Utopia: A Discussion on Utopia

¶ … Utopia: A discussion on utopia and dystopia in nineteen eighty-Four, brave new world and Haroun and the sea of stories

The Impossibility of Utopia: A Discussion of Utopia and Dystopia in Nineteen Eighty-Four, Brave New World and Haroun and the Sea of Stories

Both utopias and dystopias are speculative stories which completely re-imagine the world we live in or project it in the future. Utopias imagine impossible, ideal worlds in which perfect happiness and harmony reign and from which all forms of evil have disappeared. Modern dystopias are the reverse of utopias: whereas in utopias the world is absolutely good, in dystopias the universe becomes an absolutely evil place. As it shall be seen, the famous works which are under discussion here start from negative aspects of the world as we know it and transform them into absolutes. Although the worlds thus created seem to be entirely fictional, the main argument of the three novels is that the evil forces that exist at present could take control over our world and become permanent states.

It can be said therefore that these two notions are more or less correspondent to the two Christian concepts of heaven and hell, respectively. Also, it should be noted that utopias and dystopias are both totalitarian: the purpose is to imagine a world in which the balance provided by the existence of opposites, such as good and evil, beauty and ugliness and so on, has been completely erased. Instead of nature there is only a totalitarian state which is 'perfect', either in its goodness or in its evilness. In a way, although utopias and dystopias are virtually opposites, it should be noted that they both design a world in which possibility and change are impossible, and where there is no respite from either the absolutely positive or the absolutely negative state. It can be said therefore that the dystopia, which is a more recent concept, has appeared as an argument on the impossibility of utopias. Happiness is not possible in a state of perfect equilibrium. The term utopia is often chosen as a synonym for an ideal and therefore impossible situation H.G. Wells, one of the greatest science fiction writers of all times, has created a deceptive utopia in his famous novel, the Time Machine. In this work, the time traveler goes to the future where he encounters a seemingly perfect race of people, the Eloi, who appear to live in absolute peace and harmony. However, the hero of the story discovers later that the perfection was literally only "on the surface" as a different kind of people were living underground, being constantly exploited and persecuted by the Eloi. In this context, an interesting thing to notice is whether the works under discussion here envisage dystopias as actual possibilities or not. One of the most burning questions that the dystopia inevitably poses is whether such absolute, abhorrent worlds could actually exist some day. The other important question that the discussion of dystopia poses is whether the image of the world created in these works is not merely a slight distortion of our own world, with us being unaware of the fact that we are controlled through all the social mechanisms and institutions existent at present.

Thus, George Orwell's best known work, Nineteen Eighty-Four is also one of the best known and most discussed utopias that have been created. Written in 1949, the novel projects the future world of Big Brother, a totalitarian state from which all freedom has disappeared. The dictator (Big Brother), the new language called Newspeak, the institutions (the Thought Police and so on) and so on have become means of controlling the population and making it entirely obedient to the party. The authority is of course only one, and the individual is not allowed to think for himself. The most famous phrase in the novel is probably the recurrent "Big Brother is watching you," describing the permanent monitoring of every action anyone makes through cameras, screens and microphones. As it is well-known, the book has been made into movies and even TV-shows, in the attempt to make the audience feel as if they were completely and permanently under control or surveillance. The individual obviously disappears in the dystopian environment, until there is just the mass or the society. One of the slogans of the party announce the way in which power is instituted over the population of the Oceania, as the future world in Orwell's novel is called: "War is peace. Freedom is slavery. Ignorance is strength."(Orwell, 6) Thus, the government controls the population through terror and manipulation of the mind. The main element that supports the dystopia is therefore fear. The reader may be repulsed by the state of utter ignorance and dullness in which we find the inhabitants of the Nineteen Eighty-Four world. Also, the fact that they do not try to protest or rebel may seem surprising at first sight. Still, on a closer look, the force of Orwell's argument comes from the idea that man's instinct for survival is the strongest psychological incentive, and that it needs no further support. The total dominance is here achieved through fear. As it is stated everywhere in the novel, power consists in inflicting pain and reducing the human being to its primary instincts, where elevated and rational thought is no longer possible: "Power is in inflicting pain and humiliation. Power is in tearing human minds to pieces and putting them together again in new shapes of your own choosing. Do you begin to see, then, what kind of world we are creating? It is the exact opposite of the stupid hedonistic Utopias that the old reformers imagined....Progress in our world will be progress towards more pain. The old civilizations claimed that they were founded on love or justice. Ours is founded upon hatred. In our world there will be no emotions except fear, rage, triumph, and self-abasement."(Orwell, 181) Thus, it is plainly stated in the text itself that Orwell's world is meant to be a dystopia, a state founded on hatred, the opposite of the utopia that was founded on love and justice. Another crucial concept characteristic of the dystopias is the idea that matter can be controlled through the power of mind, and therefore nature can be completely overpowered by man: "We control matter because we control the mind. Reality is inside the skull." (Orwell, 268) Freedom is therefore abolished in all its forms, from free-thought to free-speech, and so are all the old habits of behavior and thinking, such as love, family bonds and so on: "We have cut the links between child and parent, and between man and man, and between man and woman. No one dares trust a wife or a child or a friend any longer. But in the future there will be no wives and no friends... There will be no loyalty, except loyalty towards the Party. There will be no love, except the love of Big Brother. There will be no laughter, except the laugh of triumph over a defeated enemy."(Orwell, 182) the totalitarian state will not accept loyalty or love for anyone or for anything else than itself. The question that arises is therefore whether this kind of state has any credibility. Orwell himself answers this question by expressly translating in the text the feelings of the reader in the words of Winston Smith. After hearing the description of the dystopian world of absolute hatred and fear, he exclaims that such a design would be absolutely impossible and that, in any case it could not endure: "You could not create such a world as you have just described. It is a dream. It is impossible.' 'Why?' 'It is impossible to found a civilization on fear and hatred and cruelty. It would never endure.' 'Why not?' 'It would have no vitality. It would disintegrate. It would commit suicide."(Orwell, 182) However, at the end, Smith himself is defeated by the system, and his final declaration of love and submission to Big Brother point to the victory of the dystopian state over humanity and the individual: "But it was all right, everything was all right, the struggle was finished. He had won the victory over himself. He loved Big Brother."(Orwell, 300) This nightmarish world is thus in Orwell's view, possible. According to Orwell, what makes the dystopia possible is precisely fear and especially phobia. The work has therefore deep psychoanalytical roots, inspired by Freud: Smith would not give in to the system because of the fear of death or anything else, but he gives in when he is tortured by being faced with his deepest phobia: the fear or rats. Thus Orwell suggests that such a dystopia would be possible merely because the subconscious makes men weak and less rational, and can gain complete control.

A comparison of another famous dystopia, Huxley's Brave New World with Orwell's book can lead to very interesting conclusions. Overall, the two fictive worlds have many common elements. The "brave new world" is also projected in the future, only somewhere farther away in 2495 or 632 a.F. "A.F" stands for the absolute god of this new world, Ford, an obvious allusion to Henry Ford one of the greatest and most successful manufacturers in history. The main slogan of this world is however different from that of Nineteen Eighty-Four: "Community, Identity, Stability."(Huxley, 1) the "brave new world" is not based on terror as Orwell's world was, but on conditioning and effective suggestions. Thus, the main difference is that in Orwell's world everything is done by psychological determination, whereas here the world is controlled by "New Pavlovian Conditioning." The population is here literally controlled since birth through scientific means: the human embryos are hatched in laboratories and afterwards separated in five strict classes: Alphas, Betas, Gammas, Deltas and Epsilons. Then hypnopaedia (repeated messages played during sleep) and negative stimuli (electric shock) are applied so that the individual development is thoroughly controlled. The main aim here is to abolish individuality completely and to create perfect homogeneity of the masses: "When the individual feels, the community reels." (Huxley, 94) Each individual is "created" through a complicated system in which he is conditioned so as to hate some things and love other things. In this way, each person would be satisfied with his own life conditions: "And that,' put in the Director sententiously, "that is the secret of happiness and virtue-liking what you've got to do. All conditioning aims at that: making people like their inescapable social destiny."(Huxley, 16) as in Orwell's book therefore, the power of the mind and that of psychological conditioning are superior to the forces of nature: "What man has joined, nature is powerless to put asunder." (Huxley, 22) the tendency of creating an absolutely leveled society, in which one person is like all the rest and the his or her destiny is predestinated hints at a form of similar control to that in Orwell's book: "Ford, we are twelve; oh make us one, / Like drops within the Social River; / Oh, make us now together run / as swiftly as thy shining Flivver. / Come, Greater Being, Social Friend, / Annihilating Twelve-in-One! / We long to die, for when we end, / Our larger life has but begun."(Huxley, 81) it is obvious thus that there can be no happiness in such a world, although the "brave new world" wants to be, like its name hints, a good, ideal world: "Happiness is never grand."(Huxley, 221) Everything is pre-made as from a cookery book, where the recipes are already given and the food only needs preparation: "All our science is just a cookery book, with an orthodox theory of cooking that nobody's allowed to question, and a list of recipes that mustn't be added to except by special permission from the head cook."(Huxley, 225) the phrase that gives the title of the book and which is taken from Shakespeare is obviously ironic: the world is neither new (everything is pre-established) nor brave (as change and innovation are not allowed):

This fictional dystopia is neither brave nor new. Instead, it is so controlled and safe that there is neither need nor opportunity for bravery. As for being "new," its unrelenting drives toward management and development, and its obsessions with predictable order and consumption, are as old as the Industrial Revolution."(Hochman, 2) the effective way of controlling such a society is to make it dependent on a drug called "soma," which serves as a way to level all conflicts or possible dissatisfaction: "There's always soma to calm your anger, to reconcile you to your enemies, to make you patient and long-suffering. In the past you could only accomplish these things by making a great effort and after years of hard moral training. Now, you swallow two or three half-gramme tablets, and there you are. Anybody can be virtuous now. You can carry at least half your morality about in a bottle. Christianity without tears-that's what soma is." (Huxley, 238) Thus, Huxley's main assumption is that a dystopian world can be achieved through absolute conditioning of the individual so as to make him consider his situation is perfect.