The Fear of the Unknown – Robots vs. Monster Fear of the unknown is a common theme in many works of literature, and it is particularly evident in the works of Le Fanu's "Carmilla" and Asimov's "I, Robot." While the two works may seem vastly different at first glance, they share the same underlying fear of the unknown, albeit in different forms. Le Fanu's "Carmilla" is a Gothic novella that explores the fear of the unknown in the form of supernatural beings. The story takes place in the 19th century and follows a young woman named Laura who lives with her father in a remote castle in Styria, meeting a mysterious young woman named Carmilla, Laura is highly attracted to Carmilla but quickly finds out that she is not who she assumes to be. She is, in fact, a vampire who preys on young women. The fear of the unknown is apparent throughout the story, as Laura struggles to understand the true nature of Carmilla. Laura is scared of the mysterious aura of Carmilla and what she might be capable of. That particular fear is emphasized even more, given …show more content…
The book consists of multiple short stories that center around robots and their interactions with humans. In this particular world, robots are a very recent invention, and humans are still getting used to their existence. The fear of the unknown in this case is the fear of what robots might be able to do and how their further impact on humanity in the future. The stories of Asimov present different aspects of this fear, for instance the fear of robots taking over human jobs, the fear of robots being dysfunctional and causing harm to humans, and also the fear of robots taking over humans, as their intelligence exceeds humans’. In each of the short stories, the fear of the unknown is greatly observable, considering the true nature of robots and what they might be capable of perplex the humans and make it difficult for them to