"The Diary of the Rose" is a 1976 dystopian science fiction novelette by Ursula K. Le Guin. It was first published in the Future Power collection.[1] The story happens in a totalitarian society which uses brainwashing by "electroshocks" to erase any political dissent.
The story is the diary of psychodiagnost ("psychoscopist") Dr. Rosa Sobel. She worked for state security to enter the mind of Flores Sorde and look for signs of "political psyschosis." Sobel used a brain-mapping device called a psychoscope.
Conversations with Sorde caused Dr. Sobel to understand politics in a new and different way.[2]
All events were in 1977.
The first publication was in the Future Power collection in 1976.[1] The same year it was translated into French.[9]
In 1977 it was published in the anthologies Psy Fi One: An Anthology of Psychology in Science fiction and Best Science Fiction Stories of the Year: Sixth Annual Collection.[10]
It was part of the author's collection The Compass Rose in 1982.[11]
It was translated into French (Le journal de la rose, 1976), Dutch (Het dagboek van de roos, 1978; De Roos in de Winter,[nb 1] 1985), German (Das Tagebuch der Rose, 1979), Italian (Il diario della rosa, 2003),[9] and Russian (Дневник Розы, 2008)[12]
BBC Radio first broadcast an audiobook version of The Diary of the Rose 2009.[2]