I'm searching for a short story (it's not Asimov's The Fun They Had) about a man who buys a vintage robot teacher and develops a relationship (I think the robot recites Shakespeare, and he spends more and more time with it, instead of with his family). I also seem to recall that school is now happening on television, sponsored by cereal makers. And that the man went to school in a remote area which was the only reason he had a robot teacher. It's pre-2000, likely pre-1990.
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1 Answer
It sounds very much like "Thirty Days had September", a short story by Robert F. Young first published in the Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction in October 1957.
A man, Danby, indeed buys a refurbished 4th-grade robot teacher called "Miss Jones". As well as teaching, the robot was able "to cook, sew, and be handy around the house". As the OP recalled, education is done via television ("teleducation") sponsored by cereal companies, and for example Romeo and Juliet was performed in the style of a Western. Danby finds himself falling in love with the robot, and they quote lines from Romeo and Juliet to each other, and both find the modern world tawdry and unpleasant.
It's available online at the Internet Archive.
answered Feb 25, 2021 at 0:02
