Theodore Dalrymple is a gifted essayist. Well-traveled and possessing a piercing critical eye, he observes the rare, the obscure, the recherché in culture. His prose is rich and thick and leaves the reader, I dare say, in a pondering state. And that is perhaps the goal of most essayists- to leave the reader 'thinking.' And who of us doesn't enjoy being tickled into such a state?
In this essay, Mr. Dalrymple starts by asking an interesting question. "Why did the twentieth century produce so many—and such vivid—dystopias, works of fiction depicting not an ideal future but a future as terrible as could be imagined?"
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