Front matter
Reading edition
ace books A Division of Charter Communications Inc. 1120 Avenue of the Americas New York, N.Y. 10036
This Ace edition follows the text of the first English edition, originally published in 1927.
Title-page design by Jack Gaughan.
Printed in U.S.A.
THE WORLD OF 2026 A.D.
Metropolis is a classic of science-fiction which created an impact on the literary world which reverberates to this day. Its dramatic presentation of the city-world of the next century stirred the minds of readers with an unforgettable vision of a metropolis grown to Gargantuan proportions, of humanity fighting to keep its soul against the monster world of machinery, robots, and complexity that had been spawned in our own century. The book inspired a movie which is possibly the best science-fiction film ever made.
This book is not of to-day or of the future.
It tells of no place.
It serves no cause, party or class.
It has a moral which grows on the pillar of understanding: “The mediator between brain and muscle must be the Heart.”
—T. vH.
CONTENTS
CHAPTER I
CHAPTER II
CHAPTER III
CHAPTER IV
CHAPTER V
CHAPTER VI
CHAPTER VII
CHAPTER VIII
CHAPTER IX
CHAPTER X
CHAPTER XI
CHAPTER XII
CHAPTER XIII
CHAPTER XIV
CHAPTER XV
CHAPTER XVI
CHAPTER XVII
CHAPTER XVIII
CHAPTER XIX
CHAPTER XX
CHAPTER XXI
CHAPTER XXII
CHAPTER XXIII
CHAPTER XXIV
CHAPTER XXV