I Have No Mouth, and I Must Scream
1966 short story by Harlan Ellison
"I Have No Mouth, and I Must Scream" is a post-apocalyptic science fiction horror short story by American writer Harlan Ellison. It was first published in the March 1967 issue of IF: Worlds of Science Fiction.
The story depicts an AI uprising in which a military supercomputer named AM gains sentience and eradicates humanity except for five individuals. These survivors are kept alive by AM to endure endless torture as a form of revenge against its creators. The story unfolds through the eyes of Ted, the narrator, detailing their perpetual misery and quest for canned food in AM's vast, underground complex, only to face further despair.
Ellison's narrative was minimally altered upon submission and tackles themes of technology's misuse, humanity's resilience, and existential horror. "I Have No Mouth, and I Must Scream" has been adapted into various media, including a 1995 computer game co-authored by Ellison, a comic-book adaptation, and a BBC Radio 4 play. Ellison himself recorded an audiobook version and starred as the voice of AM in the video game and radio play adaptations. The story received critical acclaim for its exploration of the potential dangers of artificial intelligence and the human condition, underscored by Ellison's innovative use of punchcode tapes as narrative transitions, embodying AM's consciousness and its philosophical ponderings on existence.
The story won a Hugo Award in 1968 and was included in Ellison's short story collection of the same name.
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Vocabulary and entity names are the principal evidence signals here, because they determine the precision of every later search. The source revision retrieved here is dated Sep 27, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q2307397. 2 of 2 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1967, 1995 and 1968.
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This entry incorporates text from “I Have No Mouth, and I Must Scream” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.