Dan Dietz

Charles Babbage

Charles Babbage, a 19th century engineer, once wrote a letter to poet Alfred Lord Tennyson in which he suggested a correction to the poem "The Vision of Sin." He felt the line "Every moment dies a man/Every moment one is born" should instead read, "Every moment dies a man/Every moment 11/16 is born." "Strictly speaking this is not correct, the actual figure is so long that I cannot get it into a line," Babbage went on to say, "but I believe the figure 1 1/16 will be sufficiently accurate for poetry."

Babbage's inability to grasp metaphor is one of many things that intrigue Dan Dietz about his main character in The Difference Engine, a play he's written about Charles Babbage. The former Austinite relocated to Tallahassee last year to teach playwriting at Florida State University, but the National Endowment for the Arts/Theatre Communications Group Theatre Residency Program has made it possible for Dietz to develop the show with Salvage Vanguard Theater, the company for which he was the resident playwright for many years, and he's been back in town for much of the summer toiling on a new workshop production that will be presented this weekend.

Dietz describes Babbage as "a notoriously unyielding person" who was very concerned with designing flawless machines. Dietz wonders: "If you cannot tolerate machines making errors, how do you tolerate the people around you? The imperfect, lumpy, fleshy people doing lumpy, fleshy people things?" Connor Hopkins, who is designing the set and has been with the project since its first workshop in January, answers, "Not very well."

Babbage's Analytical Engine

Babbage designed a machine called the Analytical Engine, which would have been the world's first computer had circumstances allowed the thing to be built. "I was just amazed," says Dietz, "that somebody had designed a computer a hundred years ahead of its time." Hopkins adds, "This was at a time when people would see a little windup toy and have serious discussions about whether or not it had a soul."

The Difference Engine is not solely the story of Babbage and his machines. It also considers his relationship to Ada Lovelace, the daughter of poet Lord Byron. Lovelace wrote the world's first computer program. Lovelace and Babbage together envisioned hardware and software far ahead of their time, and yet it was Lovelace's imagination that took it to the next level. "Ada made the mental leap that, if this thing can manipulate numbers, it can manipulate symbols. So it could create music. It could create new languages. It was a mental leap that nobody made again for a century. It's one of the greatest technological tragedies ever."

Dietz's experience developing this play with SVT has been "significantly less lonely than the usual writing process." He began with fragments which the actors and designers helped him knit together into scenes and then a play. Hopkins says, "It's been really interesting having Dan open up his head and let everyone crawl in there." Dietz responds, "My head is very thankful."

So why did Babbage and Lovelace fail? Why would the Difference Engine and the Analytical Engine remain imprisoned on blueprints? I'll leave it up to Dietz and the SVT crew to answer that in their "historical drama with nonrealistic flourishes," which will no doubt be sufficiently accurate for entertainment.

The Difference Engine runs Thursday-Saturday, Sept. 11-13, 8pm, at Salvage Vanguard Theater, 2803 Manor Rd. For more information, visit www.salvagevanguard.org.