There's something about dystopian stories that tickles the mind. The best ones floor me with intricate and gorgeously-realized detail. They seem to speak to a part of me that's curious to know what the world would be like if some apocalyptic force leveled society, stripped it bare of any semblance of the old civility it had known prior. What would this new world look, feel, sound, taste, and smell like? And how would we behave in this freshly charred landscape? What would we keep from the old as we forged our way through the new? And how would we come to see one another there?
Dystopias reign in each fictionalized universe of the following tales. Some things look familiar, remembrances of the way society used to function and people used to act still linger in characters' minds. But a new order has taken hold in each, civilization has become a stranger, darker beast than before whatever, named or unnamed, event forever altered the cultural landscape. And every story is ultimately unique in vision and force, causing audiences to view their current existences with a tinge of newly heightened inquisitiveness. Then they beg the question, 'What would I do in such a world? Who would I become?'
1. Cat's Cradle written by Kurt Vonnegut
In this, arguably his best, novel Mr. Vonnegut once again conspires to end the world as we know it - with a little help from modern religion and technology. Cat's Cradle was written during the time of the Cuban missile crisis and conjures an existence in which a veritable smorgasbord of unique characters seems to have either the best or worst of possible intentions at just the wrong stroke of the clock. Hysterically rollicking and also chillingly terrifying, the story is nothing short of an epic masterpiece of dystopian fiction that punches a little too close to the heart for comfort.
2. Fahrenheit 451 written by Ray Bradbury
Guy Montag is a fireman whose job is not to put out fires but, rather, to start them. In a bleak future in which books are an outlawed commodity, Guy is an agent of the government charged with burning any books discovered hiding in the secret rooms and shelves of those who defy society's rules. The penalty for possessing such items is sure death. But when Guy meets a strange new neighbor, he begins to question everything that has been ingrained into his being. Author Ray Bradbury penned this seminal dystopian vision with a plentitude of wit, intrigue, and action that is sure to capture any reader's mind - sending it reeling into a deep forest of queries and imaginings.
3. The Handmaid's Tale written by Margaret Atwood
"Set within a bleak dystopian future where the ability to reproduce has been sharply curbed by the effects of world pollution and gross misuse of genetic science, those few woman of childbearing age and potential are kept as broodmares for the rich and powerful. Or, as they are more politely called, handmaidens. This fictional mono-theocratic society no longer allows these women to obtain education or read, work jobs, or have their own families. They have been reduced to their most base function - as viable wombs - not the dynamic, feeling, loving human beings of infinite potentials that they may have been in a different time and place...Despite the bleak and horrific premise, it is at times a startlingly gorgeous narrative, consummated through Atwood’s stark yet sensual language." (Excerpt from my previous review.)
4. Mad Max: Fury Road directed by George Miller
Kick-ass feminist uprisings in a misogynistic, patriarchal dystopia? Yes, please! You had me at the start of this thriller that puts women in the driver's seat towards their own salvation. Max can barely hold on at first through the fiery carnage and roaring high-speed turmoil. But he gets his bearings in this female-led actioner, and he's all the better for it, too.
5. De-loused in the Comatorium recorded by The Mars Volta
Yeah, I know. It's a bit of a stretch. But just let me have this one. A prog rock concept album that imagines the fevered dreamings of a comatose drug-addled psyche, The Mars Volta nails a dystopian sonic landscape. The lyrics might not make a lot of sense on their own, but, when paired with the psychedelia of the music layered all beneath and around, they help carry this album to epic heights of pure stylistic euphoria.
6. The Road written by Cormac McCarthy
So devastatingly bleak and also so evocative and gorgeously-rendered, Cormac McCarthy's The Road plows through the field of dystopian tales with its singular staggering force. I cannot speak adequately to the power of its narrative of a father and young son traveling a dusty road through a world ravaged of nearly all other life. There are great losses and terrors and, yet, still great sacrificing love present all throughout. And the ending packs a wallop that is sure to linger long in a reader's mind, waxing and waning in intensity within the infinite ocean of the imagination.
Dystopias reign in each fictionalized universe of the following tales. Some things look familiar, remembrances of the way society used to function and people used to act still linger in characters' minds. But a new order has taken hold in each, civilization has become a stranger, darker beast than before whatever, named or unnamed, event forever altered the cultural landscape. And every story is ultimately unique in vision and force, causing audiences to view their current existences with a tinge of newly heightened inquisitiveness. Then they beg the question, 'What would I do in such a world? Who would I become?'
1. Cat's Cradle written by Kurt VonnegutIn this, arguably his best, novel Mr. Vonnegut once again conspires to end the world as we know it - with a little help from modern religion and technology. Cat's Cradle was written during the time of the Cuban missile crisis and conjures an existence in which a veritable smorgasbord of unique characters seems to have either the best or worst of possible intentions at just the wrong stroke of the clock. Hysterically rollicking and also chillingly terrifying, the story is nothing short of an epic masterpiece of dystopian fiction that punches a little too close to the heart for comfort.
Guy Montag is a fireman whose job is not to put out fires but, rather, to start them. In a bleak future in which books are an outlawed commodity, Guy is an agent of the government charged with burning any books discovered hiding in the secret rooms and shelves of those who defy society's rules. The penalty for possessing such items is sure death. But when Guy meets a strange new neighbor, he begins to question everything that has been ingrained into his being. Author Ray Bradbury penned this seminal dystopian vision with a plentitude of wit, intrigue, and action that is sure to capture any reader's mind - sending it reeling into a deep forest of queries and imaginings.
"Set within a bleak dystopian future where the ability to reproduce has been sharply curbed by the effects of world pollution and gross misuse of genetic science, those few woman of childbearing age and potential are kept as broodmares for the rich and powerful. Or, as they are more politely called, handmaidens. This fictional mono-theocratic society no longer allows these women to obtain education or read, work jobs, or have their own families. They have been reduced to their most base function - as viable wombs - not the dynamic, feeling, loving human beings of infinite potentials that they may have been in a different time and place...Despite the bleak and horrific premise, it is at times a startlingly gorgeous narrative, consummated through Atwood’s stark yet sensual language." (Excerpt from my previous review.)
Kick-ass feminist uprisings in a misogynistic, patriarchal dystopia? Yes, please! You had me at the start of this thriller that puts women in the driver's seat towards their own salvation. Max can barely hold on at first through the fiery carnage and roaring high-speed turmoil. But he gets his bearings in this female-led actioner, and he's all the better for it, too.
Yeah, I know. It's a bit of a stretch. But just let me have this one. A prog rock concept album that imagines the fevered dreamings of a comatose drug-addled psyche, The Mars Volta nails a dystopian sonic landscape. The lyrics might not make a lot of sense on their own, but, when paired with the psychedelia of the music layered all beneath and around, they help carry this album to epic heights of pure stylistic euphoria.
6. The Road written by Cormac McCarthySo devastatingly bleak and also so evocative and gorgeously-rendered, Cormac McCarthy's The Road plows through the field of dystopian tales with its singular staggering force. I cannot speak adequately to the power of its narrative of a father and young son traveling a dusty road through a world ravaged of nearly all other life. There are great losses and terrors and, yet, still great sacrificing love present all throughout. And the ending packs a wallop that is sure to linger long in a reader's mind, waxing and waning in intensity within the infinite ocean of the imagination.
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