The Tale of the Big Computer

In 1966, at the cusp of the computer age, Olof Johannesson published the sci-fi novel The Tale of the Big Computer, about the rise to power of an all-encompassing, perfectly rational computer network. But “Olof Johannesson” never existed—the name concealed the identity of Hannes Alfvén, the 1970 winner of the Nobel Prize in physics. Alfvén's novel, a Swedish best seller, inspired in turn a “computer opera” by the composer Karl-Birger Blomdahl, never to be completed or premiered after Blomdahl died of a heart attack. All that remain are fragments of evidence. Lists of noises such as “sword against shield, water boiling, meat frying, steam engine, a falling guillotine, subway, a radio being squeaky and noisy, the first voice of a sputnik, washing machine, dishwasher, A-bomb explosions.” Collaborators and collaborators' collaborators including Billy Klüver, Pontus Hultén, Öyvind Fahlström, and others involved with E.A.T. (Experiments in Art and Technology).