THE THEME OF GLOBAL CATASTROPHES IN DYSTOPIAN NOVELS OF THE XX AND XXI CENTURIES

Abstract

The force of modern globalization and the presence of dystopian energies in contemporary fiction need to be understood within the framework of Modernity and the manner in which it coincides with the rise of the modern city. Charles Baudelaire is thought to be the first poet to use the term “Modern” to describe the experience of industrialized, urban living, but using his works as a starting point can date the field all the way back to near 1840, which makes it so large as to be nearly meaningless as a descriptor.2 I take Modernism to demarcate the 35-plus year period between 1900 and the start of WWII in 1938. This locates the field as a successor to the Victorian Era, and situates it at a time in which many metropolises across the Atlantic were encountering new technologies of travel, mass communication and industrialization.