Dystopias, or anti-utopian visions of the future, hit mainstream fiction in 1895, when H. G. Wells published The Time Machine. Post-nuclear-holocausts, from the thoughtful film On the Beach in 1959 to the grim made-for-TV movie The Day After in 1983, have made a special impression on the public. Dystopias continue to be useful because, as critic Thomas Disch points out, “If we don't imagine the worst, we can't avoid it.” (And maybe we still can't.) Four writers whose job is to peer into the mist sound off on how bad is bad.
Rob Kitchin SENIOR LECTURER IN HUMAN GEOGRAPHY AT THE NATIONAL UNIVERSITY OF IRELAND, MAYNOOTH. LOST IN SPACE: THE GEOGRAPHIES OF SCIENCE FICTION, WHICH KITCHIN CO-EDITED WITH JAMES KNEALE (FAR RIGHT), WILL BE PUBLISHED IN DECEMBER BY CONTINUUM BOOKS.
Do you tend to have a hopeful or pessimistic attitude about the future?I change my mind on this quite regularly dependent on what's going on in the world, or what I've just read. Most of the time I'm quite optimistic. I think if we've managed to get this far without an apocalypse, then hopefully we can carry on without one. But then I watch the news or a documentary about some war or man-made disaster, and I change my mind. Favorite dystopias:Ones that revolve around information and communication technologies: loss of identity because computer records have been erased, “Big Brother” surveillance, viruses. I prefer the kind of dystopian future I can envisage actually happening. Is a sucker for:The Internet as surround landscape, being able to control machines from a distance, mind-reading machines, artificial intelligence.
Prospects for the human race: 0. The luckiest will live in harmony, enjoying the privileges of wealth, while the unlucky will scramble round trying to survive. That pretty much sounds like today, so I guess we'll carry on much the same.
Frederik Pohl AUTHOR OF MORE THAN 45 SCIENCE FICTION NOVELS. PLATINUM POHL, A SHORT STORY COLLECTION, WILL BE PUBLISHED IN DECEMBER BY TOR BOOKS.
Over the last decade or so, has there been a change in the way people think about the future? No. I think the general attitude now is, ‘The future is going to be what it's going to be, and there's nothing we can do about it.’
Will Platinum Pohl include any stories that are dystopic in nature? I think I can't help it. A lot of my books–maybe two-thirds–are dystopic. It's much more interesting to write about disasters. Favorite dystopias:Brave New World made a considerable impression on me at 13 or 14. And 1984 was one of the reasons the actual year wasn't that bad.
Is a sucker for: Interstellar space travel Prospects for the human race: +1. Things may improve over the present situation, but not much more. People have an interest in keeping the status quo.
Hollywood says, “Dystopic is dys-tastic!”
From the hellfire of Greek apocalyptic texts to the brainwashing and genetic engineering of Aldous Huxley's Brave New World, fictional futures have long been used by writers to drive home a point about the present. But when Hollywood latched onto the dystopia, did the message become secondary to the medium? Before September 11, dark was not so much scary as, well, cool.
1926 Metropolis
Almost eight decades later, viewers still get this silent film's point about depersonalization in a mechanized society.
1964 Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb
Yes, it had incredible sets by Ken Adam, but this brilliant black comedy also struck plenty of chords about ideology, fanaticism, and the absurdly phallic nature of missiles.
Paul Di Filippo SCIENCE FICTION WRITER. HIS MOST RECENT BOOK, STRANGE TRADES, WAS PUBLISHED IN SEPTEMBER BY GOLDEN GRYPHON PRESS.
What's your personal take on the future? I'm a natural optimist. My own book Ribofunk, for example, portrays some bad fallout from the biological developments currently under way, but also lots of positive effects. I simply can't believe that any challenges we will yet face are worse than what we as a race have already met and survived. This is not to say that we couldn't all be wiped out as a species tomorrow, only that the likelihood of such is no greater now than it's ever been.
Favorite dystopia in literature:Salt, the first novel by a new young British writer named Adam Roberts.
Favorite dystopias in film:Brazil and A Clockwork Orange
Is a sucker for: Where are our matter transmitters?! I want to beam everywhere instantly, even if it means my original body has to be destructively scanned and disassembled first!
Prospects for the human race: +3. But only if we as a species abandon some of our more self-destructive habits.
James Kneale HUMAN GEOGRAPHER AT UNIVERSITY COLLEGE, LONDON.
Have you seen a shift in the way we think about the future? I suppose it's possible our scenarios of the future have changed a little. I think my generation, like the one before it, was convinced that a nuclear holocaust was a distinct possibility, and despite the fact that the disarmament process now seems to be in reverse, the bomb doesn't seem so central to our imagined futures.
Why are visions of the future in fiction still so dark? There are still a lot of older fears around–wars, the rise of totalitarian states, computers at war with humankind–and there are plenty of newish fears, such as environmental catastrophe and sinister corporations that put profit before human life. Favorite dystopias in film:Brazil remains quite startling, and Metropolis is still worth watching, but nothing ages faster than the future.
Is a sucker for: Teleportation, anti-gravity devices–the dafter end of sci-fi technologies
Prospects for the human race: -3 to +1. I think we'll survive, but getting there is not going to be easy.
1966 Fahrenheit 451
There's not much emotion here, but plenty of dystopian angst regarding censorship and free speech.
1979 Mad Max
This post-apocalyptic Australian film had a gritty setting, lots of armored vehicles, and Mel Gibson. But what did we learn? That in the future, gasoline will be really valuable.
1999 The Matrix
Where Keanu Reeves saw a profound choice between the Pill of Reality and the Pill of the Status Quo, others just saw guns, electrodes, and lots of black leather. Style 1, substance 0.
1971 A Clockwork Orange
Though a hard-to-watch fable about behavior modification, Orange didn't shy away from going all-out on atmosphere. Remember the coffee tables?
1982 Blade Runner
“Ridley Scott has a lot to answer for,” James Kneale declares. The film's gloomy, ad-soaked city captured the public's imagination and galvanized the link between “noir” and “cool.”
