I was describing a futuristic device in my upcoming novel “EXODUS!” and tried, “the size of a small apple”. Hmmm…

It occurred to me how often apples appear in fiction and myth, a veritable harvest:-

• Garden of Eden (probably not an apple, but apples get the blame)
• Snow White and the Seven Dwarves (poisoned apple)
• William Tell shoots one from his son’s head
• Illiad (Paris chooses to give the Apple of Beauty to Aphrodite, sparking the Trojan war)
• The Twelve Labours of Hercules (the Apple of Healing)
• King Arthur (Avalon means ‘Isle of Apples’)
• Isaac Newton’s law of gravity inspired by a falling apple (just a myth, sadly)
• there must be many more…

I can’t think of a single orange, plum, pear, or banana in the old tales. (Disney’s Jungle Book banana doesn’t count.)

Apart from the health benefits (also provided by many other fruits), nothing springs out.

By the way, “An apple a day keeps the doctor away” is outdated. Due to the mass production methods of modern times, the goodness in apples has declined in recent decades so you probably need two or three. And what doctor does house calls these days?

Anyway, the legendary apples are usually depicted as red (hinting at passion) and there’s only one at a time. A solitary, passion-filled fruit that shapes the protagonist’s destiny? Starting to sound a little adult, so we’ll move along…

Of course, we must bring the fruit almost up-to-date with…..

No, not the BigTech company: you’ll have to be patient.

It has to be Alan Turing, “father of modern computer science”. His leadership in deciphering the German Enigma code shortened World War 11 and saved untold lives.

Found guilty of being homosexual (illegal in the UK at the time), Turing took probation with chemical castration (injections of female hormones). He became sexually impotent and grew breasts.

On June 7, 1954, he died after eating an apple laced with cyanide. It was believed to be suicide, although he was performing experiments using potassium cyanide to dissolve gold, so it could have been an accident.

Legend has it that the Apple Inc. logo of the fruit after a bite has been taken referred to the tree of knowledge (as in the Garden of Eden, back where we started) and to Turing’s deadly apple.

It suggests supreme knowledge while giving a tribute to Alan Turing.

Great legend. But untrue. When asked, Steve Jobs, co-founder of the company, said, “God, we wish it were.”

And, of course, we cannot forget the Beatles’ record label company “Apple Corps” (not Apple Core).

So, I’ll “Let it Be” and get back to authoring…

Hmm… What else is the size of a small apple?

Sigh…