We by Yevgeny Zamyatin (New Translation)

The chilling dystopian novel that influenced George Orwell while he was writing 1984, with a new introduction by Margaret Atwood and an essay by Ursula Le Guin.

In a glass-enclosed city of perfectly straight lines, ruled over by an all-powerful "Benefactor," the citizens of the totalitarian society of OneState are regulated by spies and secret police, wear identical clothing and are distinguished only by a number assigned to them at birth. That is, until D-503, a mathematician who dreams in numbers, makes a discovery: he has an individual soul. He can feel things. He can fall in love. And in doing so, he begins to dangerously veer from the norms of his society, becoming embroiled in a plot to destroy OneState and liberate the city.

Set in the twenty-sixth century AD, We was the forerunner of canonical works from George Orwell and Aldous Huxley among others. It was suppressed for more than sixty years in Russia and remains a resounding cry for individual freedom, as well as a powerful, exciting and vivid work of science fiction that still feels relevant today. Bela Shayevich's bold new translation breathes new life into Yevgeny Zamyatin's seminal work and refreshes it for our current era.

This book is featured on The Book Club with Michael Knowles, PragerU's show dedicated to the great books of Western civilization. In this episode, Michael Knowles is joined by journalist Mollie Hemingway to discuss how a 1921 warning about state-run families, engineered conformity and the destruction of individual thought still reads like a headline from today.

📺 Watch the episode: Mollie Hemingway — We by Yevgeny Zamyatin

Read the forgotten Russian masterpiece that predicted Orwell and Huxley, and discover why Zamyatin's vision of engineered conformity still holds up an uncomfortable mirror to our own time.