Favorite dystopian novel?

[DuplicateFeline]

I've been wondering what the most popular dystopian novel on the forum is.


My favorite is Uglies.

[Izawwlgood]

The Sheep Look Up. I loved Brave New World, 1984, and that one I can't remember the title of where people have lived in caves and can echolocate. Also Ilium was pretty dystopian. Uh...

Oh, I liked Hunger Games too.

[Quercus]

Farenheit 451 for me.

[Mighty Jalapeno]

I Am America (And So Can You!)

[Quercus]

...I forgot about Greybeard (Brian Aldiss), that's a good one too.

I can see I'm going to have to make some additions to my reading list as a result of this thread...

[serutan]

1984.

[Fizz]

Fahrenheit 451 is the best. But have you read Margaret Atwood's Madd Addam series? Sick but good.

[Zohar]

Oh yeah, Atwood, I only read The Handmaid's Tale but it was excellent, definitely one of the best dystopian novels I've read. I need to read more of her stuff too.

[almach]

Am I gonna be run out of here with pitchforks if I say Atlas Shrugged?

[Mighty Jalapeno]

It's hard to get more dystopian than Galt's Gulch, so no, I think that works.

[Izawwlgood]

I can't tell which direction you're both kidding, so well played.

[Tyndmyr]

Am I gonna be run out of here with pitchforks if I say Atlas Shrugged?

Well, your taste in literature might be questioned. =) It's certainly not the best flowing novel I've read. But dystopia, sure.

Me, I rather like dystopias as shown in sci-fi books. Heinlein, etc. The whole class of "mindless anti-science attitudes preventing progress" societies, really. Was a common thing, with a healthy dose of optimism in the dreamers prevailing.

[Liri]

Oryx & Crake (MaddAddam Trilogy) far and away. They're way more realistic now than 1984 or Brave New World. Books that deal with massive extinction and climate change are way scarier than totalitarian governments.

MaddAddam made me feel like vomiting a couple times.

[tomandlu]

1984

What's the first dystopian book?

[Tyndmyr]

1984

What's the first dystopian book?

The bible.

[tomandlu]

1984

What's the first dystopian book?

The bible.

[cemper93]

A Canticle for Leibowitz. Best writing of any of the books mentioned in this thread, although The Handmaid's Tale surpasses it in some other aspects, and is my winner if post-nuclear worlds are not considered sufficiently distopian for lack of a ridiculously evil authoritarian government.

[kiniget]

the Lotus Wars trilogy

some of the most beautiful writing I have ever seen in my life

plus the setting is basically steampunk Japan, so that's fun too

[Quercus]

the Lotus Wars trilogy

some of the most beautiful writing I have ever seen in my life

plus the setting is basically steampunk Japan, so that's fun too

Ooooh. That's going on my reading list. Thanks!

[LadyLand]

My favourite dystopian novel? Well... 1984.

[CorruptUser]

Fahrenheit 451. Best is the minorities speech. Minorities, Montag. Dog lovers, cat lovers, 3rd generation Chinese-Americans. Someone is bound to be offended no matter what you wrote. If you listen to every whiny little group ebtually your books will become bland nothings that don't even have a plot.

[ahammel]

What's the first dystopian book?

Jack London's The Iron Heel (1908)? Unless The Time Machine counts (1895). Or maybe Gulliver's Travels (1726) if you really want to stretch a definition.

According to wikipedia, JS Mill coined the word, or at least got in the first recorded use of it.

[CorruptUser]

Wait, wouldn't Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court count? The whole thing is a medieval hell without any soap, the guy comes in and through modernization, makes himself dictator. Then everyone tries to stop him and thousands upon thousand of people are killed, and everything goes back to the way things were, with even less hygiene.

But I would also second The Time Machine.