About the Author

The author of the short story One

Is One And All Alone is David Higginbottom who writes under the

pseudonym Nicholas Fisk. The Englishman who was born in London on 14 October 1923 has also been an
actor, jazz musician, illustrator and photographer. He has written more than forty books, most of which are
Science Fiction for older children. His works include Grinny, You Remember Me, Space Hostages and
Trillions.
"I believe that almost any imaginable possibility may become a reality within the lifetime of a young person today: the previous
century saw more changes and discoveries than any other and change gets faster every day." - Nicholas Fisk

Summary
The story is about eleven years old Trish who felt very lonely boarding on a spaceship with his father to reach a planet
named Trion. She has no friends except the VoicePrinter which she treated as her private diary. After a long time being alone
without human companion, she decided to clone herself so that she would have someone of her age to be her friend. At first, she
seemed to think that the clone, Clo was a perfect friend since they are totally alike. However, as time passed by Trish felt that Clo
was getting very annoying when it acted exactly the same as her, doing whatever she did, using whatever she used, saying
whatever she said and even thinking whatever she thought. One day, Trish thought of disposing Clo through the hatch. She did not
think what she was going to do is wrong since Clo and her were identical so much so that no lost would be noticed. In fact,
nobody knew the existence of Clo. Unfortunately, since Clo and Trish shared the same thought, Clo seemed to act faster than Trish
when at last, Trish was the one who had been disposed out from the spaceship. Since then, Clo continued living as Trish in the
eyes of others including Trishs father.

Plot
1. Exposition
The characters and setting are introduced. The persona, Trish described her loneliness of being the only child on the spaceship.
The characters of VoicePrinter and her parents are also introduced. She described the spaceship and that they were heading to
Trion.
2. Rising Action
- Trish was sick of being alone, bored of computer images and sounds, and she wished for a human companion of her age. She
learned the word clone from VP and then decided to make a clone of herself
- Trish thought that the clone, Clo would be a perfect friend and it was indeed a perfect friend at first. She even communicated less
with VP after she had Clo as her friend.
- Then the conflict began when Trish started to feel uncomfortable with Clo due to the fact that they were totally identical
including in terms of action and even thought.
3. Climax
- Trish decided to get rid of Clo and she was thinking of disposing it out from the spaceship. One of them was successfully being
disposed out through the hatch while another one continued boarding the spaceship.

- Surprisingly, it was actually Trish who had been disposed and not Clo. This shows that they really had the same thought of
disposing each other but Clo acted first to dispose Trish out from the spaceship. Thus, Clo took Trishs place in the spaceship,
feeling the sense of freedom; the feeling that Trish would have felt if she was not the one who had been disposed.
- Clo was boarding the spaceship happily as the eleven years old Trish. In fact, it acted as a more cheerful Trish than before as her
father also noticed the good change in Trish.
Theme
There are a few themes we can find in this short story. The first one is the theme of loneliness. This theme has been
brought out by Trish. In this short story, we know Trish is the only child, she has no sibling. She lives in a ship and this makes him
had no friends. To make the situation worse, her parents are extremely busy with their own works and have no time to company
her. The Voice Printing is the only friends she has, but as the time pass by, she started to feel bored with this kind of relationship
when there are only computer image and sound. She started to have the feeling that she really needs someone to talk to and her
loneliness has given her the idea to create a clone of herself.
Another theme of this short story is scientific life. Here, in this short story, the author has shown that every event
occurred is related to the used and technology of science. Starting with the Voice Printing which can respond to Trish, the
character of mum and dad who is working in a space ship, and from the character Trish herself the term of science and technology
has been portrayed as Trish managed to use her knowledge and the equipment at the lab science to clone herself.
The need of love and attention also become the theme of this short story. Trish felt the loneliness as her parents always
busy with their works and that causes her to get the idea to clone herself. She thought that when shed cloned herself, she will
have somebody to talk and play with. She will have someone to accompany her to replace the roles of her parents who will never
have time to be with her although it was their responsibility to give her love, wealth and leisure life means nothing to Trish if she
had to be alone.
Lastly, the theme of this short story is another person can be a mirror of ourselves. Based on this short story, Trish
could not stand Clos picking habit. Ironically, she didnt realize that Clo was just being herself; Clo actually did what he did. That
means through the character of clo, Trish actually can see the reflection of herself.
Characters and characterizations
1) Trish
Trish is the main character of this short story. Nicholas Fisk has portrayed Trish as a lonely child as his parents were busy
with their own works. She has no friend, no sibling and her only friends in that ship is VoicePrinter, She somehow got
bored playing and talking to a machine and she needed real human to talk and play with and that has lead to the creation
of Clo, her clone. Trish also has been portrayed as a genius in science and technology. It can be proved as she managed to
clone herself without anyones help. Besides, in the middle of the story, the author has shown the sense of jealousy in
Trishs personality as she felt jealous of Cleo, her own clone. She started to feel annoyed towards Clo as Clo did
whatever she did and we can see the climax of her jealousy when she scolded Clo when Clo said that it missed her mum
too. Here, we can see that although Trish always said that she needed a companion, but she was actually not ready to
share her life with anyone else.
2) Clo

Clo is the clone of Trish. Its characters were totally the same with Trishs as it was Trishs clone. It did whatever Trish
did, for example it also had picking habit as Trish did. It kept repeating what Trish said and felt what Trish felt. This
situation made Trish felt that Clo was annoying and this has become the main factor of their quarrel.
3) Voice Printing
The author has portrayed this voice printing machine as Trish best friend. Although it is a non-living thing, it can react
and response to Trish. This machine has been portrayed as loyal as it always be by Trish side, playing games with her and
also a genius machine as it can correct Trishs spelling and punctuation. It has also become a teacher to Trish. As we can
read from the short story, it gave Trish dictionary lesson and it was the one who gave the information about the cloning
process to Trish.
4) Mum and Dad
In this short story, the characters of Trishs parents had not really being highlighted by the author. Briefly, from the short
story the author portrayed mum and dad as busy parents as her father works as ship Executive Officer and her mum was
busy setting up the space station. Her father is a caring person as hes always poking his head round Trishs door and
asking Trish about her life but he just had no time to show his love as hes always been very busy.
Setting
This short story is set in the future in the year of 2045. It can be proved as in the short story Trish had mentioned that they left
Earth on 12 March 2045 and they will not reach Trion until mid January 2047.The author has imagined that in the future there
were modern creation such as the voice printing that can respond to human action such as it responds, talks and even plays game
as well as teaches Trish about the dictionary lesson.
The place setting of this short story is mainly in a ship which is on its way heading to Trion planet. Every event occurred in this
ship. This ship had been a place where Trishs father worked and in this ship also was the place that made Trish felt the loneliness
of being alone without any friends. In this ship, Trish befriended with the voice printing, and here also, to be more specific in this
ship lab science, Trish has created a clone of herself that was named as Clo.
Social setting of this short story is that of a lonely and workaholic society. The lonely society has been portrayed trough the
character of Trish who always being alone as she was the only child and had no friends except the voice printing. Her loneliness
has led her to the action where she cloned herself. The workaholic society had been shown trough the character of Trishs parents.
They were too busy with their own work until they didnt realize that they had neglected their only child. It does not mean that
they dont love Trish, they actually care for Trish but the busyness has given them limited time to be with Trish.
Language Style
1. Persona

The story is based on the first person point of view that is Trish. We can see the use of pronouns such as I and me
throughout the story. However, the persona changes at the end of the story. Trish had been disposed so that the story
continues based on Clos point of view yet still, the persona is the first person.

2. Simple choice of words and simple sentence structures.

This element also pictures the language style used by an eleven years old child.
Example: Its my private diary. It corrects my spelling and punctuation. Its clever.

3. Informal language

The author uses informal language to make the story being presented in natural way a child expresses his or her feeling
towards others.
For example, the author uses the word loo which means toilet in another way.
Some of the sentences are yet still can be understood when we consider the contexts.
Example: a) My Mum, mine only.
b) This OK?
c) Which leaves me all alone in front of my VoicePrinter, talking to it, talking
and talking.

4. The use of dialogues

The dialogues inserted could be helpful to illustrate the real situation or the feeling of the characters involved.
Obviously, we can see the dialogue between Trish and her VoicePrinter was inserted to continue the flow of the story
and to help developing the plot. This is shown when at earlier parts of the dialogue; Trish did not even know the word
clone. Only then when VP taught her about the word and the process of cloning, she got the idea of cloning herself.

5. Ironic

Travelling and boarding on a spaceship heading to a new planet should be exciting. Ironically, Trish did not think so since

she had no human companion of her age while boarding the ship for a long period of time.
Another ironic thing is the fact that Clo should be the one who was supposed to be dispose out from the spaceship.
Instead, Clo who had the same thought as Trish acted first by disposing her and it managed to take Trishs role in the
spaceship.

Moral Values
One of the moral values contained in this short story is firstly we need someone else to be with throughout our life. One can say
that he or she can live by his or her own but the reality is we need someone to give and share our life and love with or we will end
up being all alone. Just like Trish in this short story, her father works as ship Executive Officer and of course her father has great
amount of salary that enable him to provide Trish a great and leisure life. However, they have to sacrifice their time together and
this situation has affected Trishs life. Trish was always being alone and this has led him to clone himself.
Secondly, moral value of this short story is the importance of being rational. We need to be rational which means that we have to
think the negative and positive effects that will occur when we do something. We cannot just do something based on our emotion.
In this short story, loneliness has forced Trish to create a clone with the hope that the clone will company her and become her
friend. For the beginning, when Clo was created everything goes smoothly but then as time pass by, Trish started to feel that Clo
was annoying and they had a quarrel. This situation occurred because Trish never thought the sequence of cloning herself.
Another moral value contained in this short story is it is important for us to feel thankful and understand ourselves. From this short
story, the author has portrayed that Trish were not satisfied with her life which was dull and lonely. So she created a clone of
herself to accompany her. But after a period of time, Trish started to feel jealous towards Clo, and she was not willing to share
everything with Clo although at first the intention of creating the clone is to share everything with her. She also hate when Clo did
picking, without she realizing that she also did it.