The novel "We" by E. Zamyatina: problems

2024 Author: Leah Sherlock | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-17 05:25

The novel "We" is a dystopian novel written by Russian writer Yevgeny Zamyatin in 1921. It is no secret that at the beginning of the last century the political situation in the world left much to be desired, so such works were popular not only in Russia, but also abroad. It is interesting that in Russia the novel saw the light only many years later in 1988, since earlier the work was published only in Czech and English in other countries. Work on the novel "Us" took place during the Civil War.

The deep but obvious meaning that E. Zamyatin put into his novel is revealed to the reader already from the title: behind the simple pronoun “we” hides the collectivism of the Bolsheviks, when an individual person meant nothing, and group decisions played a more important role and collective activity. The heroes of dystopia live in Russia of the future in a thousand years. One of the main themes touched upon in the novel is the life of a person in conditionstotalitarianism. The novel itself is written in the form of diary entries owned by an engineer named D-503. Despite this form of writing and the fact that events take place in the distant future, E. Zamyatin, the novel "We" and its characters raise important problems of human life that will always be relevant.

The leading problem is the path to human happiness. The heroes of the novel "We" live in a world that was formed as a result of the search for a happy life. It would seem that a world dominated by technocracy and collectivism is ideal, however, it is imperfect, since a person loses his individuality and is just another cog in a huge mechanism. People's lives are subject to mathematics and scheduled by the hour. Man is impersonal. Moreover, instead of names, people are assigned a code in the form of letters and numbers. What is important, people got used to such orders, they forgot about naturalness and the need to hide something from each other.

Another problem the reader encounters is the problem of power. E. Zamyatin lays out his ideas when describing the Day of Unanimity and the election of the Benefactor. It is strange that people do not even think about choosing someone other than the Benefactor himself for the position of the Benefactor. In addition, they find it strange that the election results were once known after the election.

E. Zamyatin also introduces the situation of revolution into the plot of the dystopian novel. Part of the workers does not put up with the existing state of affairs and is ready to fight the ruler in order to liberate people from such power.

The main character joins the revolutionaries and gains a soul. At the end of the novel, the hero's beloved woman dies, and he returns to his former "balance" and "happiness" after an operation to remove the fantasy.

Thus, E. Zamyatin described the development of totalitarianism. His novel "We" is a warning about what the rejection of individuality can lead to. The writer, revealing important problems, showed how destructive a totalitarian state can be and how tragic the lives of those who happened to be part of it. The novel "We" (a summary can be found on the Internet) is an example of the dystopian novel genre and makes the reader think about a number of important issues.