Yevgeny Zamyatin. We. Trans. Natasha Randall. 1923; New York: Modern Library, 2006. Print.

I have seen We billed as the original dystopian novel. As best I can tell, it is. E. M. Forster’s short story “The Machine Stops” was published in 1909, but this is the first novel with such a theme.

Orwell wrote a review of We in 1946 while he was working on 1984. He would later suggest, probably correctly, that Aldous Huxley had read We before writing Brave New World.

I recommend this edition of the book. Not only is it a lively translation, but the Foreword by Bruce Sterling and the translator’s Introduction are very helpful.

Prior to We, futuristic novels about planned societies and socialist utopias were propaganda novels like House’s Philip Dru: Administrator, Bellamy’s Looking Backward, or even Jack London’s The Iron Heel. They all imagined a happy, peaceful future with superior minds and governments in charge. We was one of the first to suggest that such a society might operate as a well-oiled machine might, but true humanity would be stifled.

Zamyatin (spelled various ways in the Roman alphabet) had been a relatively early adopter of Russian Communism. He was imprisoned and exiled to the provinces in 1905. He sneaked back and was exiled again in 1911.

He went to England where, among other things, he studied the socialist writings of H. G. Wells. He returned to Russia to join the revolution, but it seemed that Lenin did not like him any more than the Tsar had. He was arrested in 1919 and 1922 in spite of his friendship with Maxim Gorky. He was allowed to leave the U.S.S.R. in 1931 and settled in France where he died in 1937. He wrote some short stories, but We is his only novel.

We takes place in the distant future where the world is ruled by the One State whose leader, the Benefactor, has been unanimously elected for each of the last 48 years. The story is told by D-503—the people are ciphers, literally—who is a scientist working on the Integral, a space ship whose ultimate goal is to bring the One State ideology to the rest of the universe, “to make your life as divinely rational and exact as ours.” (61)

What is most striking about We is not the plot but narrative technique. Zamyatin was applying avant-garde art techniques to writing. It reads more like a contemporary postmodern piece out of Eastern Europe than something written nearly a century ago.

Each chapter presents itself as a short, hastily written diary entry of D-503. He discovers a lost humanity in his mind: He falls in love; he begins having dreams; he discovers a band of uncivilized people in the wilderness not unlike the Indian reservation of John the Savage in Brave New World. What he has been taught about humanity and happiness has been turned on its ear. How can he know what is really true?

D-503 is a mathematician, so there are many mathematical references. He describes faces and objects in nature as geometric figures. Since emotions are no longer accepted in the culture, he uses colors and shapes when he is trying to express an emotion. His chapters have keywords as though he were putting together a math text. If We draws from any previous work of literature, it is probably closer to Euclid’s Elements than anything.

Zamyatin clearly kept up with the science of his day, hinting at space travel as hypothesized by Einstein. Still, the telephones still have dials, and how much more could D-503 had rapturously meditated on shapes if he had known about fractals!

We is the grandfather of the dystopian novels. It is a challenge to read—but a delight as well.

As Lenin envisioned, children are immediately taken up by the state. We implies that a woman who has a child is then killed to insure that no emotional connection is maintained. “Pure reason,” as Kant would say. The One State culture admires Taylor and Ford who promoted efficiency. Thoreau wrote in “On Civil Disobedience” that the state is an expedient. Socialism turns his critique on its ear and claims a totally planned society is superior because it is the most expedient.

“Our poets don’t soar in the empyrean any more; they came down to earth; they keep step with us…” (61)

Here is something the United States Supreme Court should take to heart. The court seems to be granting “rights” because it can, it is supreme after all. But is that what the true meaning of a right is? This dystopian definition sounds a lot like the Court’s definition in recent years:

Even the most adult of the Ancients knew: the source of a right is power, a right is a function of power [rex lex anyone?]. Take two trays of a weighing scale: put a gram on one, and on the other, put a ton. On the one side is the “I,” on the other is the “WE,” the one state. Isn’t that clear? Assuming that “I” has the same “rights” compared to the State is exactly the same thing as assuming a gram can counterbalance a ton.(103)

Pure Hume or Hegel! Definitely not Locke or Jefferson!

The reader can recognize some of the above as elements of Brave New World. But the temptations of the subversive I-330 are precursors to those of Winston’s girlfriend Julia in 1984. And the ending? Well, you will have to see for yourselves.

We is well worth reading! When we take a look at the world today, it is probably closer to We than any of the other novels be they utopian or dystopian. As Pogo said, “We have met the enemy and he is us.”