Books that are worth reading: “We” Evgeny Zamyatin [Book Review]
Hello dear friends! From Russian literature we move on to the literature of the Soviet. The work of Evgeny Zamyatin “We” is a sign of the thing, since it was she who became a pioneer in the genre of anti -utopia, even before Oriel, Haxli and Bradbury wrote their imperishable “1984”, “On the marvelous new world” and “451 degrees Fahrenheit”, respectively, respectively. The review will be without a zone of spoilers, since the novel itself is quite short and is easy to read in a couple of evenings.
The work was written in 1920, 3 years after the Great October Revolution and our compatriots would hardly have learned about it if in 1924 this novel was not published in English. In our country, the work was not published quite a lot of time, for very understandable reasons – it was believed that such a story did not correspond to the general line of the country to establish socialism, moreover, Zamyatin himself was severely criticized from the literary community of that time. In 27, the work was published in the abbreviated editorial office of the New York Publishing House named after Chekhov, and in 52 the full version of the novel was released. In the USSR, the novel officially appeared only in 1988, more than 50 years after the death of the writer. Let’s see what this anti -utopia is itself.
After 120 days, the construction of the integral ends. The great, historical hour is close, when the first integral will rise into the world space. A thousand years ago, your heroic ancestors conquered the power of a single state the whole globe. You have an even more glorious feat: a glass, electric, fire -breathing integral to intervene an endless equation of the universe. You have the beneficent iga of the mind to subjugate unknown creatures that live on other planets – perhaps even in the wild state of freedom. If they do not understand that we carry them mathematically unmistakable happiness, our duty to make them be happy. But before weapons we experience the word.
Excerpt from the work
The distant future, about the 32th century AD, judging by some fragmentary phrases. People live in a society where logic and mathematics reigns. Everything has been done to level differently social status and level everyone and everyone in rights. Equally shaved heads, the same clothes, the so -called unifa. The same daily routine and the same rooms for living, with glass walls. The same food and the same life. Each is employed and benefits the system in clearly defined framework. In fact, the novel fantasizes on the topic of what society would look like if the idea of Taylorism would actually be used.
Taylorism is one of the theories of management or the https://ltccasino.co.uk/ scientific organization of labor that analyzed and generalized the work processes. Its main goal was to increase economic efficiency, especially labor productivity. The use of this approach was one of the first attempts to apply science to design processes and management. The founder of the theory is Frederick Winclue Taylor
The names are also abolished, instead of them the so -called numbers are used, which are divided by the sexual, using letters at the beginning of the identifier, consonant letters for men and vowels for women. For example, the protagonist is identified by number D503. Social Institute of Family also underwent changes. Monogamia no longer exists, and everyone has the right to spend a sexual hour with any numer on special pink coupons. Children also belong to the state and study robots, the concept of mother and father as such do not exist. Thus, the system controls the absence of attachments and love, for the sake of the effectiveness of every resident. All food is synthetic and the same, there is no drawback in it. The state in fact curbed the two most powerful numbers management tools – hunger and love, erasing the individuality of each using a clock tablet – a schedule that regulates almost all the time of residents. At the same minute everyone wakes up, at the same time fall asleep. They work, eat, do a sexual hour, study in lectures – everything is painted. But the main character of the work that I will talk about a little later, admits that the tablets are not perfect – there is a watch in it when the number is left to his own devices, and may show the self -will, which will make it less happy. In the understanding of the state, of course.
I am in front of the mirror. And for the first time in my life-exactly so, for the first time in my life-I see myself clearly, clearly, consciously-with amazement I see myself as someone “him”. Here I am – he: black, drawn in a straight eyebrow;And between them – like a scar – a vertical wrinkle (I don’t know if it was before). Steel, gray eyes circled by the shadow of sleepless night: and behind this steel … It turns out I never knew what was there. And from “there” (this is “there” at the same time both here and endlessly far) – from “there” I look at myself – at him, and I know for sure: he – with drawn in a straight eyebrow – an outsider, alien to me, I met him for the first time in my life. And I’m real, I am not – he ..
Excerpt from the work
The main character of the work, as I mentioned earlier, is the mathematician and the chief engineer of the spacecraft called “Integral”. Within the framework of its construction, everyone was invited to contribute, writing their message to the inhabitants of distant planets. The message, of course, should be stuffed with agitation of the political system of society and not allow other interpretation. How a conscious number D503 begins to conduct memoirs, which he wants to use as a contribution to the general message. Get ready with the poet, the style of the novel is close to the epistolary, that is, it consists almost completely of the excerpts of those very memoirs of the protagonist. The manner of presenting the text is appropriate. Each chapter is called a “record” and has in its name various, seemingly unrelated words. For example, “Record 2nd Summary: Ballet. Square harmony. X”. Something similar was used in the “mysterious island” of Jules Verne, where in the name of the chapter its brief content was partially laid. So here – these words, these are reflection of the thoughts of the protagonist, under the impression of certain events that he describes. Since we have touched on the style of the novel, I want to pay attention a little more and those literary techniques that the author masterfully uses to recreate the strict mathematical picture of the future. On the Fantlab website.ru gives a fairly curious analytics that interested me.
Linguistic analysis
So, the author deliberately wrote the novel with a dry mathematical, lack of emotions, which affected his monotony. 10 thousand words accounted for a little more than two thousand unique, the share of dialogs was only one fifth of the novel, and the average length of the sentence for twenty signs was shorter than the average. What is it talking about? The fact that the author deliberately simplified the manner of the narrative in order to convey the way of thinking of a person who lives in strict mathematical reality. A very small number of bright emotional adjectives, exclamation marks, the general neutrality of the narrative – all this plays into the hands of the atmosphere. In general, the style in which this novel is written is quite distant, and I do not remember the analogues in other works. But let’s get back to the main character of the story, Numer D503.
Call. Day. All this, without dying, without disappearing, is only covered with daylight;as visible items, without dying, are covered by night darkness by night. In my head – light, unsteady fog. Through the fog – long, glass tables;Slowly, silently, in the beat of the chewing spherical. From afar, through the fog, it pulls out by the metronome, and I am mechanically, together with everyone, I count to this usual-playing music up to fifty: fifty legalized chewing movements for every piece. And, mechanically repulsing the beat, I go down, I note my name in the book of the departing – like everyone else. But I feel: I live separately from all, one, fenced with soft, drowning sounds, a wall, and behind this wall is another world ..
Excerpt from the work
The main character, a very interesting development path passes. The reader, through the prism of his memoir, gets the opportunity to get acquainted with the society in which he lives and understand his laws and rules. D503 introduces us to each new record in the diary with various aspects of that world, whether it be an hour -long tablet, a story about the education system or explanations about the management of feelings through the sexual hour. Despite the fact that he considers himself an extremely effective unit of the system, inside it there is an embryo of rebellion, but in the early stages of the development of history, this is expressed only in the preference of the same person for a sexual hour. This is not forbidden on the one hand, but on the other hand it has a prerequisite for attachment and love, which is already a violation of the law.
Everything changes in his life when the i-330 appears and turns everything upside down. They have a communication that regularly forces the hero to go, first to small, and then rather major violations of the rules and laws of society. Around the same time, the narrative in the novel becomes more human and less mathematical. More and more communicating with the I-330 and falling in love with it, the hero begins to doubt the foundations that were formed in society. In fact, he tries to understand how happiness and freedom correlate. The laws of society are built on simple swings – the less a person has freedoms, the more he is happy and vice versa. This idea is not meaningless and is completely reflected in our modern world. Where exactly does the main character bring communication with mysterious and strange I-330 I will not tell you. You can find out, after reading the novel directly, the benefit, as I said earlier, it is small. I can only say that the ending of the novel shocks with its simplicity and uncompromising. A few words I would like to say about the name of the work. The word “we” conveys some contextual -dependent things as well, and this is also done masterfully. In different episodes of the novel, with the help of this word, a certain unity is emphasized, but each time with different components and even different emotional colors. Then with admiration, belonging to society, then on the contrary with rejection. Due to this technique, the author regularly focuses the reader on the important things that he tries to convey and I can say that the name is selected very accurately and fulfills this function entirely. You can still tell a lot about the novel what remains behind the scenes – about the people of the renegates, about the dome surrounding the city in which the main character lives, about the old house – the fragment of the past. But then the review will turn into a detailed retelling of the plot that I do not want to do.
The world of Zamyatin is unusual. I can’t call it a unique and outstanding work, but it is worth paying his due, since it was the novel “We” that served as the impetus for the writing of the “Castard” and “Wonderful New World”, and in fact was the progenitor of the genre of anti -utopian.
Do I recommend reading it – yes, definitely, you need to know the classics. Below are several links to critical articles on a deeper analysis of this work – who is interested in, use: