We Zamyatin Analysis

The function of the setting on the Individual in Yevgeny Zamyatin’s We to portray Revolution

In the novel ‘We’ by Yevgeny Zamyatin, the author uses the function of the setting on the individual to achieve his goal of producing a satirical warning of the future if no action is taken in the present, offering revolution as the solution. The setting and its effects on the individuals in ‘We’ act as both a satire of Stalinist Russian society and a warning. Zamyatin shows how the setting of a dystopian state called the ‘OneState’ works to dehumanise its citizens or ‘ciphers’ by removing their basic human characteristics until they become like machines. Zamyatin uses these atrocities to illustrate his ideas of how revolution is necessary to life
The OneState achieves this control by implementing and enforcing routines as well as surveillance. One routine that Zamyatin employs in the dystopian state is the regulation of sex through ‘the business of the pink ticket’1. Individuals are monitored in the Bureau of Sex and given a specific timetable of when to make use of a sexual partner, as ‘each cipher has the right to any other cipher as sexual product.’ 2 This is an example of the complete control the OneState has over its citizens. The common mentality upheld by the OneState is that unhappiness stems from free will, meaning the elimination of free will is going to increase the happiness of the OneState. Another method of control employed by the OneState is surveillance. Zamyatin’s choice of surveillance in We
The minds of the ciphers are rewired into thinking completely differently, for example in the beginning of We, D-503 speaks without emotion, making numerous references to mathematics. A strong theme in We is mathematics, as it is logical and emotionless, which is fits the mind-set that emotions are evil. The OneState takes the Newtonian belief that one day mathematics will eliminate all mistakes. Another example of the rewired thinking process is during the execution of a criminal in the OneState. D-503 notes that the sacrificial cipher has ‘his hands bound with a purple ribbon’6 representing the chains or handcuffs that we use today. To the reader it seems strange that a prisoner is bound with nothing more than a ribbon. This is because the mind-set of the cipher has been changed so drastically that he believes he deserves the punishment, and will not try to escape. Zamyatin intends to get us to look at these behaviours and be challenged by the process through which the idea has emerged - could this happen in my society? The OneState makes people into machines so that they follow instructions without making mistakes. These kinds of ciphers can be seen as live-dead people, as they produce dead things without mistakes. D-503 has called them ‘tractors in human form.’ Live-live people are seen as mistakes by the OneState. They create live