We
A New Translation
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3.8 • 11 Ratings
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- £5.99
Publisher Description
Before there was "1984" or "Brave New World," there was "We"--the dystopian Russian novel considered to be the godfather of all dystopia fiction.
"We" is set in the future. The novel is set in an urban nation constructed almost entirely of glass, which allows the secret police/spies to inform on and supervise the public more easily. Life is organized to promote maximum productive efficiency along the lines of the system advocated by the hugely influential F.W. Taylor. People march in step with each other and wear identical clothing. There is no way of referring to people save by their given numbers. Males have odd numbers prefixed by consonants, females have even numbers prefixed by vowels. Everything is fine until a mathematician named D-503 decides that he is no longer going to conform.
This modern translation of Yevgeny Zamyatin book introduces the classic novel to a brand new audience. It is translated from the original manuscript dated 1920 / 1921--not the 1952 version, which has been more commonly used for modern translation.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
First published in the Soviet 1920s, Zamyatin's dystopic novel left an indelible watermark on 20th-century culture, from Orwell's 1984 to Terry Gilliam's movie Brazil. Randall's exciting new translation strips away the Cold War connotations and makes us conscious of Zamyatin's other influences, from Dostoyevski to German expressionism. D-503 is a loyal "cipher" of the totalitarian One State, literally walled in by glass; he is a mathematician happily building the world's first rocket, but his life is changed by meeting I-330, a woman with "sharp teeth" who keeps emerging out of a sudden vampirish dusk to smile wickedly on the poor narrator and drive him wild with desire. (When she first forces him to drink alcohol, the mind leaps to Marlene Dietrich in The Blue Angel.) In becoming a slave to love, D-503 becomes, briefly, a free man. In Randall's hands, Zamyatin's modernist idiom crackles ("I only remember his fingers: they flew out of his sleeve, like bundles of beams"), though the novel sometimes seems prophetic of the onset of Stalinism, particularly in the bleak ending. Modern Library's reintroduction of Zamyatin's novel is a literary event sure to bring this neglected classic to the attention of a new readership. (On sale July 11)
Customer Reviews
Terrible translation
Just to say, incredible book, but appalling translation. There are much better versions out there.