Warning Against The End Of The World Oryx And Crake: A Dystopian Novel

This thesis is to illustrate Oryx and Crake, the latest fiction written by the"Queen of Canadian Literature"—Margaret Atwood in 2003. Since its publication, this fiction has called the attention of the critics. People usually notice its value in eco-criticism, its special narrative strategy and its post-modernist features. And there are also some critics defining this novel as a science fiction because of the extremely advanced science and technology mentioned in this novel. This thesis intends to display its characteristics as a dystopian fiction.Since we entered the twentieth century, the negative influence of the misuse of modern science and technology has been becoming more and more obvious. Human beings never stopped their enthusiastic pursuit of the technology and the profit since F. Bacon, the English scientist and philosopher, put forward"knowledge is power". As a writer with high social responsibility, Atwood shows us a typical dystopian society through Oryx and Crake, and forces us to ask ourselves:"As a species, do we possess mature emotion and enough wisdom to control our powerful equipment?"This thesis consists of five parts. The first part, introduction, briefly introduces the writing background and the plot of the fiction. The first chapter shows us the main life experience of the author and some related researches. Chapter two gives a clear definition of utopia and dystopia as literary paradigm. Chapter three is the principle part of this thesis, which illustrates the deterioration of the natural environment, the political crisis, and the decline of civilization of the world of Oryx and Crake, and tries to analyze the reason for these above-mentioned negative phenomena. The last part of this thesis re-emphasizes the importance of this fiction, and appeals us to reflect on our own disadvantage and ameliorate ourselves to avoid the potential dystopian future.