Marthe and Maurice are young newlyweds living in 19^th century Paris. Smitten with the idea of progress, dissatisfied with the world as it is, and intensely curious about what the future might hold, they hold each other close one night, idly wishing that they could sleep through the centuries and awake to see what wonders humanity will someday create. As they gaze out the window of their attic garret apartment, lost in such reflections, a man appears before them in an airship of “English make” surrounded by plumes of its smoke exhaust.  

“Here I am,” he announces. “You called me, and I have come!” He presents his card: “M. John Progrès, member of all the Utopian Societies of Europe, of Asia, of Africa, of Oceania, etc. etc.” Described only as a “genie,” John Progress places the lovers in suspended animation and promptly disappeared upon delivering them to the future. While they find wonders aplenty when they awake in the year 3000, Marthe and Maurice soon discover that progress also comes with a dark side.

So begins The World as it Shall Be, an 1848 novel by the French author Émile Souvestre, sometimes referred to as the first “modern” dystopian novel. This was untrue both chronologically, being preceded by at least half a dozen contenders to the title, and structurally, as the book is barely a novel, forgoing a traditional plot in favor of a travelogue through future society.

Nevertheless, The World as it Shall Be is more than just a footnote; it inaugurated several of the most important and recurring themes in dystopian literature—most importantly the perils of unchecked technological progress.

While obscure today, Souvestre was a minor literary sensation during his lifetime and immediately after his death, with “immense sales,” according to one contemporary observer, and many of his more than two dozen books and other works were translated into foreign languages and sold abroad.

Falling in the middle of his career, The World as it Shall Be depicts a future where technology has run amok and traditional social values—such as equality and brotherly love—have become meaningless catchphrases. The book’s skeletal storyline barely supports its extensive social commentary. Known for moralizing, Souvestre walks his protagonists through a long series of loosely connected vignettes depicting almost every aspect of life in the year 3000. His comprehensive review of future society is so sweeping that the book almost defies thematic classification—encompassing corruption and greed, capitalism and journalism, fashion and sexual mores.

Marthe and Maurice are increasingly horrified by what they see—a decadent utopia of unequally distributed wealth and power. The lovers are shown to a stunningly beautiful hotel, which is revealed to be made entirely from synthetic materials with a planned obsolescence of just two years. The hotel restaurant offers a dizzying menu of water selections—spring water, carbon-filtered water, rock-filtered water, a list contained in a gilt-bound volume that continues for 366 pages. Food and drink are served by machines, which cut the meat and apply sauces.

“You can see that in a really mechanized house like this one, there is no need for anyone else,” explains their host, Mr. Atout (the French word for “asset”). “Progress must aim to make life simpler, to ensure that each one lives for himself, and by himself. … Just a little more effort, and civilization will have achieved total individual freedom for everyone; every individual will be able to dispense with the services of the rest of mankind.”

This theme continues throughout the book in multiple iterations. High-speed underground and undersea transport lines relieve humanity of the burden of conversation with fellow travelers. Children are selectively bred in the manner of livestock, raised and educated in terrariums by machines in order to solve “the great problem attendant on the perpetuation of the species… the strong emotional attachment of individuals.” Life is transactional, with financial incentives for husbands to let their wives cheat on them, and children to keep their aging parents alive but in ill health.

Marthe and Maurice come to regret their wish to see the results of progress. Exhausted from their tour of the dysfunctional future, they fall into sleep, dreaming that God will send three avenging angels to raze this world and force humanity to start over “from the ruins.” John Progress never returns to rescue the ill-fated lovers from the dystopian future, but his hidden hand would shape many novels to come.

Technology plays an important role in the vast majority of dystopian stories. In most, technological innovations have been turned to the service of social malfeasance. But in some stories, like Souvestre’s, the inherent nature of technology at large creates the beating heart of a social catastrophe.

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For more on technodystopia, check out J.M. Berger's new novel, Optimal, now available for pre-order.