Matched - Condie's Dystopia Where the Society Decides How You Live, What You Work, Whom You Marry, and When You Die

I finished another dystopia in the style of the famous Zamyatin, Huxley, Orwell, Bradbury, and Burgess. Matched by the still young and inexperienced author Ally Condie learns from the best; yet the novel lacks the power, strength, gloominess, and total desperation of the famous predecessors. Still, a rather good read proving that dystopia is not dead and even more important now in the light of our technology-dominated world.

In Condie's world society controls everything - the way you live, whom you marry, what you eat, where you work, and even how you die. People live a life pre-determined by the Officials. Freedom seems a small price to pay in exchange for a well-regulated, healthy, and successful life. Cassia is a girl, who strongly believes in the Society and its means of guiding life. At the age of 17th she is to be assigned a life-partner based on thorough investigations about her character. She is to be "matched". In her lucky case, to her best friend Xander. His friendly face appears on the screen as the best match for a husband, securing a long happy life and healthy offspring. For a moment, though, another face flashes, the fase of the strange Ky. This sets Cassia to doubt the matching, to mistrust the society, and the oppose the choice that has been forced upon her.

Matched is a novel mostly about freedom of choice. Are we ready to abandon this luxury for a comfortable life? Indeed, through technological investigations society has established a perfect world. People are assigned jobs that match their character. All of them are specialists in their field knowing nothing about other fields though. They follow a carefully prepared personal diet that provides the exact amount of calories needed. They are matched to the most suitable member of the opposite sex and their children have the perfect genes. And exactly at the age of 80 people have to die. Society has decided that this is the perfect age to live the world and in a sort of way help people do so. In this obvious perfection, Cassia falls in love with Ky, who is a deviation. He is not "right" and "perfect" according to the norms of society. He is different. And the different are not to be tolerated or let to live according to their rules. In Matched, we see the imperfections of a perfect world, who limits the individuals. The only thing that sets them free is love.

The previous examples of dystopian novels also used love as a trigger for change. The characters in 1984, Brave New World, and We started doubting the status quo the moment they fell in love with the wrong person. In Matched, love is the central theme. The lack of freedom in love suffocates Cassia and prompts her to fight the Officials, to abandon the security, and to isolate from society in order to find Ky. This is a really wonderful love story in the light of dystopia. Although it doesn't have the literary qualities of the other dystopian novels and in times it is largely predictable, Matched should be read. At least, it leaves you with a good taste in your mouth and with a hope that may be totalitarian regimes could be overcome with the power of love. Something that Orwell, Huxley, and Zamyatin certainly don't believe.

"We" is Bigger Than "I" in Zamyatin's Dystopian World

Before George Orwell, Anthony Burgess

Ray Bradbury, and Aldus Huxley, there was the pioneer of the dystopian novel. The first man who wrote a shocking novel about the extremities of totalitarianism and control was actually Russian. Yes, Orwell, Bradbury, and Huxley were taught about socialist dictatorship by no other but Yevgeny Zamyatin.

We was published in 1926 as a response of the author's personal experiences during the Russian revolutions in 1906 and in 1917. The dystopian world of We is set in the future, where people do not have names but numbers. Males have odd numbers prefixed by consonants while women - even number prefixed by vowels. All of these "numbers" wear identical clothes, sleep in identical places, and are subject to the ideal of industrial efficiency. Human beings are screws in a machine - the "I" is not important; the "We" creates the state. The whole country is made up of glass as to facilitate control by the secret police and the spies. The ruler is (and has been for quite some time) the same one, the Benefactor, always chosen non-anonymously, as there is no other candidate. The control over society is secured by the successful victory over the two things that drive it - hunger and sex. People eat only mechanically prepared food (the ancient, or future equivalent of GMO) and have sex with whomever they want but only in the pre-determined hours.

In the light of this totalitarian regime, the main character is D-503. He is the builder of the Integral, a space ship supposed to take the logic of the One State to the rest of the universe. However, love and affection mess up the mechanically functioning mind of D-503. He begins doubting the regime and its sustainability and he visits a doctor, fearing he might be having a soul. The reason for his rebellion is a woman, an idea followed by Orwell and Huxley as well. I-330 is magnetic, sensual, and sexual. She dreams of life outside of the wall that surounds the state from the wild nature. She smokes, drinks, and experience the pure pleasure of sexual affairs. Her character and passion attempt to shaken the carefully mechanized world in which D-503 lives.

The Integral that is supposed to send the message of power and control to other nations is analogous to the Marxist's view of a Global Communist state. The focus is on industry and mechanization, which break down actions to easily understood and performed tasks, which require no imagination or creativity. D-503 writes a poem, the initial purpose of which is to share with the others the happiness and wisdom of the One State. Zamyatin here is disgusted with the use of literature by the communists to manipulate and shape public opinion. D-503's poem is a manifesto of conformity and equality but as the protagonist begins to experience his "soul", his attitude towards the regime understandably changes.

We certainly set the beginning of the dystopian novels that widely spread in the second half of the 20th century. Authors were fascinated with the topic of totalitarianism gone mad, especially in the light of the USSR and its rise to power. In We every hour of life is determined by The Table, a precursor of 1984's telescreen. The benefactor is the equivalent of Orwell's Big Brother. The similarities with Brave New World are even more obvious - the control of sex, the focus on industrialization and mechanization, the lack of the family, and the programming of people to love the regime that deprives them. Huxley indeed goes a bit further with his society of promiscuous conformists, pleasure seekers, and happy consumers.

To be honest Zamyatin is not as good as the other authors that followed him. His novel is still a child in its ideas about the endless possibilities of control mechanisms over the society. yet, the Russian is the first one to see through the idea of social equality and to the devastating effects its extreme form might lead in a futuristic world. In that sense, his contribution to the future development of the dystopian literature is incomparable.

Communism, Oops, I mean Animalism

1984 by George Orwell is a manifestation of the failure of communist regimes, which fail when their leaders become corrupted with power and start serving their own interests rather than the interests of those, who they are meant to serve. But before inventing the utopian world of 1984 with its new language, Newspeak, used to transform reality, to turn black into white, and to conceal important truths, Orwell wrote Animal Farm.

The subtitle is 'A Fairy Story'. Indeed, in Animal Farm animals behave, speak, and think like human beings. However, unlike a fairy story, the novel doesn't have a happy ending. It tells the story of a revolution, that had the best intentions to change the lives of the animals in Manor farm for the better by overthrowing their cruel owner. However, the leaders become corrupted with power and the initial ideals are carefully modified in order to serve not the community, but the chosen few. 'All animals are equal' turns into 'All animals are equal but some animals are more equal'. Sounds familiar, doesn't it?

Animal Farm is a witty allegory of the Russian revolution and its terrible consequences in the Soviet Union. At the beginning of the novel Major, a forward looking pig sets the principles of Animalism, according to which animals should be working for themselves, and not for the human beings. All animals are equal and should share the benefits of their work. Similarly, Lenin, highly influenced by Marx, presented the postulates of communism, which triggered the Russian revolution in 1917. Unfortunately, Major dies and the struggle for power is divided between the two pigs Napoleon and Snowfall. Eventually, Napoleon overthrows his opponent largely through methods of fear and terror. Snowball is exiled from the farm and is now portrayed as an enemy to the principles of Animalism. Similarly, Trotsky is outcast from the Soviet Union by Stalin.

As Napoleon gains more power, he orders working conditions and targets, which are hard for the other animals to achieve. Some of them still work hard because they believe in the initial principles of Animalism. Slowly, however, these principles become perversely changed in order to serve the pigs, who become the chosen few in the farm. Analogically, Stalin uses terror and secret police to control people and to hide the true severe conditions in the Soviet Union.

Eventually, the animals suffer even more than before the revolution. They are forced to work longer hours, they starve, and they are suppressed by Napoleon and his army of fierce dogs. The new commandments of animalism allow the pigs to enjoy a lifestyle similar to Mr Jones's, the previous owner. They drink, wear human clothes, play cards, and sleep in beds, all of which contradict the initial principles set up by Manor. Obviously, Stalin and his loyal supporters also formed a higher class, which enjoyed the benefits of power.


The Flag of Animalism. Quite resembling something familiar, eh?

The revolution in Animal Farm (and in Russia accordingly) fell apart not because of the principles of equality. It fell apart because the leaders became corrupted. They served themselves and not the community, slowly but surely turning into the dictators they so wanted to overthrow in the first place. Orwell ingeniously points out the shortcomings of totalitarianism, and on a larger scale the shortcomings of the human behavior. Animal Farm is a political satire with all the powers of a myth. It is also a realistic examination of the importance of honesty and truth, two things the world desperately needs after the two world wars.

Orwell believed in the values of democratic Socialism and liberal and social conscience. His works have influenced many writers to focus on the communist myth (especially the Soviet one) and the reasons for its collapse. Ray Bradbury, Aldous Huxley, Anthony Burgess, and George Orwell, all authors use quite different, yet witty and profound perspective to investigate the devastating effects of a world, where truth is concealed, mind is controlled, and people are severely suppressed with the false illusion of equality.

Strangely, a book against informational propaganda was in fact negatively affected by this same propaganda. Animal Farm was finished in 1943, during the Second World War but was published late in 1945. The reasons: at the end of the war the Soviet Union was a British ally against Hitler's Germany. Thus, it was seen by many political leaders that Stalin and Soviet Communism should not be criticized, even indirectly. God bless, though, Orwell was not one to be persuaded by such orthodox views. His novel, a precise attack on the failure of the Russian revolution was published.

I will finish off with a sentence I saw in a movie last night, which I believe very well adapts to the topic. The use of information and disinformation is ultimately power. The Soviet communists are well aware of this fact and effectively use it to establish and stabilize their power.

A Clockwork Orange - Burgess's Rebellion against Political Brainwashing

"A clockwork orange is a creature capable of doing only good or evil - an organic entity, full of juice and sweetness and agreeable odour, being turned into an automaton". A Clockwork Orange is Anthony Burgess's rebellion against brainwashing and political suppression. Born in 1961, the novel shocked the audience with its frightening ideas about a social order, controlled by the ultimate political power. Nearly 50 years later, Burgess is acknowledged as a prophet; his rebellion against a depersonalized system, which creates identical individuals driven by their animal instincts and forced to obey mechanical laws is more true now than ever.

The protagonist and story-teller, Alex, is a 15-years-old rebel, who wanders around the streets of London with his friends, Peter, Georgie, and Dim. The boy is positively conditioned to feelings of evil, which prevent his exercise of free will. Alex and his friends enjoy robbing, beating, and raping other people; their life is subjected to constant violence and crimes. The rebellion of Alex somewhat reminds the reader of Holden Caulfield in Catcher in the Rye. Yet, Burgess's character is much more brutal, cynical, and sinister. Despite Alex's agressive actions, the reader feels empathy towards the young boy. Born and raised in a political regime, which suppresses people's free will and conditions them to either good or evil, Alex is destined to go the wrong way. The boy expresses his rebellion through deliberately hurting other people. In one of their games of fun, Alex and his friends accidentally kill an old woman. Left behind by his so-called buddies, Alex is imprisoned for murder. After several years spent in prison, the boy is offered sudden freedom in exchange of participating in a so-called behavior-modification treatment, called the Ludovico Technique. Alex is forced to watch violent movies, the result being he feels nausea at the mere thought of violence. The results after this questionable method are difficult to analyze. It seems as if the government is doing society a favor by eliminating violent behavior in criminals; in reality, this brainwashing is a warning against the dangerous control of the human mind. The progress of medicine allows certain political parties and groups to use medicaments and techniques to eliminate free will and to substitute it with a frightening form of control, which distorts a person's ability to exercise his right to choose. Aldous Huxley and George Orwell have expressed similar ideas respectively in Brave New World and 1984 by portraying a society of identical individuals, controlled through different mechanisms in order to obey to a political doctrine. In A Clockwork Orange, Burgess depicts the socially unacceptable brainwashing of people through the story of a single individual. Despite the strange situations, in which Alex finds himself, the reader still feels close to his sufferings. After all, as Burgess implies, we must not let ourselves become clockwork oranges - people driven by their animal instincts or controlled by mechanical powers. We must protect and fight for our right to choose.

One of the most interesting aspects of A Clockwork Orange is the language in which Alex and his gang speak. A mixture of English, Russian, Gypsy, German, and a language invented by Burgess himself, this language style contributes to the immense philosophical power of the book. In 1961 the author predicted that in several decades people will be talking mainly in two languages - English and Russian. From my point-of-view this cannot be more true. Having studied in English for more than 7 years now, I constantly use English words in my everyday dictionary and so do my friends. Globalization is spreading at such a fast rate, that borders, languages, and nationalities have less and less meaning. This strange language is called by Burgess Nadsad. I benefit from speaking both Russian and English and I understand quite easily all the words. For the non-Russian speaking readers of Burgess, though, comprehending the novel was much more difficult. Still, Burgess refused to provide a dictionary for his invented language; the author claimed that the novel must be felt rather than understood completely.

The meaning of the title is of a surrealistic individual with a mechanism. Burgess has learned that in Malaysian orang means human. This is how the author came up with the rather unusual concept of an orange driven my mechanical laws. Burgess's life also contributed to his infatuation with the concepts of good and evil. His first wife was beaten up and lost their child. While he spent time in the USSR with his second wife, Burgess noticed that the young gangs run wild unpunished by the police, whose main aim is to protect the Communist power.

A Clockwork Orange is not a bite for every mouth. It is brutal, vulgar, cynical, and violent. The way Alex and his friends speak and think, their actions and lack of social conscience is frightening. Yet the author ingeniously points out that artificially conditioning them to do only good is not a better alternative either. This mechanical intervention into the complexities of the human mind creates clockwork oranges - people driven by mechanical laws rather than by their free will. The novel, as 1984 and A Brave New World, is revolutionary for its time. It criticizes a social order that has not yet appeared but with the advancements of technology and medicine is scarily very close to us.

It is unnecessarily to say that I loved the book a lot. I was amazed by Burgess's style, by his invention of a totally new language, by his ability to portray the rebellion of a single individual against a socially wrong system, something no author has done in such a dimension. Interestingly, the last, 21st chapter was not published in the US until 1986. In it, the protagonist Alex finally sees the errors of his lifestyle, decides against violence, and commits to changing his life. Publishers in the US told Burgess that readers would never go for the last chapter and Alex's transformation. Even the film adaption of Stanley Kubrick, which became a hit, did not feature this last chapter. Kubrick sees it as inconsistent and unconvincing. Still, Burgess's idea of originally using 21 chapters divided into three parts of 7 chapters had its meaning; the author believed that the age of 21 was a milestone, upon which a character enters into maturity and realizes his mistakes. I am glad this translation in Bulgarian includes the last chapter, because this was the original intention of the author. Anthony Burgess is brilliant and I have no doubt in his better judgement.

PS: Thanks to A Clockwork Orange I met Hristo from Knigolandia. He asked me while I was reading the book in a cafe whether I liked the translation. Having read the whole novel I must admit I love it. Being the second translation of the book after censorship in 1989 fell, I believe the translator has done an amazing job in capturing Burgess's ideas, yet sounding modern and close to contemporary youths.