The main character, D-503, realizes something interesting: he has a soul. And it just so happens that he's the head-honcho behind the development of a spaceship called the Integral. In this "utopia" people live in glass domes--what an Arizonan like me would call a biosphere--and have no privacy, expect for certain special times. So there is definitely a heavy science fiction aspect to this work, quite amazing for 1920-21 Russia. One thing that really stuck out was how believable the main character--D-503--was. As a mathematician, he thinks in numbers and geometrical shape. Instead of saying of a table, "it looked like a wooden animal", he might say something like, "it looked like a rectangle sitting atop four cylinders." A small detail, but one worth noticing. As in Brave New World and 1984, the ending line has the power of a knife being driven into your stomach. I'll disagree that WE is better overall than BNW and 1984, but it a good book in its own little way. The writing style can be a little clunky--as is usually the case with translated works--but not terribly so. Yes, this is a good book, well worth your time, effort, and money.

Evgeni Zamyatin's novel "We" is often compared to Orwell's "1984" and Huxley's "Brave New World", and rightly so, since it is a strong influence on both (though Huxley of course denied it). "We" is a terrifying vision of a future, in which all aspects of life have been rationally mechanized, according to the best tradition of Taylorism. The residents of OneState have no freedom; instead they have infinite, mathematically proved happiness. "Those two in Paradise were given a choice: freedom without happiness, or happiness without freedom. The fools chose freedom. But we brought them back the chains," says R-13, one of the OneState's chief poets.

This nightmarish vision sheds light on the present, as well. Not necessarily, as is often stated, on the terror of one Stalin. The book was written well before the establishment of the Soviet state, and on an impulse that had long before prompted Zamyatin to write in a similar vein. An earlier novella of his, "Islanders", as well as many of his short stories and plays, all have the same philosophical purpose behind them: to show that the contemporary (at the time) trends in European society, culture and art are leading to a destruction of the individual will and a horrible mechanization of life. A recurrent theme in Zamyatin is the escape from overly-civilized cities, to the freedom of the countryside and of the nature itself. Zamyatin felt, and I would gladly argue that he was absolutely correct, that the modern European civilization gradually limits the scope of the individual's understanding of the world and draws him into a sort of slavery of the spirit.

I recommend "We" to everyone. For the depth of its philosophical stance, for its brilliant structure and wonderful language, this book is clearly superior to either "1984" or "Brave New World", though it is, unfortunately, not nearly as widely recognized.

Imagine a world where everything is subservient to the United State. Where people do not have names, but are referred to only as numbers. Where your job, your home and your mate are determined for you by the "Well-Doer" and thoughts and actions are closely monitored by the "Guardians." This is not 1984 - this is Zamiatin's WE - predating Orwell by almost 25 years, and eerily describing the USSR under Stalin 10 years before its worst excesses.

The similarities between Zamiatin's world and Orwells are many and obvilious. Both are a biting satire of totalitarianism: its centralization of authority, its blatant disregard for human life and the crushing oppressiveness of the State. However I believe Zamiatin's to be the better story.

Orwell does not have Zamiatin's sarcastic use of the double entendre. And Zamiatin's writing style (especially his use of mathematical metaphors) reinforces the impersonal nature of his "utopian" society. Finally, Zamiatin's story is much more psychological than Orwells - much of the story takes place in the thoughts of the main character.

WE is rightly considered a masterpiece of modern Russian literature. If you have read 1984, I highly recommend reading WE.