More Worrier than Philosopher

John Hersey’s newest contribution to social forecasting, a novella entitled My Petition for More Space, unhappily produces an effect more like the feeble fizzle of a damp squib than the awesome resonances of Doomsday he seems to have intended. Brave New World and 1984, classics of this variety of fiction, were stunning in their persuasiveness because of Huxley’s and Orwell’s chilling ability to extend everyday experience to a grotesque but entirely plausible conclusion—a conclusion, moreover, made ineluctable because it proceeded from a carefully developed philosophical framework. Furthermore, both Huxley and Orwell were adroit at creating appealingly credible characters whose victimization by the forces of the future was genuinely moving.

Hersey, by contrast, is more a worrier than a philosopher; more a reporter than a novelist. And it makes all the difference, especially in fantasies of the future.

RB

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Rene Kuhn Bryant

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John Hersey’s newest contribution to social forecasting, a novella entitled My Petition for More Space, unhappily produces an effect more like the feeble fizzle of a damp squib than the awesome resonances of Doomsday he seems to have intended. Brave New World and 1984, classics of this variety of fiction, were stunning in their persuasiveness because of Huxley’s and Orwell’s chilling ability to extend everyday experience to a grotesque but entirely plausible conclusion—a conclusion, moreover, made ineluctable because it proceeded from a carefully developed philosophical framework. Furthermore, both Huxley and Orwell were adroit at creating appealingly credible characters whose victimization by the forces of the future was genuinely moving.

Hersey, by contrast, is more a worrier than a philosopher; more a reporter than a novelist. And it makes all the difference, especially in fantasies of the future.