the genre questioned the idea that scientific achievement would solve all of humanity’s problems, instead posing situations in which greater control over nature or other people causes new kinds of problems.

In “‘Repent, Harlequin!’ Said the Ticktockman,” the workings of science and technology are obscured by Ellison’s invented jargon like “swizzleskid” and “teepers,” but their use allows governmental authorities a disturbing level of control over time and human life. The main source of this control is the Master Timekeeper’s ability to “turn off” citizens’ cardioplates “by [a] simple scientific expedient (utilizing a scientific process held dearly secret by the Ticktockman’s office)” (151). Ellison’s story isn’t interested in explaining or glorifying the science behind the cardioplates; instead, it demonstrates how science and technology, absent of human kindness, can destroy humanity.

Because of New Wave’s more pessimistic attitude toward the future, it overlaps at times with dystopian fiction, as seen in New Wave classics such as Anthony Burgess’s A Clockwork Orange (1962) and Philip K. Dick’s Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? (1968). These works, along with other dystopian fiction, explore societal problems such as poverty, war, eugenics, and totalitarianism. Many literary dystopias represent themselves to their citizens as utopias. “‘Repent, Harlequin!’ Said the Ticktockman” alludes to a dystopian classic, George Orwell’s 1984 (1949), in its final page. Ultimately, the story critiques the idea of a perfectly ordered society that relies on fear to control its citizens.