Language English Publisher Quinn Publications Followed by "The Pacifist" Genre Science Fiction Preceded by Critical Mass | Published in If Publication date February 1957 Originally published February 1957 Series Tales from the White Hart Country United Kingdom | |
 | ||
Similar The Pacifist, The Man Who Ploughed, The Reluctant Orchid, Tales from the White Hart, Death and the Senator | ||
"The Ultimate Melody" is a science fiction short story by Arthur C. Clarke, first published in 1957. The story describes the work of a physiologist who attempts to discover the connections between music and the rhythms of the electrical pulses in the brain. He believed that all "hit-tunes" were merely poor reflections of an "ultimate" melody, and he built a machine to search for this tune. By the end of the story, he succeeds, but the influence of the melody is so powerful that he becomes completely catatonic.
The piece was later published as the sixth story in Clarke's collection Tales from the White Hart.
References
The Ultimate Melody Wikipedia(Text) CC BY-SA