Yevgeny Zamyatin

Evgeniĭ Ivanovich Zami︠a︡tin

Evgenii Ivanovich Zamiatin

The narrator describes a state in which the individuals have given up their freedom for materialistic rewards, in this utopian satire

We: New Edition

An ode to the human nature and what happens if it’s suppressed in totalitarian regimes.

Nezumi

me, an intellectual: “wow this is just like We”

Rach

you: “wow this is just like 1984” 

me, an intellectual: “wow this is just like We”

Daniela V.

It's so hard to review this book. I loved it through and through, but it's overwhelmingly beautiful and complex. 

I consider myself a fanatic of the dystopian genre and I haven't read a lot of russian literature, so I thought We might be a nice way to reconnect with this kind of literature.

George Orwell is one of my favourite writers, and right when I started this book I realized that 1984 owes We so much. The massively intrusive government depicted in 1984 is an improvement of OneState in We.

Leaving aside those similarities, 1984's main theme is manipulation through the restriction of privacy, whereas We is about the destruction of individualism. The citizens of OneState are practicaly brainwashed. Their names are now only numbers, they live in a world of glass buildings. Everyone follows the same schedule, sexual encounters are scheduled and assigned with pink tickets. Everyone lives in cities, separated from the outside world by the Green Wall. The world is ruled by logic and mathematics, following the Taylor system and free will is not a problem anymore. D-503 is the builder of the Integral, a spaceship that will be used to carry the message of the Benefactor to other worlds and conquer them. That's why the book is called "we", the word "you" is no longer necessary in this society. As noted in the book:

"(...) And even the elections amount to little more than symbolism, to remind us that we are one, powerful, million-celled organism, that we are, in the words of the ancient “Gospel,” one Church. Because the history of OneState does not know of a single instance when so much as one voice dared to violate the majestic unison of that glorious day..."


The narrator is D-503, who at first believes in the system. After meeting a mysterious woman, he starts to feel things he've never felt before. He is diagnosed by a doctor. He has a soul. That's the motive of the bipolarity of D-503 and the duality of his speech. After the quote noted before, but very close to it, D-503 expresses that he no longer cares about the system or the Benefactor (the Day of Unanimity is the day of the year that the Benefactor is relected):

"(...) And all that stuff I just wrote about the Day of Unanimity—nobody needs it, it’s all wrong, I want to cross it out, tear it up, throw it out. Because I know (maybe this is blasphemy, but it’s true) that the only holiday for me is being with her, only if she’s there next to me, shoulder to shoulder..."

Another of the main themes is revolution. This is clearly a reference to the communist revolution in 1917 and how the bolsheviks thought it was the final one. To illustrate what I'm saying, I present you these two fragments:

"(...) I jumped up. “This is unthinkable! It’s stupid! Can’t you see that what you’re plotting is ... revolution?”
“Yes—revolution! Why is that stupid?”
“Stupid—because there can’t be a revolution. Because our—this is me talking, not you—our revolution was the final one. And there cannot be any further revolutions of any kind. Everybody knows that”..."

"(...)“But, I-330, that’s stupid. Since the number of numbers is infinite, how can there be a final one?”
“And how can there be a final revolution? There is no final one. The number of revolutions is infinite. The last one—that’s for children. Infinity frightens children, and it’s essential that children get a good night’s sleep”..."


The ending made me let out a tear. It's terribly sad, of course, but beautiful in its own way. I recommend this book to absolutely everyone.

And to end this review, I leave you my favourite quote from this amazing book:

"(...) “That means you love it. You’re afraid of it because it’s stronger than you, you hate it because you’re afraid of it, you love it because you can’t master it. You can only love something that refuses to be mastered”..."

Nathan Griffin

2017 Update:  This re-reads very well. I probably liked it more the second time. Still need to read 1984 again to compare.

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The original dystopian novel. Orwell was a fan and claimed it inspired him to write 1984.

I haven't read 1984 since high school, but what I appreciated about We more than 1984 was that it's less about an authoritarian government and more about a society that puts utility, rational behavior, and data as the ultimate means to advance society. The government in We is way less sinister than 1984 and you could really even argue that it's ultimate goal was the flourishing of the people under its rule. It's easy to denounce the overreach and crimes of Big Brother, but in a culture driven by rapidly advancing knowledge and sheer amounts of data, are we as willing to admit to ourselves that those will ultimately fail as our saviors as well?

Also, while it made parts of this book tough to follow, the jagged, frantic writing in parts really works well.

Bethan Northwood

i’d do anything for a woman like I-330 too i’m sure

Carolina Lopes

I enjoyed the writing style and the overall idea (the way the world functions and the story). That being said, I found it very confusing at times, which is why I kept it at 3 stars instead of 4.