Ranking the “Big Three” of Dystopian Literature

Ajouté : 2026-05-30

[00:00:32]So, I have now read what is called the big three of dystopian literature, the big three dystopian novels, which is 1984, Brave New World, and Fahrenheit 451. And I thought that in this video, I would review um each book and just let you know which one I believe is the best and most accurate dystopian novel. So, I'm going to start with the most famous one, which is 1984 by George Orwell.

[00:00:59]This book was written in 1948. And so, it takes place in 1984, which at the time that it was written, 1984 was still in the future. Um, and in this future of 1984, your entire life is controlled by the government. You are not allowed to think anything that the government doesn't want you to think. You're not allowed to do anything they don't want you to do. Not allowed to say anything they don't want you to do. And so your entire life is completely in the government's control. And there are these things everywhere called telescreens which are just basically TVs and through them big brother which is the head of the entire government um spies on everyone through these telescreens and you're not allowed to shut them off. So no matter what you're doing big brother is watching you through the telescreens. So, in my opinion, this book is very, very accurate to the modern day. And it's incredible how much it predicted. How the government spies on us through our devices and how they sort of make up news sometimes um and lots of other stuff as well. This book predicted so so much of 21st century politics and everything. And I really enjoyed this book. I especially found the third act of the book to be the best part. It was so so good. That third act, the third act is so amazing and fascinating and easily the best part of the book and there's no denying that 1984 is a very good book. Um, however, I do not think that it is the best of the big three of dystopian novels. And this is probably the one that I liked the least out of the big three. And the reason for that is that 1984 shows us the bad of the future, the evil of the future. It shows us evil, but it doesn't show us good.

[00:02:44]It's just a very dark and depressing read about everything bad and evil and everything that could go wrong in the future and everything that is already going wrong with the world. And it doesn't show us any of the good that is happening in the world or that could happen in the world. All it does is show us the evil of things, show us the bad of things, show us the dark side of things, but it doesn't show us any good or how good can combat the evil. And the thing with with stories is that they should show us what evil looks like, but what they should also do is show us what good looks like and how good can combat evil. And it should give us hope for the future and not just be all depressing about everything. So, this was still a very good book. Um, but in my opinion, it is not the best of the big three dystopian novels. Probably my least favorite because it shows us the dark path that things would go and that things are already going, but it doesn't show us the good, how good can combat it. It doesn't give us any hope, which is what stories should do. And so, I'm going to give this one 7 and a half out of 10. Still a very good book, but not the greatest in my opinion. The next one is Brave New World, which I just finished reading very recently. Now, Brave New World is in a future in which people are not born to people. They're more they're manufactured sort of like robots. Um, and in this dystopian future, everyone is very happy. They just do whatever they want, whatever pleases them most.

[00:04:14]There's this drug that everyone takes called Soma, which immediately makes them feel happy or delighted. If they're feeling sad or angry or anything, they just take Soma and it'll make them feel better. And so it's interesting to see the contrast to see the contrast between 1984 and Brave New World. How um George Orwell who wrote Brave New World feared that we would be controlled through fear, fear of the government. Um uh but Aldis Huxley who wrote Brave New World feared that we would be controlled through pleasure and that society would collapse because we get to do whatever we want because of pleasure. And I think that Brave New World is actually a good deal more accurate than 1984 because Soma is like social media. It's like screens. Like whenever someone is feeling angry or sad or depressed or anything, then you can just go on your phone and scroll through Instagram or whatever. Maybe it'll make you feel better. You just watch some sort of TV show, play a video game, and get lost from your emotions completely. This book was a very quick and fun read. And again, as with 1984, I think the third act of the book was the best. Both 1984 and Brave New World have the greatest endings, especially the ending of Brave New World. It was so good and meaningful. It had such a Christian ending. Uh Brave New World has a lot of deep themes as well. And I want to read you a brief passage from Brave New World that I thought was probably the best part of the entire book. So this is a conversation between um someone called John who is realizing that this um world of theirs is not that great that doing whatever they want pleasing themselves however they want is not the greatest thing to do and anyway so he is speaking to Mustafa Mond who is one of the leading authorities and they're just debating about stuff and Mustafa man's stance is that uh the people don't need God they don't need the Bible they only need pleasure Um, and so John is talking and John says, "But God's the reason for everything noble and fine and heroic. If you had a god, my dear young friend," said Mustafa, "Civilization has absolutely no need of nobility or heroism. These things are symptoms of political inefficiency." "In a properly organized society like ours, nobody has any opportunities for being noble or heroic. Conditions have got to be thoroughly unstable before the occasion can arise. where there are wars, where there are divided allegiances, where there are temptations to be resisted, objects of love to be fought for or defended, there obviously nobility and heroism have some sense.

[00:06:54]But there aren't any wars nowadays. The greatest car is taken to prevent you from loving anyone too much. There's no such thing as a divided allegiance.

[00:07:03]You're so conditioned that you can't help doing what you ought to do. And what you ought to do is on the whole so pleasant. So many of the natural impulses are allowed free play that there really aren't any temptations to resist. And if ever by some unlucky chance anything unpleasant should somehow happen, why, there's always soma to give you a holiday from the facts.

[00:07:25]And there's always so much to calm your anger, to reconcile you to your enemies, to make you patient and long-suffering.

[00:07:31]In the past, you could only accomplish these things by making a great effort.

[00:07:35]And after years of hard moral training, now you swallow two or three half gram tablets and there you are. Anybody can be virtuous now. You can carry at least half your mortality about in a bottle.

[00:07:47]Christianity without tears. That's what S is. And then John says, but the tears are necessary. Don't you remember what Oll said? If after every tempest came such calms, may the winds blow till they have wakened death. There's a stories one of the one of the old Indians used to tell us about the girl of Mataski.

[00:08:08]The young men who wanted to marry her had to do a morning's hoing in her garden. It seemed easy, but there were flies and and mosquitoes, magic ones.

[00:08:17]Most of the young men simply couldn't stand the biting and stinging. But the one that could, he got the girl. And there was just so much good dialogue between John and Mustafa in this chapter. And it had such a good ending, especially later when John says, "I don't want comfort. I want God. I want poetry. I want real danger. I want freedom. I want goodness." And I think this was a very good book, more accurate than 1984. Certainly a good deal better than 1984 because like 1984, it showed us the evil of things and the bad of things. But unlike 1984, it showed us the good of things. how good can combat evil. And it didn't just show us the dark side of things. It also showed us the good side and gave us hope for the future. Yes, the third act of the of this book was definitely the best. I think this was a very good book.

[00:09:10]I'm going to rate it 9 out of 10.

[00:09:15]Now, the last of the big three dystopian novels is Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury. Now, this book takes place in the year 2022 in the future. And in this future, the government is trying to keep the people happy. And they're also trying to protect them from knowledge, from thinking, and from learning. And so, what the government is is doing is they are trying to burn every single book that has ever been written in an attempt to destroy all knowledge forever. firemen are hired to uh set all the books on fire to burn as many as they can in an attempt to destroy all knowledge forever. Now, I believe that Fahrenheit 451 is the most accurate dystopian novel of the big three, and certainly the most well-ritten, the most excellently plotted, and the one with the best characters. The pros is so good. It is so beautifully written. I think that Ray Bradbury writes the greatest pros of any author that I've ever read besides J.R.R. Tolken. And I've been reading a lot more Ray Bradbury recently. Like I'm reading his um short story collection, The Illustrated Man right now. And I've also read The Martian Chronicles. And his pros is just amazing. Fahrenheit 451 is for sure the most beautifully written um of these dystopian novels. Also, I want to quick mention that the reason the title is Fahrenheit 451 is because 451 degrees Fahrenheit is the temperature at which paper burns. In case you were wondering why the book was titled that, it is such a good story and a very emotional story as well that I really enjoyed. I highly recommend Fahrenheit 451. It is the greatest of these three dystopian novels. And when I first read Fahrenheit 451 about maybe a year ago, I thought that it was a really, really, really good book, but it wasn't my favorite. But then the more that I thought about Fahrenheit 451 after Id finished it, the more I started to realize how much better it was than I had initially thought. And so after thinking about it over a year after finishing reading it, I I think I can say that Fahrenheit 451 is now one of my favorite books ever. The way Bradbury writes is so so good. His pros is amazing and beautiful. And the thing with Fahrenheit 451 is that like Brave New World, it shows us the evil of things. It shows us the bad of things.

[00:11:36]It shows us evil, but it also shows us good and how good can combat the evil, which is what a good dystopian novel should do. Every story should should show us evil in a realistic way, but it should also show us good in a realistic way. and how good and light can destroy the darkness and the evil. And most of all, a good dystopian novel should give us hope for the future, no matter how bleak things may seem. Because with a book like 1984, I mean, it was such a prophetic book because it predicted so accurately so many things that are going on today. And yet, it didn't give us any hope. It's like if the things in 1984 actually happened in real life, it would just be like, "Oh, all the things in that book came true." But then like what do we do? That's it. Whereas I don't believe that that would happen if all the events in Brave New World and Fahrenheit 451 uh literally came to be.

[00:12:32]For example, if all the events in Brave New World literally actually um started to happen, then we would probably do something like what John does. Just don't take the Soma live out in the forest or something like that. I don't know. Um, and then if Fahrenheit 451 happened, we could memorize all the books so that we can reprint them in case all the copies of that book are eventually burned like they do in Fahrenheit 451. And that, in my opinion, is what a good dystopian novel and a good book in general should do. It should show us evil, but it should also show us good. Fahrenheit 451 is a 10 out of 10. So, of these three dystopian novels, my favorite is Fahrenheit 451.

[00:13:12]My second favorite is Brave New World and in last place is 1984. All of them are still very good books, but in my opinion, Fahrenheit 451 is the best and the one I most definitely recommend to you the most. And Brave New World is really amazing as well. But anyway, that is it for this video. I hope that you enjoyed it. Thank you so much for watching it and for now, farewell.