Recently, works such as The Hunger Games have created a huge furore in society, especially among those members of society who are interested in dystopian books. But we have read dystopias quite often before, and not all of them are as technologically advanced as the one in the aforementioned book. More often than not, they are about enslaved societies, socially oppressed circles of people. One of the most famous examples of such a novel of dystopia is considered George Orwell’s 1984, which gave life to the winged expression “Big Brother is watching you,” thus embodying life under a microscope. A similar story load can be found in The Hunger Games, which broadcasts to the masses the attempts of some people to kill others. Yet the literature of dystopia has not always sought such modernization: television and computers are merely the newest additions to the genre. In fact, the roots of this trend go back to the beginning of the 16th century, when Thomas More wrote a book called Utopia, which, paradoxically, described a society very far removed in structure from its name. In general, writers who create in this genre, first of all, put in the concept of dystopia the meaning of a kind of society, split and destroyed by social norms and attitudes.
Anti-utopia is a kind of society with perfect ideals by design, but fallen and destroyed in fact. Anti-utopia shows a nightmarish picture of the near future. Typical themes of dystopia usually involve rebellion, social pressure, revolutions, wars, overpopulation, and catastrophe. Many consider this genre relatively new in literature, but the reality is that it has a very long and fascinating history. You will find evidence of this in this brief excursion into the history of the dystopia genre.
Functions of the dystopia
Through the novel of the dystopia, the author demonstrates his own conviction concerning the problems of humanity and society, and warns people of their weakness. Writers usually resort to the genre of dystopia to discuss reality and portray problems that are very likely in the future. Although the role of the dystopia in literature is limited to educating and warning the audience, do not underestimate its influence in highlighting problems of pressing social, political, and governmental concern.
The structure of dystopias
Background: A dystopia is usually part of a fictional universe that tells the story of how this world was formed or how it has evolved (or degenerated) in relation to our society. Prehistory vividly demonstrates the process of shifting levers of control over society, changing social norms, or the emergence of government power, run by individual corporations, totalitarian dictators, or bureaucrats.
Main Character: There are several types of protagonist who may appear in a dystopia book. One of these is the character who intuitively senses society’s problems and tries to fix them, openly believing that throwing the dictator off the Olympus of power is indeed possible. Often the worldview of such a character is shaped by his environment, which also is not indifferent to confrontation with the holder of power.
The other type of protagonist is an integral part of a society that perceives itself as nothing less than utopian, but at a certain point he realizes how wrong this very society is, and attempts to change or destroy it.
The plot: often the protagonist meets a character endowed with anti-utopian traits, perhaps the leader of the whole society. A conflict occurs in which the protagonist also meets, or is supported by, a group of people driven by the idea of destroying the dystopia. Sometimes these people were previously part of this dystopia, but they have managed to come to their senses and shed this burden.
Culmination: In a dystopia novel, the problem is often left unresolved; in most cases, attempts to destroy the dystopia are in vain. Sometimes the hero manages to break the vicious circle and break free, but in the overwhelming majority of cases the protagonist (or the group of people we discussed above) is defeated and the dystopia continues.
Examples of Anti-utopias
Texts of Revolutionary Significance
Perhaps nowadays the development of the dystopian genre in art has received a second wind, but its activity can be traced back to the times of the 18th century. Perhaps at that time such work was a reflection of not so fantastic utopian beliefs, but rather a response to threatening ideals and political attitudes. Thus, the novel dystopia uses its denunciatory form of imposing a worldview as a way of criticizing the ideology in the abyss of which these truly courageous texts were created.
However, repugnant views of totalitarian regimes and scenarios of post-apocalyptic destruction are closely intertwined within this genre, and in addition they have strong links with other literary movements, such as travel novels, satire and science fiction. It would therefore be a mistake to completely identify all of these movements.
The primary impetus for the dystopia movement belongs to Jonathan Swift, who published Gulliver’s Travels in 1726. Many might associate his story of the Lilliputians with nothing more than a good old Disney fairy tale, but Gulliver’s story is much darker than one might think. The writer publishes a sharp critique of contemporary society, wrapping his considerations in thick layers of metaphors. In one land, for example, Gulliver encounters a nation for whom science and rationalism are paramount, their pointless experiments draining natural and human resources. In contrast to them, the author presents other settlements, bloodthirsty and savage in nature, which cannot fail to amaze the traveler.
Upon his return to London, Gulliver comes to a stunning conclusion: being able to compare inherently polar ideologies, he realizes that he is no different from the peoples he has visited, and even more, his entire society is permeated with sinfulness.
The Dawn of Thinking Machines
A little later came the publication of Samuel Butler’s no less iconic novel of dystopia, called Yedgin (the title hides nothing less than an anagram of the word nowhere, which already unambiguously hints at the story message of the work), published in 1872 for the first time on behalf of an unknown author. In his novel Butler plays with all sorts of satirical devices against Victorian society. His book Yedgin can rather be categorized as utopian literature, although it also has the general traits of dystopia.
During the writer’s lifetime, technological advances were not yet as widespread as they were in the 20th century, but his speculations about how a machine could penetrate the mind are truly fascinating. Since then, the idea of the unmitigated danger that technological development brings with it has become an integral part of dystopian literature.
The Origins of Doublethink
Already in the first half of the 20th century two foundational texts for dystopian literature were published. We are talking about Aldous Huxley’s O marvelous new world (1932) and George Orwell’s novel 1984 (written in 1949). The thought police, Big Brother, doublethink, and the New Age: all these concepts are firmly rooted in our minds, but the ways in which they originated have been somewhat forgotten.
In Huxley’s work, the reader is plunged into a perfectly engineered world in which human beings are artificially grown like a vegetable and then seated at a predetermined place in the structure of society, with no one to complain about their situation until the system fails. Orwell’s novel features a character named Winston, who, under the pressure of propaganda, begins to ask irrelevant questions, but the social machine leaves him no room for willfulness. You can read more about the book here.
Paradoxically, both books are not devoid of quite ordinary and familiar details in our lives that everyone has heard or seen about: technology, television, drugs, etc.; all of which combine to produce a deafening effect of approximating the real world and detailing the danger that in theory may await us all.
In fact, the list of dystopian books could go on for a very long time, and it is easy to find notes of dystopia in every single work, which is why all literature is intertextual, each new genre inextricably linked to the other.