I have always been fascinated with prophets. That's why I've carried out this research. The aim of my research was to study carefully the most prominent dystopias of the XX century and point out which episodes were reflections of real events, contemporary to the author, and which were prophetic and later became our reality…or are bound to become.
Having done this, I came to a certain conclusion: dystopias are extremely important; they are a warning to our generation and for those who are to come, a warning not to repeat the same mistakes, if we don't want to live in the world described. All dystopias are very different, and all deal with different vices of the society. What we should do is never forget about the lessons, which history has given to us.
With the wakening of the imagination, people immediately began to dream of a better life. As civilization developed, this dream began to take shape, and people started to compose songs and write books about a better life.
One of the first writers to make a complex and systematic image of a perfect world was Thomas More, who wrote a novel "Utopia". Since then the attitude this word has gone through many changes, and many people started to express their pessimistic view on our perspectives (that's dystopia), but nothing can prevent a human being from dreaming...
In the very beginning I’d like to make a few useful remarks. My work is dedicated to utopia, but I guess there's no need to explain that a capital study on all aspects and trends of utopias can be a work of a lifetime for at least half a dozen of people. Concerning this, I’ve decided to limit myself in the historical period (it's mainly the XX century, but sometimes I’ll refer to earlier times), and in the aim of my job. In fact, I want to show on some examples, how the artists (not only writers, but also musicians, poets and cinema-directors will be mentioned) interpreted the surrounding world and distorted it in their own artistic manner, and then to point out the prophetic elements of their works.
I also feel bound to mention beforehand that the main topic of my work appears to be dystopia, as the XXth century is undoubtedly the era of dystopias.Of course, some utopias are going to be taken into consideration. But with one aim: to prove that in the last century utopias were very much engaged to the social systems and governments' tasks, or, if to put it straight, appeared mostly in totalitarian states.
Here you will also find some basic information about the history of Utopianism, a short vocabulary, articles about the most prominent writers and their works, and a chronological table of the XXth century, marking the events, important for my topic.
Olga Sinodova © 2007