Roderick
These are notes for the Roderick novels by John Sladek. They were first published separately as Roderick, or the Education of a Young Machine (1980) and Roderick at Random, or the Further Education of a Young Machine (1983), before being reissued together (as Sladek originally intended) as The Complete Roderick (2001).
Major characters
- Roderick: learning system.
- Dan Sonnenschein: young computer science genius.
- Lee Fong: head of the Roderick project.
- Ben Franklin: researcher on the Roderick project.
- Leo Bunsky: researcher on the Roderick project, presumed dead.
- Allbright: alcoholic poet, friend of Dan.
- Dora: student, friend of Allbright.
- Avrel Stonecraft: corrupt NASA official.
- Helen Boag: Dean of Persons at Minnetonka University.
- Professor Rogers: sociologist and committee manipulator.
- Jane Hannah: anthropologist with an encyclopedic knowledge of mythology.
- Aikin, Dollsly, Fethers, Tarr: pseudoscience scholars competing with Fong for funding.
- Mister O'Smith: bionic cowboy assassin.
- Ma and Pa Wood: elderly meta-hippies in Nebraska, sometime performance artists and inventors.
- Indica Dinks: former dancer, Ben's ex-wife.
- Bax Logan: Indica's lover.
- Hank Dinks: Indica's second husband, friend of Allbright, freelance journalist.