a harbinger of a world in which a scholar would be left with only a barren choice of what orders to issue to robot researchers. Analysis The critic Joseph Patrouch has pointed out that the speech Asimov gives Ninheimer is an eloquent self-exculpation rather than a caricatured luddite tract and cites the story as an example of a general rule that Asimov's best stories are those in which his personal technophile optimism is thus qualified. References External links "Galley Slave" at the Internet Archive Short stories by Isaac Asimov Works originally published in Galaxy Science Fiction 1957 short stories Fiction set in 2033