The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas
by Ursula K. Le Guin(1973)
Short Storyc. 8 pages
“With a clamor of bells that set the swallows soaring, the Festival of Summer came to the city Omelas.”
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by Ursula K. Le Guin(1973)
“With a clamor of bells that set the swallows soaring, the Festival of Summer came to the city Omelas.”
Ursula K. Le Guin(1973)
A city of perfect happiness, described in rapturous detail, but the happiness depends on one child kept in permanent misery in a basement. Some citizens, upon learning this, walk away. Le Guin's story is a thought experiment about utilitarianism, about scapegoating, about the foundations of prosperity. The narrator invites us to imagine the details of Omelas, then shows us the cost. The child cannot be comforted because comforting would end the bargain. Those who walk away go into the darkness, destination unknown. The story offers no answers. It demands that we ask the questions.