Dystopia
Parent categories: fiction - science-fiction
Related: apocalypse
Contrast: utopia
Titles: Nineteen Eighty-Four (1949)
Unidentified book cover of 1984 (1949) - George Orwell [Amazon.com] [FR] [DE] [UK] [...]
Nineteen Eighty-Four is an allegorical political novel written by George Orwell. The story takes place in a nightmarish dystopia where the omnipresent State enforces perfect conformity among members of a totalitarian Party through indoctrination, propaganda, fear, and ruthless punishment. [...]
Definition
A dystopia is the antithesis of a utopian society.
A dystopian society is usually characterized by an authoritarian or totalitarian form of government, or some other kind of oppressive social control.
The first use of the word has been credited to John Stuart Mill, whose knowledge of Greek would suggest that he meant it as a place where things are bad, rather than simply the opposite of Utopia. The Greek prefix 'dys'/'dis' signifies 'ill','bad' or 'abnormal', whereas 'ou' means 'not' (Utopia means 'nowhere', and is a pun on 'Eutopia' meaning 'happy place' - the prefix 'eu' means 'well'). So 'dystopia' and 'utopia' are not exact opposites in the sense that dysphoria and euphoria are opposites. [Mar 2006]
See also: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dystopia [Mar 2006]
Utopian and dystopian fiction
Utopian fiction is the creation of an ideal world as the setting for a novel. Dystopian fiction is the opposite: creation of a nightmare world. Both are commonly found in science fiction novels and stories.
The word utopia was first used in this context by Thomas More in his work Utopia; literally it means "nowhere". In this work, More sets out a vision of an ideal society. Other examples include Jonathan Swift's Gulliver's Travels, and B.F. Skinner's Walden Two. Gulliver's Travels may also be seen as a satirical utopia because it is actually a comment on the society the author lived in. The same goes for Erewhon by Samuel Butler.
For examples of dystopias, see two of George Orwell's books, Nineteen Eighty-Four and Animal Farm, as well as Aldous Huxley's Brave New World, Ray Bradbury's Fahrenheit 451, Kurt Vonnegut's Harrison Bergeron, Margaret Atwood's The Handmaid's Tale, Ayn Rand's Anthem and William Gibson's cyberpunk novels. --http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Utopian_and_dystopian_fiction [Feb 2005]
Dystopian literature
This is a list of examples of dystopian literature.
- 1984 by George Orwell
- Acidity (Novelette) by Nadeem F. Paracha
- Alongside Night by J. Neil Schulman
- Among the Hidden by Margaret Haddix
- Animal Farm by George Orwell
- Anthem by Ayn Rand
- Ape and Essence by Aldous Huxley
- Battle Royale by Koushun Takami
- Bend Sinister by Vladimir Nabokov
- Brave New World by Aldous Huxley
- The Children of Men by P.D. James
- Cloud Atlas by David Mitchell
- A Clockwork Orange by Anthony Burgess
- Chung Kuo by David Windgrove
- Dayworld by Phillip Jose Farmer
- Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? by Philip K. Dick
- Doc and Fluff by Pat Califia
- Die Andere Seite by Alfred Kubin
- The Domination by S. M. Stirling
- Elvissey by Jack Womack
- Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury
- Feed by M. T. Anderson
- A Friend of the Earth by T. C. Boyle.
- The Giver by Lois Lowry
- The Handmaid's Tale by Margaret Atwood
- Harrison Bergeron by Kurt Vonnegut
- I Have No Mouth and I Must Scream by Harlan Ellison
- Incal (and spinoffs) by Alejandro Jodorowsky
- In the Country of Last Things by Paul Auster
- The Iron Heel by Jack London
- It Can't Happen Here by Sinclair Lewis
- The Jagged Orbit by John Brunner
- Jennifer Government by Max Barry
- Kallocain by Karin Boye
- Level 7 by Mordecai Roshwald
- Logan's Run by William F. Nolan and George Clayton Johnson
- The Machine Stops by E.M. Forster
- Make Room! Make Room! by Harry Harrison
- Neuromancer by William Gibson.
- Oryx and Crake by Margaret Atwood
- Planet of the Apes by Pierre Boulle
- Player Piano by Kurt Vonnegut
- Random Acts of Senseless Violence by Jack Womack
- The Man in the High Castle by Philip K. Dick
- The Running Man by Richard Bachman, a pseudonym for Stephen King.
- The Sheep Look Up by John Brunner
- The Shockwave Rider by John Brunner
- Stand on Zanzibar by John Brunner
- This Perfect Day by Ira Levin
- Time out of Joint by Philip K. Dick
- The Trial by Franz Kafka
- Utopia X by Scott Wilson
- V for Vendetta by Alan Moore and David Lloyd
- The Wanting Seed by Anthony Burgess
- We by Yevgeny Zamyatin
- Welcome to the Monkey House by Kurt Vonnegut
- The Slynx by Tatyana Tolstaya
- Rammer by Larry Niven (later incorporated as Part I of the novel A World Out of Time)
- Smith's Dream by C. K. Stead