Im reading Rossum's Universal Robots (R.U.R), which is the play that introduced the term "robot" into the English lexicon. Its interesting that the robots are distinctly organic beings, artificial, engineered beings sure, but they are organic and have anatomies analogous to humans. They are still described as "mechanical" and as "machines" but they are not machines the way we conceive of the robot today.
It also cuts through the bullshit that tends to cling to stories about robot work forces or robot uprising. The robots are clearly people despite being artificial. The robots are explicitly a slave labor force built to undercut the labor of normal humans. The guys who build them are all freaks. You can take any scene from Bladerunner, I Robot (the movie version), Fallout 4, or anything else where the humanity of a synthetic person is questioned and its basically beaten to the punch by its own antecedent. Very interesting text.
