jankp's Full Review: Evgenii Ivanovich Zamiatin and Clarence Brown - We
Some of you have taken me to task for not appreciating Aldous Huxley’s Brave New World, as evidenced by the comment section of my review of that science fiction classic. How could I not appreciate the brilliance of his vision of a dystopic society, so relevant and terrifying to our progressive world? It seems obvious that you have not read Yevgeny Zamyatin’s We, which was written in Russia around 1921, published in English in 1924, but not published in Russia until 1988. It was the first banned novel in Russia, a masterful satire of social and political idealogy that predicted the horror of what was to come. So we want an utopia built on happiness for all? Zamyatin will shred such logic to pieces and toss it to the wolves, but only as a true visionary can with finesse.
Translated exquisitively by Mirra Ginsburg, she introduces us to the indomitable heretic and satirist who was Zamyatin through his thought put forth tirelessly in essays, stories and novels during the 20s. In 1929 he and all other independent thinkers were finally forbidden to publish in Russia and Zamyatin asked to leave the country. This was, to his surprise, granted in 1931 and he died heartbroken and friendless in 1937.
Permit me to first introduce his extraordinary tale with his own words as an overture shall herald a glorious, poetic masterpiece. Note that his journal-keeping hero of We is presented, but Zamyatin could be speaking directly to us as well.
But then, if this world is mine alone, why does it go into these notes? Why record all these absurd “dreams,” closets, endless corridors? I am saddened to see that, instead of a harmonious and strict mathematical poem in honor of the One State, I am producing some sort of fantastic adventure novel. Ah, if it were really nothing but a novel, and not my present life, filled with X’s, the sign for irrational number, and falls.
However, perhaps it is all for the best. You, my unknown readers, are most probably children compared to us, for we have been brought up by the One State and hence have reached the highest summits for man. And, like children, you will swallow without protest everything bitter I shall give you only when it is carefully coated with the thick syrup of adventure. Pp 102-3
Yes, I admit it. Zamyatin’s evocative novel went down much easier for me than Huxley’s abrasive, shallow novel, but not only because We is filled with mystery, heretical thought, satire and psychological madness, but also because it’s emphatically more authentic, told through the eyes and mind of the hero.
A Plot Teaser
The hero, or perhaps victim?, of the book is the Builder of the One State’s greatest project, the Integral, a space rocket that shall carry forth into the worlds of the universe the beauty of the One State. He is known as the number of his living space, D-503, for in this futuristic world of mathematical harmony and mass cohesion, there are no individuals to upset the rhythm. He and his “family” have grown up to believe it’s the only way to be happy, but then he meets another woman who repulses him at first because she intrigues him and the trouble begins.
She pursues him. In this society everybody is a sexual commodity that can be registered for with the One State to engage in sex, the only time when the shades are allowed to be lowered (perhaps the Big Brother-like Benefactor couldn’t stand seeing such a human act), and this woman with golden eyes and small teeth, I-330, registers for him.
It’s like he has never lived before. Suddenly he feels his heart pounding, his hands shaking. He needs her with him all the time, but she disappears for a couple of days, while he’s convinced he’s become sick. As the doctor tells him, he’s developed a soul and is given medical leave. Finally I-330 appears and leads him to the Ancient House with an ancient landlady just inside the Green (glass) Wall enclosing them from the primitive world.
The colors here assault his senses, alienate him. After sex, a fifteen-minute deal basically, he turns and loses her. He checks the bedroom closet and tumbles through space until he hits bottom where endless corridors await him. What will he find? Is the woman his salvation or his demise? Will the Integral launch according to One State’s purposes or will D-503’s soul allow him to do so?
You’ll have to find out for yourself!
Final Thoughts
You may have picked up on how D-503 is a Jesus figure in charge of building the vehicle that will proclaim the good news of the One State to all the universe. Yet he has no soul until he meets this mysterious woman who plays with his heart and mind. The suspense leaps off the page as I enjoyed the satirical observation that religion has no soul, which is from a nefarious, primitive source. Would he commit suicide? Would he become so crazy that he murders the outraged Benefactor (their God, like Ford in BNW) or one of the Guardians, so droll-ly compared to our idea of Guardian Angels?
I love how D-503 proceeds into insanity, so well shown through these journal entries. Each entry is titled with three points of thought or sometimes with his inability to think of what he wants to say. He drives the book along, but I also was amused by the peripheral characters: I-330, O-90 (the woman who has loved him), U (an older lady who falls in love with him), S (his Guardian) and a couple others with their quirks.
There may be no soma controlling the masses as in Brave New World, but their drug is in their religious fervor for the One State, which includes torture and sacrifice as Jesus had submitted to. Towards the end of We, however, an even more horrifying way to ensure nobody develops a soul is set into motion.
Zamyatin made me think while reading these 232 pages and I’m the better for it. Happiness isn’t governed by reason and logic, or proclaiming heaven’s glory, but by the building of my “primitive” soul and, dare I add, imagination.
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