Book Club Guide

We

by Yevgeny Zamyatin · 1924 · Science Fiction

Key themes

Mathematical certainty versus human chaos
The individual against the collective
Revolution that devours its children

About this book

D-503, a mathematician in a future totalitarian state called the One State where all citizens live in glass apartments with no privacy, falls in love with the revolutionary I-330. Zamyatin's novel — written in 1924 and suppressed in the Soviet Union — was a direct influence on Huxley's Brave New World and Orwell's Nineteen Eighty-Four.

Written in 1920–21, We was the first work banned by the Soviet censorship board. It was not published in Russia until 1988 but profoundly influenced the development of the dystopian novel.

Discussion questions

D-503 is a true believer who is slowly destabilised by feeling. Is his journey a liberation or a fall — does the novel frame the emergence of his inner life as gain or loss?
The One State has made people transparent — literally and figuratively. What is Zamyatin saying about surveillance, privacy and the relationship between visibility and control?
We was written in 1920-21, in the early years of Soviet power, and circulated in samizdat before being published abroad. How does knowing its context change how you read it?
The novel is often described as a direct influence on Orwell's 1984 and Huxley's Brave New World. In what ways does reading We illuminate the later novels — and in what ways does it feel distinct?
The Benefactor rules by election — citizens vote for him unanimously. What is Zamyatin saying about democracy and consent when they are performed within a totalitarian structure?