The Science Fiction Novel - Dystopia anyone? Or maybe just some predictions of the Future.

Meow??

Our visitors have gone for a walk into town so they'll be gone for a couple of hours maybe. It's a mite colder this morning, 2 degrees C or so. I went for a morning walk of an hour earlier. It was my first chance for a few days as it has been rainy most mornings up until today. Fresh and cool this morning when I went so pretty perfect. Clyde thought he was a cat last night and jumped off of the small shelf we have behind our sofa in the family room. Silly little dog cut his foot a bit as well. He's ok today but feeling foolish. Silly, silly little dog.

So today I continue with my look at the Science Fiction Novel. Next in line, Aldous Huxley, got me thinking a bit and I've decided to highlight four separate books by four different authors. I think there is a theme there, a look at a dystopian future is how I'm going to try to present it. The four authors I will highlight are not unique or alone in their dark visions of the future but I think they do set a standard.

So with that preamble let's get started, eh?

Aldous Leonard Huxley

1. Aldous Huxley - Brave New World (1932).

Of the four books I will highlight, Brave New World is the one I enjoyed the least. Aldous Huxley was born in Surrey, England in 1894 and died in California in 1963. He was a philosopher and novelist, over the course of his life he wrote 50 fiction / non-fiction novels. He was interested in philosophical mysticism and in his later novels, he presented his visions of dystopia (Brave New World) and utopia (The Island - 1962).

I've only read Brave New World of his writings. The synopsis of the book is provided below.










"This fantasy of the future is one of Aldous Huxley’s best-known books. lts impact on the modern world has been considerable. Abandoning his mordant criticism of modern men and morals, the author switches to the future and shows us life as he conceives it may be some hundreds of years hence. Written in the thirties when - whatever the immediate outlook may have been - people believed that ultimately all would be for the best in the best of all possible worlds, this novel is a warning against such optimism. With irrepressible wit and raillery, Huxley satirizes the idea of progress put forward by the scientists and philosophers; and his world of test-tube babies and "feelies" is uncomfortably closer now than it was when the book was first published."

"Brave New World is a dystopian novel by English author Aldous Huxley, written in 1931 and published in 1932. Largely set in a futuristic World State, inhabited by genetically modified citizens and an intelligence-based social hierarchy, the novel anticipates huge scientific advancements in reproductive technology, sleep-learning, psychological manipulation and classical conditioning that are combined to make a dystopian society which is challenged by only a single individual: the story's protagonist. Huxley followed this book with a reassessment in essay form, Brave New World Revisited (1958), and with his final novel, Island (1962), the utopian counterpart." (Wikipedia)

Eric Arthur Blair (AKA George Orwell)

2. Brave New World has been compared to this next novel, 1984 by George Orwell. Orwell was born in India in 1903 and died in London in 1950. Unlike the works of Huxley, I've read and enjoyed others of Orwell's works and have more on my bookshelf as well. His examination of British rule in India and Burma in Burmese Days was excellent. His view of his early life as a struggling artist in Down and Out in Paris and London was an interesting read. Of course his classic look at Communism in Animal Farm is a classic. But here I will take a look at his other classic and one of my top science fiction novels (mind you, I may have to do another look at my favorites in the near future ;0)). 

1984 was originally written in 1949. It is Orwell's prediction of the future, an especially dark future of "Big Brother is Watching" and "Newspeak" and centers on a totalitarian state run by a dictator who controls all aspects of life, whose secret police watch everything you do, who keeps people in line by starvation, the threat of war with other nation states.

The book has been the subject of two movies, the classic of 1956, starring Edmund O'Brien as Winston Smith and the later version in 1984 with William Hurt as Smith and Richard Burton as O'Brien and also featuring the Eurythymics song Sex-crimes. Of course I can't compare the two as I've only seen the first. Why ruin a classic with a remake?

The books themes include Nationalism, Futurology, Censorship and Surveillance. One of the most interesting aspects for me was the dictionary of Newspeak at the back of my book. It features how words are used by the government to control language to also control thought, complete thoughts reduced to simplistic terms of simple meaning; Ingsoc (English Socialism), Minitrue (Minstry of Truth). What I recall is how words were used to change the meanings, e.g. The Ministry of Peace actually being the War Ministry, the Minstry of Truth actually being the Minstry of Propaganda, etc.

When the real 1984 came around, there seemed to be a bit of relief that the world hadn't actually followed Orwell's prediction, but (and here is a mini-rant) take a look at the situation in the US and major dictatorships (Russia, China, etc) today. The US has a president who creates a constant aura of fear to keep his followers in line. He forms a commission of voting integrity to actually limit voting rights. He derides those who actually care about the US and who can present these ideas intellectually and clearly, telling his followers that they are liberal elites who hate America. His minions in the government proudly tell these same followers that they are proud to be 'dumb' because it makes them the same as these self-same followers. (Rant ends for now, but keep this in mind as I review the next two authors / books).

Ray Douglas Bradbury

3. Ray Bradbury - Fahrenheit 451. Ray Bradbury was an American author and screenwriter who lived from 1920 - 2012. Over the course of his life eleven novels and numerous collections of short stories. Some of his more well-known novels / collections include The Martian Chronicles, Something Wicked this Way Comes, The Illustrated Man, I Sing the Body Electric, Dandelion Wine, etc. The complete collection of his works can be found at this link.

My focus in this entry will be, of course, Fahrenheit 451, written in 1953 and Bradbury's second novel. I've read a couple of times over the years and also have seen the excellent movie, starring Oscar Werner and Julie Christie, that came out in 1966. In a similar vein to 1984, it features a dystopic future where books are 'evil' as they give people ideas that might make them question what the government is doing. People with books are to be arrested or killed and the collections of books to be burned by the fire department (not there to stop fires but the reverse). The title of the book refers to the burning temperature of book paper. The story follows one fireman, Guy Montag who begins to question what he is doing, what his life is all about. He begins to hide books and to read them. Now, I may be confusing the book with the movie as I elaborate but the theme remains the same.

Julie Christie's character attracts Montag. He begins to explore the hidden culture that preserves books that is a threat to the government. Specific people are responsible for memorizing a certain book, so that even if the paper copy is destroyed, there will be a memory of it to pass along. It's a scary, fascinating book / movie and another that highlights aspects of society that need to be examined closely; once again as per my earlier rant, this concept of the dumbing down of a country's people. The Nazis held book-burnings to destroy cultures they found threatening. The current president of the US has not met a book he's felt the need to read and he and his staff tell people not to believe what they read, only to believe what he says. It makes for a very scary time and authors like Orwell and Bradbury definitely were concerned about it.

Margaret Eleanor Atwood

4. Margaret Atwood - The Handmaid's Tale. My 4th book / author is more current but even more applicable to the current world situation and offers another dark, scary look at the future. Margaret Atwood was born in Ottawa, Canada in 1939. She is the author of 15+ novels, of all genres, of 10 collections of short stories, poetry collections, non-fiction, etc. I was introduced to her in a Canadian Lit course in university and explored some of her novels and poetry at that time. I read The Handmaid's Tale, which came out in 1985 around that time. It was the winner of the Arthur C. Clarke award, of the Governor General's award and was nominated for the Man Booker prize as well.

Atwood has written other Sci-Fi novels, which I will address at a later date and most recently she has written a sequel to Handmaid entitled The Testaments which I have yet to read. Handmaid's was turned into a movie in 1990, starring Natasha Richardson as Kate, the protagonist of the book. An award winning TV series starring Elizabeth Moss in the lead role was presented in 2017 and has continued to develop the future presented in the book for 4 seasons. 

Atwood presents a world in which the United States has been taken over by an Evangelical leadership and turned into the state of Gilead. A civil war is still being fought. In this theonomy dictatorship, women are subjugated into a patriarchal society and it presents ways in which the society tries to return the US to a more rational society. 

It is a very dark society presented in the voice of Offred (Of Fred), a handmaid to The Commander, there to do his bidding and breed children for The Commander and his wife, in a very strange ceremony. The story also presents other characters and their situations as they react with Offred and The Commander and his household. It's a very strange, dark, fascinating world that Margaret Atwood had created, one that (rant again) can be seen in forms in present day US; what with the efforts by Republican leaders to overthrow Roe vs. Wade, with states' ever increasing attempts to limit abortion rights, etc. I do find it amazing how these books, or at the very least, the last three, reflected things that are occurring in the US as I write this. (Rant ends, please feel free to continue it yourselves)

Of course, these aren't the only books that present dystopic futures, as it is a popular sub-genre of the Sci-Fi novel. I'm sure I will highlight others as I continue with this discussion / presentation. More to follow. :0) Enjoy the rest of your week... Get out and vote in 2020 if you are a concerned American. ;0)