Dystopia- a variety in fiction that describes a state in which negative development trends have prevailed (in some cases, not a separate state is described, but the world as a whole). Dystopia is the exact opposite utopias.

Dystopia is a logical development of utopia and formally can also be attributed to this direction. However, if the classical Utopia concentrated showing positive traits described in the work of social order, then dystopia seeks to identify his negative traits.

An important feature of utopia is its static nature., while dystopia is characterized by attempts to consider the development of the described social structures (as a rule, in the direction of increasing negative trends, which often leads to a crisis and collapse). Thus, dystopia usually works with more complex social models.

Interesting! Soviet literary criticism generally perceived dystopia negatively.

Quote: “In dystopia, as a rule, a crisis of historical hope is expressed, the revolutionary struggle is declared senseless, and the ineradicability of social evil is emphasized; science and technology are seen not as a force that contributes to solving global problems, building a just social order, but as a means of enslaving a person hostile to culture”

In the USSR, any anti-utopia was inevitably perceived as a doubt about the correctness of this theory, which at that time was considered an unacceptable point of view. Dystopias that explored the negative possibilities for the development of capitalist society, on the contrary, were welcomed in every possible way, but they avoided calling them dystopias, instead giving a conditional genre definition"warning novel" or "social fiction". It is on such an extremely ideological opinion that the definition of dystopia given by Konstantin Mzareulov in his book Fiction. General course":

«… utopia and dystopia: ideal communism and dying capitalism in the first case is replaced by communist hell and bourgeois prosperity in the second».

Modern literary criticism singles out the “pseudo-carnival” as the structural core of the anti-utopia, if the main emotion of the carnival described by Bakhtin is ambivalent laughter, absolute fear combined with reverence for the state becomes the basis of the totalitarian pseudo-carnival.

Dystopia is a current of social thought, which, in contrast to utopia, not only denies the possibility of creating an ideal state living together people, but also proceeds from the conviction that any attempts to build an arbitrarily constructed "fair" social system lead to catastrophic consequences.

History of the genre

In Russia, at the end of the 18th century, the creator of dystopia in its modern form and function was the writer Mikhail Matveyevich Kheraskov.

His dilogy "Kadmos and Harmony" (1789) and "Polydor, the son of Kadmos and Harmony" (1794) has a form quite common for classicism allegorical journey, closely related to the classic examples of utopia: the characters travel through fictional countries, comparing "good" states with "bad" ones.

However, in Kadmos and Harmony, Kheraskov goes beyond these genre boundaries, not limiting himself to static comparison, but showing how a utopian state based on the ideas of freedom, equality and fraternity gradually evolves to its opposite.

A group of Enlightenment philosophers and their followers establish an ideal state on a fertile island. Soon a struggle for power begins on the island, and philosophers, using their knowledge, win a number of privileges. Privatization takes place: land, fields and forests are divided among citizens in equal shares, a hierarchy of ranks is introduced. Scientists begin to charge for medical, legal and economic advice, gradually turning into oligarch tyrants. This utopian experiment ends internecine war, causing the island to die in flames.

The genre reached its heyday in the 20th century. AT Soviet Russia- a country in which utopian ideas are being implemented at the state level,

• Yevgeny Zamyatin writes the novel "We" in 1920.
• It was followed in 1925 by "Leningrad" by Mikhail Kozyrev,
• Andrei Platonov from the mid-1920s to the early 1930s wrote Chevengur and Kotlovan.

Following Zamyatin's "We", the classic examples of the genre are the novels "Oh wonderful new world by Aldous Huxley, written in 1932 and created in 1948 Orwell's 1984 (novel)

The most cult books are the following author's works:

1. George Orwell "1984". The novel describes a world divided between three totalitarian states. The book about full control, the destruction of everything human and about trying to survive in a world of hatred. The novel was repeatedly censored by the socialist countries. It was banned in the USSR.
2. Ray Bradbury Fahrenheit 451. Fahrenheit 451 is the temperature at which paper ignites and burns. This is the world of the future, in which all written publications are ruthlessly destroyed. special detachment firefighters, the possession of books is punishable by law, and interactive television successfully serves to fool everyone.
3. Aldous Huxley "Brave New World" Before us appears a society in which, it would seem, there is no place for pain and sadness. Almost from birth, every person is inspired that his place in society is the best; everyone is provided with whatever benefits they need. If, nevertheless, sadness has crept into the soul, it is enough to take a couple of soma tablets, and there will be no trace of a bad mood.
4. George Orwell "Animal Farm". Animal Farm is a parable, an allegory for the 1917 revolution and subsequent events in Russia. Animal world The barnyard endured bestial treatment by people for a long time, but one day this patience snapped. The four-legged rebelled and drove out the farmers, but they themselves declared themselves a free republic under the leadership of pigs.
5. Evgeny Zamyatin "We". One of the most famous dystopias in the world. In the twenty-sixth century, the inhabitants of Utopia have lost their individuality so much that they are distinguished by numbers. At the head of the United State is someone called the Benefactor, who is annually re-elected by the entire population, as a rule, unanimously. The guiding principle of the State is that happiness and freedom are incompatible.
6. Anthony Burgess A Clockwork Orange. This is an evil satire on the modern totalitarian society, which seeks to turn the younger generation into the obedient will of the leaders of the “clockwork oranges”. Smart, cruel, charismatic anti-hero Alex, the leader of a street gang, preaching violence as a high art of life, falls into the iron grip of the newest state program for the re-education of criminals and becomes a victim of violence himself.
7. Tatyana Tolstaya "Kys". "Kys" is an actual dystopia, a terrible and wonderful tale about the death of our civilization, about mutated citizens running wild in radioactive forests, but most importantly, about the degradation of a language that is still recognizable, but already obscure.
8. Andrey Platonov "Pit" The Pit reflects, as in a distorting mirror, the main events of the first five-year plan held in the USSR: industrialization and collectivization. A wonderful example of dystopia, harsh satire on the realities of everyday life and social structure the Soviet state.
9. Kazuo Ishiguro Don't Let Me Go. Katie, Tommy and Rude grew up in boarding schools. Studied, painted pictures, played in school plays. Over time, they learned that their destiny is donation. They were created specifically to save the hopelessly ill. And these children are not shocked. They resignedly prepare to first become assistants and brighten up the last days of their comrades, and then they themselves will receive a call to excavation.
10. Kurt Vonnegut "Slaughterhouse Five, or the Children's Crusade" Would you like to imagine yourself in the place of Billy Pilgrim, who goes to bed an elderly widower and wakes up on his wedding day, enters the door in 1955, and leaves it in 1941? You just need to learn from the Tralfamadorians to see in four dimensions. One piece of advice for you: when wandering in time, choose the doors so as not to accidentally end up in slaughterhouse number five.
11. Vladimir Nabokov "Invitation to execution". In an unnamed fictional country, a young man named Cincinnatus C. is awaiting execution, imprisoned in a fortress and sentenced to death for his disturbing public opacity, or, as the court concluded, "epistemological infamy." Haunted by "wretched ghosts" of guards and relatives.
12. Arkady and Boris Strugatsky "Snail on the slope". In the story "The Snail on the Slope" there are two worlds, two different societies, each of which lives according to its own laws. We see the world through the eyes of Candide and Peretz. These are scientists, people of thought who do not accept violence and persecution. Both of them are “sick with a longing for understanding” and will strive for the truth to the very end, but each in his own way.
13. Alex Garland "The Beach". The beach is a piece of heaven on earth among the Thai islands. He is discovered by a group of people. The complete absence of civilization and the sheer wilderness captivates all people who see it. There are a lot of rumors about this place, it was even called Eden. But getting there is not so easy. To find yourself there, you need to be quick-witted, courageous and purposeful.
14. Lauren Oliver Delirium. Near future. A world in which love is forbidden, because love is a disease, the most dangerous amor deliria, and a person who violates the ban is threatened with severe punishment. Therefore, any citizen who has reached the age of eighteen is obliged to undergo the procedure of liberation from the memory of the past, which carries the microbes of the disease.
15. Stephen King "Running Man" Lives in an ordinary small town a common person, slowly but surely plunging into the abyss of black hatred for himself and others. And once there is a reason, there is no stopping it. America has gone to hell. People are dying of hunger and the only way earn - take part in the most monstrous of the games generated by the perverted mind of a sadist.

Genre characteristics

The main goal of the dystopian mood is:

• undermining the basis of an optimistic view of the future;
• to prove the impossibility and nightmarishness of any utopias.

Dystopia is characterized by:

• the projection onto the imaginary society of precisely those features that cause the greatest rejection in modern society;
• the location of the dystopian world at a distance - in space or in time;
• description of the negative features characteristic of a dystopian society in such a way that a feeling of a nightmare arises.

In dystopia, the main dream is to survive, to be reborn, to return your world, accepting it as it is. After all, dystopia is an image of a "future without a future", a dead mechanized society, where a person is assigned the role of a mere unit.

Functions of dystopia

Through a dystopian novel, the author demonstrates his own conviction regarding the problems of humanity and society, and also warns people about their weakness. Writers usually resort to the dystopian genre to discuss reality and depict problems that are very likely in the future. Despite the fact that the role of dystopia in literature is to educate and warn the audience, one should not underestimate its influence on the coverage of pressing social, political, and governmental problems.

Structure of dystopias

background: Dystopia is usually part of a fictional universe that tells how this world was formed or how it evolved (or degraded) in relation to our society. The backstory clearly demonstrates the process of changing the levers of control over society, changing social norms, or establishing the power of the government, controlled by individual corporations, totalitarian dictators or bureaucrats.

Main character: There are several types of protagonist that can appear in a dystopian book. One of these is a character who, at the level of intuition, feels the problems of society and tries to fix them, frankly believing that it is really possible to throw the dictator off the Olympus of power. Often, the worldview of such a character is formed under the influence of his environment, which is also not indifferent to confrontation with the holder of power.

Another type of protagonist is an integral part of a society that perceives itself only as utopian, but at a certain moment he realizes how wrong this very society is, and attempts to modify or destroy it.

tie: often the protagonist meets a character endowed with dystopian traits, perhaps the leader of the entire 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 managed to come to their senses and throw off this burden.

climax: in a dystopian novel, the problem often remains unresolved, in most cases attempts to destroy the dystopia are futile. Sometimes the hero manages to break the vicious circle and break free, but in the overwhelming majority of cases, the main character (or the group of people we talked about above) is defeated and the dystopia continues.

Differences between dystopia and utopia

As a form of social fantasy, utopia relies largely on non-scientific and theoretical methods knowledge of reality, but on the imagination. Related to this whole line features of utopia, including such as a deliberate separation from reality, the desire to reconstruct reality according to the principle “everything should be the other way around”, a free transition from the real to the ideal. In utopia, there is always an exaggeration of the spiritual principle, in it a special place is given to science, art, education, legislation and other factors of culture. With the advent of scientific communism, the cognitive and critical significance of the classic positive utopia begins to gradually decline.

Of greater importance is the function of a critical attitude to society, primarily to the bourgeois one, which is taken over by the so-called negative utopia, new type literary utopia, formed in the second half of the XIX century. A negative utopia, or dystopia, differs sharply from a classical, positive utopia. Traditional classical utopias meant a figurative representation of an ideal, desired future. In a satirical utopia, a negative utopia, a warning novel, it is no longer an ideal future that is described, but rather an undesirable future. The image of the future is parodied, criticized. This does not mean, of course, that with the appearance of negative utopias, utopian thought itself disappears or devalues, as, for example, the English historian Chad Walsh believes.

In fact, a negative utopia does not "eliminate" utopian thought, but only transforms it. It, in our opinion, inherits from the classical utopia the ability to predict and social criticism. Of course, dystopias are a controversial and heterogeneous phenomenon, in which both conservative and progressive features are found. But in the best works of this type, a new ideological and aesthetic function arose - to warn about the undesirable consequences of the development of bourgeois society and its institutions.

Dystopia in cinema

Fahrenheit 451, 1966

United Kingdom. Directed by François Truffaut.

This film is most often remembered when people start comparing books and pictures based on these books: Fight Club, A Clockwork Orange, Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas, and Fahrenheit 451. It is impossible to say unequivocally that the film is better, but disputes on this score have not subsided for fifty years now.

Following the author of the novel, Ray Bradbury, Truffaut tells us the history of mankind, in which all written publications are mercilessly destroyed by a special detachment of flamethrowers, and the love of literature and the possession of books are prosecuted. Young Sergeant Guy Montag follows orders to destroy literature, but an encounter with young Clarissa changes his entire system of values. He becomes a dissenter in a deeply totalitarian society that only reads comics. Interestingly, all the credits in the film are read by the actors, and not written. This is fully consistent with the idea of ​​a new world in which there is no place for printed text.

Andromeda Nebula, 1967

USSR, director - Yevgeny Sherstobitov.

The only domestic film on our list. Of course, Soviet science fiction is known throughout the world, but first of all - as a literary direction, and not a cinematic one. Sherstobitov's film takes us to the distant future. A group of astro-pilot scientists embark on a perilous journey across our galaxy. The starship on which they travel, by a strange coincidence, goes beyond the ecliptic and finds itself in the gravitational field of a planet called the Iron Star, which scientists have known about for a long time, but no one could determine its exact location. Earthlings decide to land on the planet, hoping to replenish fuel supplies on the Alien starship and return to Earth.

"Mad Max", 1979

Australia Directed by George Miller.

The first picture of the 34-year-old Australian director George Miller became a real sensation in the world of cinema. It was sold to Americans for worldwide film distribution for very little money, and as a result brought in gigantic revenues that exceeded one hundred million dollars. In 1998, Mad Max entered the Guinness Book of Records as the highest grossing film. It was after this role that Hollywood learned about the 23-year-old actor Mel Gibson, who later became a world celebrity. In the near future, after a major catastrophe that forever changed our civilization, at least some kind of life became possible only next to the endless highways. Cop Max was nicknamed Crazy for his uncompromising, brutal, all-out fight against road gangs of even more crazy outcasts on motorcycles and cars. In a bloody war, Max loses his wife and child, and after that his revenge on the bandits becomes his life's work.

Blade Runner, 1982

United States, directed by Ridley Scott.

The film is based on Philip Dick's novel Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? 45-year-old British director Ridley Scott previously shot a spectacular space film Alien. In this film, Scott successfully combines the style of a "black movie" about a cynical private eye and classic fiction with a high-tech component. This is the story of retired detective Rick Deckard, who is reinstated by the LAPD to search for a gang of cyborgs who have escaped from a space prison on planet Earth. Rick Deckard is tasked with finding out the cyborgs' motives and then destroying them.

"Brazil", 1985

Great Britain, director - Terry Gilliam.

The script of this film was written by the brilliant Terry Gilliam together with Sir Tom Stoppard. This fact already says a lot and raises the film to a whole new level of quality. The year of creation of "Brazil" - 1984 - coincides with the name of the famous dystopian novel by George Orwell. Initially, the picture was supposed to be called "1984 1/2", but in the end Terry Gilliam chose a more illustrative title. Petty official Sam Lowry is quite content with his boring and meaningless life. He chose the job of an insignificant clerk and agrees to put up with an unsettled life against the will of his mother, who occupies an important position in the elite circles of the system. One fine day, he meets a girl whom he had always seen in his dreams before. In order to meet her again, Sam decides to change jobs. This step changes his whole life.

"12 Monkeys", 1995

United States, directed by Terry Gilliam.

Terry Gilliam has a knack for making excellent fantastic, but harmless in terms of age rating films. And, of course, it has its own unique style. His "signature" style of storytelling is best manifested precisely in his dystopian projects.

In this film, the director takes us to the not-too-distant 2035. A monstrous, incurable virus has killed 99% of the population of our planet. The survivors are forced to drag out their miserable existence underground. Hardened criminal James Cole volunteers to go on a perilous journey in a time machine: on assignment, he must go into the past to help scientists find the source of the deadly virus and understand the mystery of the mysterious "Twelve Monkeys". The role of Cole played great importance for further career Bruce Willis, and he did a great job with her. And Brad Pitt, who at that moment was in the status of a young rising star, made a very bright bid to become part of the Hollywood elite.

"Gattaca", 1997

United States, directed by Andrew Niccol.

The very word "gattaca" (gattaca) is formed from the first four letters nitrogenous bases of DNA chains: guanine, adenine, thymine and cytosine. This information does not help in any way to understand the film, but rather, on the contrary, confuses the viewer. Apparently, this is exactly what the director and screenwriter Andrew Niccol was trying to achieve. In the world he created, every person is genetically programmed, and there are fewer and fewer who were born in love, and not in a laboratory. One of the last "children of love", Vincent Freeman, is labeled "unfit" at birth. He is subject to passions, succumbs to emotions, but he believes that his dreams will someday come true. To do this, he buys another person's identity in an attempt to trick the selection committee into becoming a respected member of the Future Gattaca Corporation. However, he cannot even imagine how tedious and difficult it is to be two different personalities at the same time. Especially when the police are on your heels...

"Matrix", 1999

USA, directors: Andy Wachowski, Larry (Lana) Wachowski.

It is difficult now to find a person who has not watched or at least not heard about this film. The scene in which Morpheus asks the protagonist to choose a red or blue pill has long been a classic and has been quoted many times by other directors. However, the film The Matrix itself was not without hidden quotes (even a whole book was published about this). For example, the scene in which Neo meets the gifted children in the Oracle's apartment is an homage to the Japanese animated film Akira.

As soon as the film hit the screens and hit the audience with the effect of a freezing camera, a huge number of people immediately appeared, claiming that they were the first to transfer this invention to the big screen, and the Wachowskis were already followers. It is not known whether this is true or envious gossip, but the film certainly did not become worse from this.

"Mr Nobody", 2009

Germany, Belgium, France, director - Jaco Van Dormel.

His name is Nemo Nobody, he is an equation in which there is nothing but unknowns. Either a serious boy beyond his years, stuck on the platform, or a hundred and twenty-year-old old man, the last mortal of a happy Earth in the 22nd century, who happily forgot about how he lived his life. Only one thing can be said with certainty: Jared Leto is so handsome here that neither the old man's makeup nor the sometimes ridiculous and sugary scenes in the film can spoil him. However, it would be an unforgivable mistake not to appreciate the virtuoso quality of directing by Jaco van Dormel. As a result, the film needs several viewings, since everything does not always become clear the first time.

Interstellar, 2014

United States, directed by Christopher Nolan.

Screenplay by the Nolan brothers based on scientific papers theoretical physicist Kip Thorne, who explores the theory of gravity, as well as on his popular book "Black holes and the folds of time ...". This controversial blockbuster was inspired by the work of modernist architect Ludwig Mies van der Rohe when designing the buildings in the film.

Dystopia is a genre of literature that describes a society dominated by negative development trends. The main direction of the plot is the survival of the heroes in a world where humanity initially lost. If you like books that are philosophical in their tension, dystopia will suit your taste. Reading novels in this genre, you can reflect on eternal themes interaction between the people and the state, the internal contradictions of man and eternal values. Best dystopian books they paint before us a basically totalitarian society, where a number of rules are in place that restrict freedom - to think, feel, live. As a rule, they have an unhappy ending, as a person inevitably fails.

The very concept of genre was introduced at the end of the century before last. Books in the dystopian genre became a logical continuation of the utopia, within which an ideal society was demonstrated. But to this day, an ideal and happy society has not been built, it remains only in literary works, it made writers throughout the ages think about the causes and origins of it. At the same time, it is very difficult to find dystopian books in the lists of Soviet literature. The fact is that this genre in the USSR was subjected to comprehensive criticism, as it showed the inconsistency in practice of utopia as such, while the idea of ​​an ideal communist state dominated in Soviet society. And only in the nineties Russian authors undertook to massively master this genre.

Dystopian books: a list of outstanding works

If you have not yet had time to get acquainted with this genre, on the KnigoPoisk website you can find a rating of dystopian books, among which there will definitely be something that you like. The best works will make you think about the historical past and modern realities. Dystopian books, a list of which is presented on this page, will help you understand the authors and the intricacies of literary works.

Vasilov Alexander. Grade 11.

Those two in paradise - were given a choice: either happiness without freedom - or freedom without happiness; There is no third. They, boobies, chose freedom - and what: it's understandable - then for centuries they yearned for fetters. (Evgeny Zamyatin, novel "We")
Civilization is unthinkable without a stable society. A stable society is inconceivable without a stable member of society. And with strong experiences - moreover, in loneliness, in hopeless disunity and isolation - what kind of stability could there be? (Aldous Huxley, Brave New World)

Freedom is in general sense, availability of choice. Lack of choice, options for the outcome of an event is tantamount to a lack of freedom. A person will always strive for freedom, understanding his own "I", the achievement of life goals.
The problem raised in my work can be considered the question: what can happen to a person when, worshiping abstractly constructed ideals, he voluntarily renounces the freedom of personal self-realization and puts an equal sign between lack of freedom and collective happiness? Is it even possible to find happiness in an unfree society? In my work, I will try to answer all these questions by analyzing and comparing two anti-utopian works: the novel by the Russian writer E. Zamyatin "We" and the novel by the English writer O. Huxley "Brave New World".
Dystopia (from the Greek "anti" - against and "utopos" - a place that does not exist anywhere), (English dystopia) - a direction in fiction, in narrow sense a description of a totalitarian state or society, in a broad sense, a description of any society in which negative development tendencies have prevailed. The term "dystopia" as the name of a literary genre was introduced by Glenn Negley and Max Patrick. A dystopia is a depiction of a fictional world that should never exist. The whole dystopian world is built on logic, and a person is no longer a person, he is a social unit. In fact, in dystopian works, a person simply cannot exist, because the so-called human "I" is destroyed, and instead "We" appears. People do not have the right to express their own opinion (although in reality it simply does not exist in dystopia). In dystopia, all people obey a certain ritual and play a certain role in it. A dystopian society is ritualized. Where ritual reigns, no movement of personality is possible. On the contrary, the movement of this one is programmed. Plot conflict occurs where the individual relinquishes his role in the ritual and prefers his own path. The inner atmosphere of dystopia is fear, the main character's fear of not complying with the rules of the society in which he lives, the fear of being different from everyone else. We can say that dystopia is a person's attempt to look into the future, an attempt to predict what can happen to society in a particular development of events. (It is quite logical that dystopia was perceived negatively by Soviet literary criticism, since Soviet philosophy considered the social reality of the USSR, if not as a realized utopia, then as a society that owns the theory of creating an ideal system. Therefore, dystopian works were perceived as a doubt in this theory that at times Soviet Union was unacceptable.) In fact, dystopia is often compared to science fiction, but only dystopia tells about more real and easier to guess things. Science fiction is more focused on finding other worlds, modeling other realities. Despite such a noticeable difference between these two genres, elements of science fiction are used in dystopia to create the world that the author describes.
Utopia (from the Greek "utopos" - "not a place"; a place that does not exist) is a direction in fiction that describes an ideal, from the point of view of the author, society. The name of the genre comes from work of the same name Thomas More - “A golden little book, as useful as it is funny about the best structure of the state and about the new island of Utopia”, in which “Utopia” is only the name of the island. In fact, dystopia as a genre is defined by a dispute with utopia, it is believed that utopia and dystopia are opposites. Dystopia looks into utopia with bitter mockery. Utopia does not look in the direction of anti-utopia, it does not look at all, because it sees only itself and is carried away only by itself. The main distinguishing feature of utopia, its specificity, is that its creation did not take into account the limitations of the real world. In particular, the historical background. Therefore, in ordinary consciousness, utopia is often perceived as something unrealizable, an unrealizable social ideal.
The border between utopia and dystopia is the border between reason and madness, it only remains to determine what exactly can be considered in this case the personification of reason, and what is the personification of madness. Comparing utopia and dystopia, we can highlight several points, paying attention to which you can determine the differences between the two genres:

1. dystopia is distinguished by its anthropocentricity, the conflict is at the center of the work social environment and personality;
2. utopia is focused only on building the ideal social order, the personality in the work does not play an important role;
3. utopia is characterized by the author's belief in the impeccability of the social model built by him;
4. the author of the dystopia shows the reader a world in which any feelings are destroyed in every possible way. The author describes a world that simply should not exist.

But, despite the rather large number of differences between genres, I suppose that dystopia can be considered a logical continuation of utopia, since the author of dystopia develops utopia further, looks at events more realistically, tries to look into the future. We can say that dystopia pays for the sins that utopia embodied. The time of dystopia continues the time of utopia, they are of the same breed. Leonid Geller argued: "the time of utopia is the time of correcting the mistakes of the present, qualitatively different, at least in design, from the present." From the statement, we can conclude that errors could not be corrected or had to be corrected differently, since correcting errors means striving for some kind of ideal, striving for an ideal means the appearance of a utopia, but the appearance of a utopia entails the appearance of a dystopia, which cannot be called good phenomenon. Dystopia and utopia form a certain balance, which, in my personal subjective opinion, can be called our modern world, as humanity strives for ideals, but at the same time tries to look into the future in order to predict the emergence of possible problems that may arise.
There is such a term "practopia" (a literary genre in which, as in utopia, a model of a better society is described, but, unlike utopia, imperfection is recognized this society, which is closer to dystopia (the term was introduced by the American sociologist Alvin Toffler)), which, in my opinion, can best describe a real society.
The anti-utopian novel "We" is the most important work of E. Zamyatin. The novel was perceived by contemporaries as an evil caricature of the socialist, communist society of the future. Now this work is perceived as a warning novel, a dystopia in its purest form, which helps to see the alleged dystopian future through the eyes of the author. In 1920, Yevgeny Zamyatin wrote the novel “We” in a hungry, unheated Petrograd, in an atmosphere of war communism, with its forced (and often unjustified) cruelty, violence against a person, in an atmosphere of widespread belief that a quick jump directly into communism was possible, therefore the novel can strike with its cruelty in relation to the personality of a person. The novel was not published in Russia for a long time, but translations into other languages ​​(English, Czech, French) appeared all over the world, starting in 1924, when the novel was published in New York. Why wasn't the novel published in Russia? The answer to this question is very simple: critics and writers perceived the novel as a slander on the Soviet system and communism, the novel was considered a mockery of the socialist future. Two years after writing the novel, E. Zamyatin was arrested, after which he receives an order to be deported abroad.
In the analysis of the work, I will not devote much time to the plot of the novel, I will not retell the novel, I will try to answer the questions that I posed at the beginning of my work. "We" is a reminder of the possible consequences of thoughtless technological progress, which eventually turns people into numbered ants, the novel is a warning about where science can lead, which has become divorced from the moral and spiritual principles in the conditions of a global, so to speak, "superstate" and celebrations of technocrats.
In order to begin to analyze the novel, I turned to the very concept of "dystopia". In a narrow sense, dystopia is, after all, a description of a totalitarian state, so one can partly agree with the opinion of critics who argued that "We" ridicules the socialist future, but personally it seems to me that the author of the novel was not going to ridicule communism, he tried to suggest what could happen to humanity, if people stop striving for the development of their inner world, they will cease to be individuals. From the point of view of logic, when people cease to be individuals, they will begin to live, guided only by basic instincts. Such individuals will stop thinking about self-expression, promotion at work, philosophy, as all this shows any difference between people. Such a system of life, in the end, will lead, it seems to me, to the construction of a dystopian society in which people will strive for one goal (no matter what goal it is). Here the question of the freedom of such a person involuntarily arises, does such a person need freedom? NO! Of course, the authors of anti-utopian works say that being not free one cannot become happy, but I think that the people whom Zamyatin describes in his work are absolutely happy, although they are happy in their own way. Of course, from the position of a normal person, all of the above sounds at least unusual and stupid, but now I tried to consider only the “pluses” (very dubious) and “minuses” of a person in a dystopian society, which Zamyatin described in his novel “We”. I dare to suggest that Zamyatin's novel describes the most rational approach to building a futuristic society (and in general, dystopia surprises with its logic, while utopia is a kind of fairy tale about a happy future). Zamyatin showed the reader a rather paradoxical situation when humanity, trying to achieve universal happiness, deprived people of their freedom. The United State, which the writer created in the novel "We", is striking in its technical development, but at the same time it surprises with cruel behavior towards people living in this state. You can put yourself in the place of a resident of the United State and imagine a life in which there is no free thought, no self-expression, no feelings. Complicated. I would even say that it is unbearable. After reading the novel "We", I realized that such a society (dystopian) can exist only if there are no factors indicating that a person is an individual, and not one of the mass. Therefore, the emergence of such a society is impossible, since it is simply impossible to achieve collective happiness for the whole world, to impose this happiness, because no one knows what it is for another.
The novel of the great English writer O. Huxley "Brave New World" was written in 1932. Huxley noted that the theme of the book is not the progress of science itself, but how this progress affects the personality of a person. In comparison with other works of dystopians, Huxley's novel is distinguished by the material well-being of the world, not false, falsified wealth, but really absolute abundance, which, which may seem strange, ultimately leads to the degradation of the individual. In his novel, Huxley tried to study a person as a person, and not as a social unit, so the novel is more relevant than other works of this genre, since the main emphasis is on the state of the human soul. Analyzing the novel by Aldous Huxley, one can find quite a lot of similarities with the novel “We” by Yevgeny Zamyatin, but I will talk about this a little later. In his novel, Huxley demonstrated a world in which the personality of each person is "truncated" to a size subject to submission and programming. I would like to pay special attention to the process of the appearance of children in Brave New World. In the work, people do not grow, but are grown. (I immediately recall Zamyatin's "child breeding"). Even before the birth of children, they are divided into higher and lower, through a kind of chemical effect on the embryos, thus accelerating the growth rate of a person, endowing him with some qualities. This is absolutely correct from the point of view of logic, but if you look at this aspect from a different point of view, the question arises: who gave the right to manage the future life of people. But the most terrible moment in the process of growing people is, it seems to me, the so-called hypnopedia. With the help of hypnosis, children are “driven in” during sleep with information that they must learn. The higher castes, such as Alpha, after such hypnosis begin to feel superior to the lower castes (Epsilon), who are told that they are mentally handicapped and should be used to do the most dirty and routine work. It seems to me that the very distribution of people by caste can play a rather important role in a dystopian work. On the one hand, such a move shows that in the state described in Brave New World, everything is aimed at simplifying life, but on the other hand, dividing people into classes contradicts the notion that in a dystopia all people should be equal to each other, should be identical; for the existence of classes shows a certain difference between people in society. Despite all the immorality public life, which is described in the novel, world state reaches the heights of science. But after all, the topic of the book is not scientific progress in itself, but how this progress affects the personality of a person. O. Huxley himself in his writings argued that scientific discoveries signify a great revolution in the history of mankind, but such a revolution cannot be truly revolutionary. It is possible to carry out a truly revolutionary revolution not in outside world but only in the soul and body of man. An attempt at such a revolution is demonstrated in Brave New World. It can be said that in the novel they are trying to instill in people a love for slavery, which can only be established as the result of an intrapersonal revolution. In order to carry out such a revolution, in the dystopian society created by O. Huxley, they invented and inspired the following:

1. improved methods of suggestion; even before birth, children are taught conditioned reflexes;
2. a substitute for alcohol or drugs, less harmful and more enjoyable than previously known species (in this case, such a substitute is soma);
3. a reliable people management system that will make life easier for people.

If we try to guess what could happen to the "brave new world" further, we can see only two ways of development of such a society. In one case, such a dystopian world could exist forever, if you limit the influence on the world from the outside, do not stop imposing a rigid ideology. In another case, such a society will simply fall apart over time, become obsolete, since the human personality cannot develop in a dystopian condition, and if not the development of the individual, then there is no development of society. Aldous Huxley showed the reader a novel in which he described a possible threat to civilized society. The author of Brave New World sees such a threat in the movement towards personality-erasing “harmony” (non-freedom = collective happiness) and in the growth of mass consumption. Huxley, like all dystopian writers, is trying to warn society about the possible deprivation of a person. own desires, feelings, thoughts, even free life. Huxley rethought the concepts of "personality" and "freedom" in a new way, which allows us to better understand his views on life and society.
When reading two novels (“Us” and “Brave New World”), the first thing that catches the eye is the fact that both works are similar to each other. It can be assumed that the novel "Brave New World" owes its appearance to the work "WE", because the novel by Yevgeny Zamyatin was written in 1921, when Aldous Huxley's novel was written in 1932. Both works tell about the rebellion of a person as a person against a rational, mechanized, insensitive world, in which the main characters of the two novels are located. I dare to suggest that the type of society in both novels is the same, even the atmosphere of both books is similar. Only here in Huxley's novel there is almost no political subtext, which is observed in Zamyatin's novel "We". If we start talking about the problem of collective happiness, touched upon in two works, then we can say that Huxley more accurately described the way of imposing happiness (albeit peculiar) on each individual, because collective happiness depends on the happiness of each person, which, as it seemed to me, was not taken into account Zamyatin. It may seem strange, but it seemed to me that the whole dystopian world was better "constructed" by the author of "Brave New World", although this can be explained by the fact that the novel "Us" was written earlier. Of course, such little things can be compared endlessly, but basically I was trying to find some similarities in order to somehow generalize the ideas of two twentieth-century dystopian writers. The main idea of ​​both authors, most likely, was the idea of ​​how a free person would behave in an unfree society, in a society with a perverted understanding of the relationship between a man and a woman, with a perverted understanding of the meaning of “true happiness”. And both authors came to the conclusion that every idea of ​​a free person (or a person who is characterized by self-expression), if such a person has no associates, perishes in a dystopian society.
Of course, a dystopian society should never and never will exist, everyone understands this very well. But, despite this fact, dystopias will always be relevant, as people will always fight against lack of freedom, they will fight for the right to self-expression, for the right to be a person. I tried to identify the features of the dystopian genre in literature by comparing two dystopian novels: the novel "We" by the Russian writer Yevgeny Zamyatin and the novel "Brave New World" by the English writer Aldous Huxley. Tried to find some common features in two different novels, and I guess I succeeded. Writers often do not have the same point of view on some specific issues, but doing this educational research work, comparing and analyzing the works of two different writers from different countries, I realized that in matters of freedom of society and freedom of the individual, the opinions of writers often converge, since each person strives for freedom, strives to comprehend his own "I", everyone wants to be a person.

A dystopian society is one in which negative tendencies prevail. social development. The dystopian societies depicted in works of fiction are often characterized by a totalitarian political system suppressing individuality. The authors of anti-utopias are trying to draw attention to the existing problems, which in the future can lead to catastrophic consequences.

Dystopia as a literary genre

The dystopia genre originates from the satirical works of Swift, Voltaire, Butler, Saltykov-Shchedrin, Chesterton and others. However, real dystopias began to appear only at the beginning of the 20th century. Globalization trends and the emergence of societies that are somewhat utopian (communist in the USSR and National Socialist in Germany) forced the authors to turn to the dystopian genre.

The German sociologist Eric Fromm called the first dystopian novel "The Iron Heel" by Jack London, published in 1908. Dystopian novels appeared throughout the 20th century. The most famous of them are the novels “We” by Yevgeny Zamyatin, “Brave New World” by Aldous Huxley, “1984” and “Animal Farm” by George Orwell, “451 degrees Fahrenheit” by Ray Bradberry.

Origin of the term "dystopia"

A few decades before the first appearance of the term "dystopia", the term "cacotopia" (translated from the ancient Greek "bad", "evil") was used in a similar sense. It was first used by the English philosopher Jeremy Bentham in 1818. Subsequently, this term was supplanted by the term "dystopia", but continues to be used periodically. The word "dystopian" was first used by the English philosopher and economist John Stuart Mill in 1868 in his speech in the British House of Commons.

The term "dystopia" as the name of a literary genre was introduced by Glenn Negley and Max Patrick in the book In Search of Utopia. The name "dystopia" arose as a contrast to the word "utopia", introduced by Thomas More. In his 1516 book Utopia, More describes a state with an ideal social order. Mora's novel gave its name to a genre that unites works about perfect and absolutely just states. To XIX century the genre of utopia has exhausted itself, moreover, the opinion has been established that any attempt to build a utopian society will lead to horrific consequences.

The dystopia genre is in some way a continuation of the utopia genre. But if utopian novels described the positive features of society, then dystopias are concentrated on negative social trends.

In the mid-1960s, the term "dystopia" appeared in Soviet literary criticism, and a little later in Western criticism.

To the collection "Anti-utopia of the XX century", M, 1989:

Theoretical disputes about the boundaries of the genre have been going on for a long time. Terminological disagreements eventually settled down, and now three gradations have been outlined: utopia - that is, an ideally good society, dystopia - an “ideally” bad society, and dystopia - located somewhere in the middle.