Yevgeny Zamyatin was a Russian novelist, playwright and satirist whose writing explores the themes of despotism, individuality, and alienation. His most famous work is the novel We, which pioneered the dystopian literary genre, opening the field for novels like George Orwell’s 1984 and Aldous Huxley’s Brave New World. Many of his lesser-known writings critique and document the realities of Russian life under both the Tsarist and Communist regimes.
Zamyatin was born in the rural village of Lebedyan, Russia in 1884 to an orthodox priest and a musician. In addition to being an avid reader, as a young adult Zamyatin studied engineering in St. Petersburg, after which he joined the Russian...
