Yevgeny Zamyatin’s dystopian novel “We” is an actual and nowadays work that tells about the events of the distant mechanized future. The society in it is based on strict totalitarian control over the personality, including in the intimate sphere, denial of fantasy and is subject to a strict mathematical routine, and first and last names are replaced by letters and numbers. But, despite all this, even in such conditions, the human personality does not die.
Plot of the novel
The anti-utopia novel "We" was built in the form of diary entries of the number D-503, a brilliant engineer on the Integral spacecraft. The hero writes for distant civilizations, which the government of the earthly United State calls for to follow the example of humanity and to regulate his life according to mathematical laws.
One day, when the D-503 is walking with his girlfriend O-90, an irritable white-toothed stranger speaks to him. The impression of the meeting is best conveyed as described by Zamyatin, a quote from the novel "We":
But I don’t know - in my eyes or eyebrows - some strange annoying X, and I just can’t catch him, give him a digital expression.
In just a few days, D-603 already accepts the invitation of I-330, the same stranger, to visit the Ancient House with her, where she plunges into the chaos of life before the formation of the One State. But he refuses to offer to stay, having violated the daily routine.
I-330 with its individuality and freedom at the same time attracts and scares the hero, who believes - and this will confirm as well as possible the quote from "We" Evgeny Zamyatin, that
... the instinct of unfreedom has long been organically inherent in man ...
He even intends to convey to a new acquaintance, but instead goes to the Medical Bureau. D-503 does not understand that he is in love, and therefore thinks he is ill. As a result of the examination by a doctor, he is temporarily suspended from work. At the same time, the D-503 is no longer convinced that it wants to lose its new attitude. This is a clear quote from Zamyatin’s “We”:
However, what: a week ago, probably, I would also be offended. And now - now not: because I know that I have it - that I am sick. And I also know - I do not want to recover. I don’t want to, that's all.
The hero in love allows I-330 to carry him over to the Green Wall, where the so-called savages, who have retained their individuality, live. Soon, D-503 begins to cooperate with them and help them plan to destroy the city.
At the same time, D-503 succumbed to the persuasion of O-90 to give her a child, despite the fact that both of them were threatened with death. Later, with the help of I-330, when the revolutionaries partially implement their plans and break into the city, he will transport a deeply pregnant girlfriend over the Wall, never realizing that she is in love with him, which follows from quotes from “We” Zamyatin:
“And you want me to go to her - that I ask her - that I ... Do not ever dare me about this again!”
In the chaos of the struggle between the city and the jungle, work on Integral does not stop. The hero is also on the side of the revolutionaries: they want to hijack a ship and send it to the city in order to destroy it once and for all. The plan almost succeeds, but at the last moment the Guardians appear and do not allow to carry out the plan.
Immediately after D-503, he receives the audience of the Benefactor, who forgives him for treason and says that I-330 only used it, and did not like it. Succumbing to a provocation, the hero goes to the Bureau of the Guardians to repent and convey to the revolutionaries, but does not have time: everyone is driven into the audience and subjected to operations to remove imagination. After the operation, D-503 without hesitation gives the government everything he knows about the revolutionaries, and also talks about the I-330, which no longer evokes any feelings in him.
The dystopian Zamyatin novel “We” ends like this:
And I hope we win. More: I'm sure we will win. Because the mind must win.
Hidden characters in the novel
The scene is not explicitly stated anywhere, but with some quotes in “We” Zamyatin hints that the One State is the former Soviet Russia. For example, in the Ancient House the hero sees a portrait of Pushkin.
You can also notice that the D-503 is extremely popular among women. At least three heroines described in the novel: I-330, O-90 and Yu - are in love with him or lust for him. The secret of the hero’s erotic appeal lies in his hairy hands. He is a descendant of free people, and here are quotes from Zamyatin’s novel “We” about this:
“Your hand ... After all, you don’t know - and few know that women from here, from the city, happened to love those.” And you probably have a few drops of sunny, forest blood.
Pregnancy O-90 is also symbolic: the best that died in D-503 can bloom in his child. A quote from "We" Zamyatin about the woman’s love for the hero, cited earlier, gives hope that he will not be forgotten.
Features of the style of the novel
The language of diary entries in “We” is heterogeneous, changing with the hero: from “geometrically wire” to metaphorical and redundant, flowery individual and, in the finale, to the verified “geometrically wire” again. Inside the mechanical and laconic style of the first lines there are sometimes interspersed with individuality. You can also discern the second motive behind this: the formation of the D-503 as a writer and the inability to write without imagination and a personal "I".
Followers of Eugene Zamyatin
Evgeny Zamyatin’s anti-utopia novel “We” had a strong influence both on contemporaries and on future generations of writers. After him, dystopian novels appear one after another, continuing the idea of personal death in a totalitarian society and revealing the topic of an imaginary universal good, directly or indirectly based on the work of Yevgeny Zamyatin.
In particular, one of the most famous anti-utopias in the history of world literature - 1984, by George Orwell, not only familiar with We, but also left a detailed review, has direct parallels with the Zamyatin text.