Philobiblon

By Yevgeby Zamyatin, translated by Sophie Fuller and Julian Sacchi

from the introduction
p. 10 “Zamyatin saw the world in terms of an eternal struggle between forces of energy and forces of entropy, found in the established and dogmatic. Entropy lulled man into a dangerous complacency. What foundt against entropy was revolution and heretical thought, the energy of an unquenchable life force…. The regulated, restricted life of the respectable English middle classes seemed to Zamyatin to be a perfect example of the horrors of entropy. He depicts a world where everything has its correct place, where the vases displayed in every window on one side of the street are blue and on the other freen. It is a world in which Reverend Dewley plans a set of timetables detailing his every movement. Reverend Dewley dreams of a time when the government will adopt his ideas and everyone will live by time table. This is, of course, exactly what has happened in One State – Zamyatin’s future society in We/ Almost every hour is ruled by the Table of Hourly Commandments… He believed that literature could only be kept alive by constant innovation and revolution. His work is full of imagery and symbolism. Characters are reduced to a pair of worm-like lips or a glittering pince-nez. The lumbering Campbell is a lorry and the rigid Mr Draggs a little iron monument.”