Writing Cookbooks for the Kitchens of the Pastpresenture: A Preliminary Dystopian Reading of Hermann Hesse's The Glass Bead Game. By © Erin A. Quibell A thesis submitted to the School of Graduate Studies in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts Department of German and Russian Memorial University ofNewfoundland March 2006 St. John's Newfoundland Library and Bibliotheque et 1+1 Archives Canada Archives Canada Published Heritage Direction du Branch Patrimoine de !'edition 395 Wellington Street 395, rue Wellington Ottawa ON K1A ON4 Ottawa ON K1A ON4 Canada Canada Your file Votre reference ISBN: 978-0-494-30500-3 Our file Notre reference ISBN: 978-0-494-30500-3 NOTICE: AVIS: The author has granted a non­ L'auteur a accorde une licence non exclusive exclusive license allowing Library permettant a Ia Bibliotheque et Archives and Archives Canada to reproduce, Canada de reproduire, publier, archiver, publish, archive, preserve, conserve, sauvegarder, conserver, transmettre au public communicate to the public by par telecommunication ou par !'Internet, preter, telecommunication or on the Internet, distribuer et vendre des theses partout dans loan, distribute and sell theses le monde, a des fins commerciales ou autres, worldwide, for commercial or non­ sur support microforme, papier, electronique commercial purposes, in microform, et/ou autres formats. paper, electronic and/or any other formats. The author retains copyright L'auteur conserve Ia propriete du droit d'auteur ownership and moral rights in et des droits moraux qui protege cette these. this thesis. Neither the thesis Ni Ia these ni des extraits substantiels de nor substantial extracts from it celle-ci ne doivent etre imprimes ou autrement may be printed or otherwise reproduits sans son autorisation. reproduced without the author's permission. In compliance with the Canadian Conformement a Ia loi canadienne Privacy Act some supporting sur Ia protection de Ia vie privee, forms may have been removed quelques formulaires secondaires from this thesis. ant ete enleves de cette these. While these forms may be included Bien que ces formulaires in the document page count, aient inclus dans Ia pagination, their removal does not represent il n'y aura aucun contenu manquant. any loss of content from the thesis. ••• Canada Abstract The purpose of this thesis is to show that Hermann Hesse's The Glass Bead Game (1943) is a part of the dystopian tradition of the early 20th Century. Hermann Hesse's novel covers many of the same themes and ideas as We ( 1924) by Y evgeny Zamyatin, Brave New World (1932) by Aldous Huxley and 1984 (1949) by George Orwell. As these dystopias appear to set the standard for the genre, I would like to expound upon the themes and ideas that they discuss, in order to clarify the standard to which I will hold Hesse's novel. The thesis begins with an exploration of the life of Hermann Hesse and his contemporaries, and a look at the motivations behind each of the novels mentioned above. The discussion then expands into a thematic and comparative analysis of the ideas of thought control and propaganda, the treatment of the outsider, i.e., the protagonist, and the treatment of women in dystopian literature, as well as the function of science, technology and war in the genre. This is followed by an exploration of the function of history and the closed nature of the dystopian state. After proving the merits of seeing Hesse's novel as a part of the dystopian tradition, the thesis concludes with a brief discussion of what Hesse may have been criticizing in his novel, as all novels of the genre are a criticism of something in the author's present-day reality. 11 Acknowledgements Endeavours of this nature demand countless hours of seclusion, but are never achieved in solitude. For this reason I would like to express my appreciation and gratitude to my supervisor, Dr. John Buffinga, who offered constructive criticism, saved me from my language quirks, kept my journalistic flair under control on a weekly basis, and went to bat for me when it was really needed. I would like to thank the School of Graduate Studies for the financial support I received while completing my degree, including this thesis, for answering my countless questions, and for providing excellent service to graduate students overall. Others that are in receipt of my appreciation include Prof. Marcella Rollmann and Dr. Margaret Heukaeufer for taking the time to examine this work and provide me with valuable and constructive input. Mrs. Marjorie Mercer and the rest of the German department are also deserving of my thanks. As well, Dr. Stuart Durrant for clarifying some of the information pertaining to Y evgeny Zamyatin and Soviet literature and Prof. Pat Byrne for pointing me in the right direction with regard to dystopian scholarship. I am also greatly indebted to the librarians at the QEII, who go above and beyond the call of duty, and to Dr. H.E.A. Campbell for his support, encouragement, and advice. One does not live in the vacuum of academia, and there is an army of people outside the ivory tower who humoured me when I was obsessing about my thesis, kept me smiling, and who were there every step of the way. When surrounded by such wonderful people, one cannot feel anything but gratitude. St. John's, March 11, 2006, revised July 27, 2006. lll Recipe for Dystopia: Ingredients (Table ofContents) Abstract ii Acknowledgments iii Recipe for Dystopia: Ingredients (Table ofContents) iv Preface: A Wordfrom Our Sponsors... 1 1. Lucy, You Got Some Explaining to Do: An Introduction 2 2. Dystopia/or Dummies 29 3. The Outsider: Stranger in a Strange Land 69 4. The Protagonist and the Peer: How Character Interaction Informs the Audience ofthe Values ofthe Society and Reinforces the Idea ofthe Protagonist as an Outsider 82 5. Sex and Love in the Dystopian City: How the Ideas of Creativity, Women's Societal Roles, and the Feminine Aspect are 'Manhandled' in the Closed, Patriarchal Society ofthe Dystopian Genre 100 6. We Love the Leader (or ifwe don't we'll pretend): Surveillance, Conditioning and Control in the Dystopian State 111 7. War! What is it goodfor? Absolutism... 125 8. Inside the Box: The Closed Nature ofthe Dystopian Society 135 9. History, Memory, and the Pastpresenture: How the Motto ofthe Party in Orwell's 1984 Epitomizes the Usage ofTime and Nostalgia in the Dystopian Novel 144 10. The Final Showdown: How the Protagonist and the 'Dictator' Always Share Recipes in the End 160 11. Serving Suggestions: The Flavours ofHermann Hesse's Dystopia 174 12. Good Night and Good Luck: Concluding Remarks 184 Selected Bibliography 186 Works Cited/ Consulted 194 lV Preface: A Word from Our Sponsors ... ... For although in a certain sense and for light-minded persons non-existent things can be more easily and irresponsibly represented in words than existing things, for the serious and conscientious historian it is just the reverse. Nothing is harder, yet nothing is more necessary, than to speak of certain things whose existence is neither demonstrable nor probable. The very fact that serious and conscientious men treat them as existing things brings them a step closer to existence and to the possibility ofbeing born. -Albertus Secundus tract. de cristall. spirit. ed. Clangor et Collo.f lib. I, cap. 28. 1 Utopias are realizable. Life is moving toward a utopia. And perhaps a new age is beginning, an age in which the intellectuals and the cultivated class will dream of avoiding utopia and ofreturning to a society that is non-utopian, less perfect' but more free. - Nicolas BerdiaeJ/ 1 The motto from Hermann Hesse's The Glass Bead Game trans. by Richard and Clara Winston (New York: Henry Holt and Company,1990) 9. As with all the primary sources used in this thesis, see Works Cited for original publication information. 2 The infamous quote that prefaces Aldous Huxley's Brave New World (New York: Harper Perennial, 1989). It appears in French in this edition: the English translation of the quote was acquired from G. Beauchamp, "Technology in the Dystopian Novel," Modern Fiction Studies 32.1 (Spring 1986): 54. Chapter 1: Lucv. You Got Some Explaining to Do: An lntroduction3 Based on the title of this exercise one can surmise that I am attempting a dystopian reading of Hermann Hesse's last novel. However, how I am going to achieve this goal and many other things about this paper need a little clarification. I shall begin with the title of the work and move from there. Karl Marx once defended his Communist Manifesto by stating that he was not "[writing] cook-books for kitchens ofthe future."4 By all accounts ofhistory it would appear that Stalin, Trotsky, and many other Bolsheviks believed him. In the twentieth century, the age of industrialization and the modem man, we as a civilization began dabbling in the art of applied utopia. One could hypothesize that in the face of rapidly advancing technology and increased human comfort, perhaps that generation believed that the time of the futuristic paradise in Thomas Moore's Utopia and other likeminded works was upon us. The result of this experimentation was devastating. So devastating, in fact, that it spawned a new genre of literature-dystopia. Scholars claim that the Russian Y evgeny Zamyatin was the first to contribute to this new category of writing when he wrote his novel We, which was seen by scholars as a criticism of Stalin and the Bolsheviks. In tum, Zamyatin influenced Orwell, the author of one of the most blatant and disturbing accounts of totalitarian society, and many others that would follow.