D.L.’s Comments (group member since Mar 09, 2013)

D.L.’s comments from the Utopian and Dystopian Reading Group group.

Have been a rubbish Goodreads contributer for a couple of weeks owing to entering an assessment heavy period of an Open University qualification, so forgive me for my only recent post being an advert, but my novel Immemorial is free 15th and 16th of April. It's had a few nice reviews, but would be great to see what a group of dystopian experts make of it.

Thanks to those of you that download it, hope you enjoy it.

DLC

I've not read that (but will do!) I hope so - that's the one thing that seems to pervade dystopian fiction - that something inside people seems to understand that things could or should be better or at least different. Rick's yearning for animals lost in Do Androids Dream, Bernard Marx, Julia, all of whom are inculcated with the mores of their own society still somehow yearn for something else. I wonder sometimes if it's that yearning, like Offred and Moira in The Handmaid's Tale, for something else that really makes a dystopia rather than the actual society depicted.

I completely agree, but to play devils advocate - would any earlier group of humans see the enforced working schedule/tax/lack of common grounds as acceptable and will it be seen so in the future? Yet people have adapted so that what is (historically speaking) an unnatural state for humanity is now the norm. As mentioned - the Parson children in 1984 are so well institutionalised that the society of Airstrip One has become normal - it is only the transitional generation (Winston et al) that see it as unnatural. Once a population has had propaganda ingrained in them (as with most of the cast of Brave New World), is happiness then redefined and could not a functional dystopia be viewed as a Utopia within expressed limits?

The OED have already done that:

Adjective (happier, happiest)

1feeling or showing pleasure or contentment:Melissa came in looking happy and excited [with clause]:we’re just happy that he’s still alive [with infinitive]:they are happy to see me doing well

•
(happy about) having a sense of trust and confidence in (a person, arrangement, or situation):he was not happy about the proposals

•
(happy with) satisfied with the quality or standard of:I’m happy with his performance

•
[with infinitive] willing to do something:we will be happy to advise you

•
[attributive] used in greetings:happy Christmas


2 [attributive] fortunate and convenient:he had the happy knack of making people like him


3 [in combination] informal inclined to use a specified thing excessively or at random:they tended to be grenade-happy

You see - this is the thing for me. It's something I've been planning to write about if and when I get round to taking my MA. In terms of historical appraisal, the most successful societies are not judged in units of human happiness, but in longevity. As morality tales and political or philosophical warnings, dystopias may be judged immoral - but how would the historians of their future view its dissidents? Would they be lauded as freedom fighters or would they be viewed in the same light as the visigoths that sacked Rome?

From a strictly 'human survival' perspective - how important is the unit of human happiness?

Yet the main threat to the society in Brave New World is external (the savage)? I suppose what I'm getting at is - if the citizens for the most part are subjugated to such an extent that they are unaware of their position (it's been a while since I read it) the Gammas(?) or have been institutionalised - like the Parson children in 1984 - at what point would a dystopia become a successful revolution? A cohesive state in society does not necessarily mean a happy one, but a stable one. Obviously the reader is intended to see the inequality of their own society in a dystopia - but can a dystopia ever be seen to be successful? What about PKD's Do Androids Dream? Another dystopia, yet Mercerism is used to provide the illusion of cohesiveness or social inclusion.

What is it, do you think, that really makes a dystopia? Brave New World, for example is a dystopia - yet the vast majority of its people seem to live reasonably happily, and the same could be said of many dystopian novels - that there is a majority for whom life is at least as good as it is now, or are convinced by propaganda or otherwise that they are happy. Is it only the reader and the protagonist that can decide upon a books dysoptia quotient? Or is there something about the method of control and its severity that makes a society inherently dytopian?

Hi, apologies for yet another author sales pitch. I know they're everywhere these days and most of you couldn't care less, but if you don't ask, you don't get - as the saying goes. Anyway, here's the blurb - it's available in paperback or e-book form and has garnered a few five-star reviews on amazon.

In an England still reeling from the largest terrorist attack in its history, torn apart by social unrest, a man wakes to find himself accused of that attack, but with no memory of the event. As he reacquaints himself with the present, he must discover his identity and come to terms with a past that haunts his dreams. Who is Ernest Featherstone? Why can he not remember?

Part satire, part traditional literary dystopia, Immemorial is a dark and witty exploration of identity, morality, religion and relationships against a backdrop of an England in turmoil.

Thank you for reading,

DLC

A little bit of adult content in places, but Snow Crash is a pretty good, youthful dystopia.