This story is about love, which means that it is also about hate.

Imagination is like a muscle. I found out that the more I wrote, the bigger it got.

As science pushes forward, ignorance and superstition gallop around the flanks and bite science in the rear with big dark teeth.

Give us power, give us light To holdall love within our breast's small space.

This story is about love, which means that it is also about hate.

Nature is an experimenter.

The truth is that Trout, like Vonnegut and Ray Bradbury and many others, writes parables. These are set in frames which have become called, for no good reason, science fiction. A better generic term would be 'future fairy tales'. And even this is objectionable, since many science fiction stories take place in the present or the past, far and near.