IGeorge Orwell’s 1984 looms over the terrain of dystopian fiction as a kind of template for the idiom, the masterpiece that did more than any other work to pave the way for the current obsession with sociopolitical commentary in the guise of dark futuristic fable. Without Orwell as the role model—or perhaps 'big brother' is a better label?—we would never have Fahrenheit 451 , The Handmaid’s Tale , A Clockwork Orange , The Road , Never Let Me Go and so many other seminal works of fiction with their own twist on the Orwellian narrative.
But let’s not forget that Orwell wrote another dystopian novel, Animal Farm , which was drew on the techniques of satire and absurdism to makes it points. This book also has a legacy, less pervasive yet just as significant. The comic dystopian tale is less common than its dark twin, but can be just as thought-provoking. In fact, the attempt to reframe political debate as a series of comic observations on an apocalyptic future-in-the-making might even be considered as the de facto tone of in-the-moment media. If you doubt it, just spend a few moments measuring the mood of Twitter and social media, or late night monologues and Saturday Night Live , or even the pronouncements emanating from the centers of political power. Absurdism was once a literary style; nowadays it’s a way of coping.
This is the context in which we are invited to make sense of Gary Shteyngart’s novel Super Sad True Love Story (2010). At first glance, that might seem an admonishment to make sense of nonsense, but we are all getting quite skilled at just that, aren’t we? Shteyngart is operating in the thick of the comic dystopian tradition, a subgenre that has not only proven its power on the printed page (Kurt Vonnegut’s Cat’s Cradle , John Barth’s Giles Goat-Boy , Michel Houellebecq’s Submission ), but also on the cinema screen, as demonstrated by some of the most peculiar and prescient political films ever made, such as Brazil , The Truman Show and Idiocracy .
The hero of Super Sad True Love Story , Lenny Abramov, is out-of-touch with his futuristic society, which often resembles an exaggeration of the worst aspects of our current-day media-saturated culture. Abramov still reads books—rejected by most of his contemporaries as stinky, dusty relics of an antiquated pre-digital age. People have embraced ‘Media’ (with a capital M) instead but, as we gradually discover over the course of the novel, this is not a real vocation anymore. Professional journalism doesn’t exist; instead young wannabes stream their own speculations and commentaries on the state of the world.
And it’s a sad state, especially in the United States where an authoritarian government rules in the name of “bipartisanship.” Orwellian abuses of language are the calling card of the new administration, which disseminates its harsh policies via slogans, signs, logos and cartoon characters. The nation’s latest marketing campaign is built on the catch phrase: Together We’ll Surprise the World! That sounds ominously appropriate for our current day political branding—and it’s even short enough to fit in a tweet!
But this government constantly needs new slogans. In the dystopian world of Super Sad True Love Story , the United States has fallen far behind the rest of the world, and China has emerged as the lender of last resort for Americans. The failing Bipartisans are constantly seeking for some new policy to turn things around. Sometimes they promote consumer spending. But in other instances, they push for more savings. As a last resort, they even launch a war against Venezuela. The policies are different, but they have one thing in common: they always fail and produce unintended bad consequences along the way.
It’s an ugly world. But Abramov has one advantage. He has a job with a successful high tech company that offers HNWI (that stands for High New Worth Individuals) a chance to live forever. The price tag is high, but those who sign up get access to a range of advanced medical techniques that reverse the course of aging. Lenny’s boss Joshua is not just CEO of the company, but also a flesh-and-blood example of its services. He is 70 years old, but looks younger than 39-year-old Abramov. The latter would like to participate in the rejuvenation processes, but he needs to make a few million yuan- pegged dollars if he hopes to take advantage of this biotech fountain of youth.
Abramov shares the narrating responsibilities of this story with his love interest Eunice Park. Lenny and Eunice share a similar background: they are both children of over- bearing immigrants (Russian Jews and Korean Christians respectively) who are torn between a desire to assimilate to American ways and a need to hold on to family roots and traditions. Lenny is considerably older than Eunice, but ironically has an even older competitor for her affections, namely his boss Josh, who feels that his juiced-up body is ready for romance.
This thumbnail description of the plot does not do justice to Shteyngart’s richly comic storytelling. The chapters related by Eunice are presented in the form of emails and texts to her family and friends. While reading them, I couldn’t help but be reminded of Frank Zappa’s classic satire song “Valley Girl.” Shteyngart, like Zappa, has great skill in capturing the shallow jargon and mind-numbing consumerism of modern times. Abramov’s chapters, in contrast, are presented as more sober diary entries, filled with self doubts, motivational musings and existential angst. The contrast between the two prose styles could hardly be more pronounced, and the budding romance between these two individuals, with their incompatible worldviews, provides ample momentum for both humor and narrative surprises.
The collapse of society is almost a sub-plot in the context of this book. But that merely adds to the opportunities for satire in Shteyngart's engaging novel. There’s a reason why absurdist stories about politics are usually written from the perspective of the outsider or subaltern—think, for example, of Kafka's The Trial or Heller’s Catch-22 . You need to get outside the groupthink in order to appreciate it in all its idiocy. The insiders are just cogs, each turning in their prescribed direction. Only the uninitiated trying to make sense of the whole machine can savor its dysfunction.
Shteyngart closes the book with a surprising coda, which turns the satire around and focuses it on the literary world. Our author shows he can even laugh at himself, and at the pretensions of highbrow writers. That capability—to laugh at ourselves—may even be a corrective to some of our real world political woes, and not just inside books of fiction. There are two types of comedy: one invites people to laugh at us, and the other demands that we only laugh at people different from us. The first is gentle and disarming, the second is cruel and corrosive. Even though we live in a culture that puts great stock in comedy, there’s a great shortage of that self-directed laughter. It’s not the least virtue of Super Sad True Love Story that Shteyngart does what he can to fill the gap.
Ted Gioia writes on music, literature and popular culture. He is the author of ten books. His most recent book is How to Listen to Jazz (Basic Books).
The nation’s latest marketing campaign is built on the catch phrase: Together We’ll Surprise the World! That sounds ominously appropriate for our current day political branding .