Kurt Vonnegut’s Galápagos, published in 1985, is a novel whose events take place between 1986 and 1,001,986. It is narrated by a spirit following a group of people who would eventually become the progenitors of all of humanity. These people embark on the “Nature Cruise of the Century” to the Galapagos Islands and, having shipwrecked […]
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Outta the Way Dummy: Examining the Importance of Educational Reform in Mark Twain’s A Connecticut Yankee In King Arthurs Court
Unlike the future utopia that Edward Bellamy created in Looking Backward, in which he sought to fix perceived social problems of the late 19th century, Mark Twain’s A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthurs Court instead looks to highlight the positive aspects of the United States in 1889 by placing all that knowledge in the time […]
Little Rascals: Representations of the Hitler Youth in George Orwell’s 1984
In George Orwell’s dystopian novel 1984, the reader is introduced to Winston Smith, an outsider in a society under totalitarian rule by Big Brother. Though Smith works for the Party he feels himself outside of it, relishing in small rebellions against the state. Smith, like many dystopian protagonists, begins his downfall by writing in a […]
Climate Change Denial & the Carbon-Combustion Complex
Written by Naomi Oreskes and Eric M. Conway who are both history of science professors at Harvard and the California Institute of Technology respectively, The Collapse of Western Civilization: A View from the Future (2014) is not a dystopian novel; it is an essay. It is an essay divided into three parts, which tells the […]
Planet of the Apes by Pierre Boulle
The film Planet of the Apes stood out to me for exposing the effect of placing humans as inferior to apes. The use of the Statue of Liberty in the closing scene highlights the fact that the Americans and Europeans certainly held a superior attitude over more “primitive” cultures. An example of this may be […]
Twain’s Ideology Within the Text
Mark Twain’s “A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur’s Court” is a clear illustration of a feudalistic form of government dating back to the early 6th century. Twain had his own thoughts on this particular way of rule and because of that, creates a fictitious utopian society to explore his views. Certain themes and quotes truly […]
Mad Marx: The Dangers of Capitalism in H.G Wells’ The Time Machine
In H.G. Wells’ 1895 novel, The Time Machine, the reader follows an unnamed protagonist known only as “the Time Traveler” into the distant future. Initially the Time Traveler is met by the small and happy, though dimwitted, descendants of the human race known as the Eloi. A peaceful society, they eat only fruit and live […]
Progressivism in Mark Twain’s A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur’s Court
A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur’s Court by Mark Twain, published in 1889, is an often anachronistic portrayal of the middle ages through the eyes of a 19th century engineer. The engineer, Hank Morgan, suffers a blow to the head by a man named Hercules and awakens from his stupor in the 6th century. What […]
Panopticons in Orwell’s 1984
Written by British novelist, essayist, journalist, and critic George Orwell, the novel Nineteen Eight- Four (often written 1984) was first published in 1949. It is a dystopian novel that follows in the tradition of Zamyatin’s We, Wells’ The Time Machine, and Rand’s novella Anthem. In 1984, Orwell examines the consequences of oligarchy, totalitarianism, and collectivism […]
Galapagos by Kurt Vonnegut
Kurt Vonnegut’s Galapagos is a dash of fantasy, part social experiment, and a touch of sea story, all within a narrative giant. This piece is meant to illustrate how humans are pure animals. It tells the bizarre tale of humanity nearing extinction, while one lone island’s inhabitants are becoming animalistic. The characters on the island […]