Fairy Tale Spotlight: The Beast that Shouted Love at the Heart of the World [Short Story Review]

[I spoil the main premise of the story.]

"The Beast that Shouted Love at the Heart of the World" is a short science fiction story written by Harlan Ellison. It was published in 1968. This is more of a traditional science fiction with aliens and such, but the premise is still pretty surreal.

The idea here is that there is a seven-headed dragon with dogs heads that is completely insane. As a matter of fact, he is the very spirit of insanity. The aliens who capture him drain him of his insanity and somehow transmit his spirit across all time and all space. This is used to explain why some people in our world throughout history just did horrible things for seemingly no reason.

Where this explanation is a bit dry of substance, the presentation of this story is very ambient. I actually liked how everything was described. It is a very surreal story for something I consider fairly mundane. For that reason, I think it is okay to recommend this one. It has a visual appeal to it if anything. Just understand that there isn't much substance behind the point it's trying to make. Just a simple "what if."

This blog was written on August 15, 2024.

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