SHORT STORY ANALYSIS: Genocide in “The Doom of Principal City” (1918) by Yefim Zozulya

 

Genocide in “The Doom of Principal City” by Yefim Zozulya

“The Doom of Principal City” (1918) is a disturbing and devastating short story by Soviet writer, Yefim Zozulya. It’s a fascinating piece of speculative fiction, believed to be the first ever dystopian piece of “world” fiction. Zozulya’s short yet powerful story illustrates the various methods that conquerors use to oppress and, eventually, eradicate occupied people.

Step 1: Hide them.

The main idea of the story is this: an enemy of war seeks to “preserve” a defeated people by building a new city above theirs. The two peoples are to never mix nor see each other after the construction of “Upper City” is complete. The residents of “Principal City” must serve as the hidden foundation of Upper City for all eternity. They will literally live in the dark, since Upper City will block out the sun and blue sky. Over time, history will forget the existence of Principal City and its people. They will figuratively be “dead and buried”.

Step 2: Silence them.

Upper City may need Principal City to act as its infrastructural foundation, but it doesn’t want to see or hear it.

All forms of psychological and emotional torture are inflicted upon the Principal City dwellers by Upper City residents, such as blasting mocking laughter down to Principal City through giant tube-like machines. This reminds me of brainwashing torture rooms that mock and humiliate victims by forcing them to listen to particular music, chants, or other noises. There are some attempts to block out the laughter coming from Upper City through beating drums, screaming, explosions and even shooting—all of which fail. As a result of the “demoralizing, inhuman, unknown laughter,” “there were dozens of mental disorders, about eighty suicides, and a vast, incalculable number of grave nervous shocks” (p. 69).

Over time, the residents of Principal City either commit suicide or succumb to sin, anger, violence, and vulgar and immoral behaviour.

A disturbing development is the creation of a “Government of Obedience,” whereby six members of Principal City must be appointed to fulfil various roles that ensure the comfort of Upper City residents as their homes continue to be built. The three roles that stand out to me are:

1. The Minister of Quiet, whose task is “reducing noise in Principal City to a minimum so that it would not disturb inhabitants of the soon-to-be Upper City” (p. 71).
2.   The Minister of Quantity, whose duty is “to limit and, if need be, to reduce population growth so that overcrowdedness of Principal City would not affect the well-being of Upper City in any way” (p. 71).
3.    The Minister of Illusions, who is “in charge of creating an illusion of the sky by means of grand scenery, wherever it would be possible” (p. 71).

Not only are residents of Principal City physically rendered invisible by way of living under ground, shrouded by their conquerors, but they must 1) maintain their own invisibility for the sake of their conquers’ peace, and 2) create illusions of a sky to reinforce delusions of freedom. I have never read another dystopian piece of fiction where the oppress are forced to actively dehumanize and eradicate themselves from civilization. It is another level of humiliation and demoralization.

Two additional disturbing points: the Upper City allows residents of Principal City “permission to satisfy the natural need of indignation during the space of five days” before which the Government of Obedience must be formed (p. 72). The Upper City construction workers withdraw from Principal City to allow the oppressed a wreck room type of therapy before accepting their inevitable psychological defeat. This is akin to allowing a frightened animal to thrash about in its cage until it wears itself out. Oh, and one more thing: Principal City must appoint its members for the Government of Obedience after these five days of emotional freedom or else “Principal City would be wiped off ruthlessly from the face of the earth in a few hours” (p. 72). How generous.

The threat of wiping out or exterminating the pests of Principal City brings me to the third method of oppression this story explores:

Step 3: Dehumanize them.

It's implied with the description of The Minister of Quantity that Principal City must control its own citizens’ reproductive activities and, if need be, kill off citizens to limit its population size for the sake of Upper City’s prosperity. It’s almost as if the people of Principal City aren’t “people” with families at all, but bacteria that keeps multiplying. Imagining the Other as “disease” is a common dehumanizing tool used by racists and colonists. Zozulya explicitly mentions this by writing that Upper City began “vigorous work to radically disinfect Principal City, which had to be perfectly neat and wholesome as a future foundation for Upper City” (p. 72). Principal City residents are required to cleanse themselves of all diseases, lest they be starved of food. In addition to becoming a disease-free city, Principal City becomes a “singular sight” whereby people of all classes, standings and positions are reduced to the same uniform entity: “cleanly and tidily dressed, well combed and well bathed, their homes a model of cleanliness and order” (p. 72).

The Final Step

Rebellions are violently crushed by the Government of Obedience, with particularly riotous neighbourhoods being cemented and turned into huge “cubes of cement, graves to so many lives, [which] came to be known as the Cubes of Immature Dreams” (p.73). When unrest starts up again, the huge machines would play laughter to psychologically force residents into submission. At times of obedience and sought-after submission, the same machines would echo encouraging chants from the Upper City such as:

                                             “We love you!!! We love you!”

                                             “Man loves obedience in his neighbors!”

                              “The meaning of life lies in suffering and self-improvement!” (p. 73)

The short story ends with a violent revolution. Citizens of Principal City set fires to bridges and their own houses so that the foundations of Upper City would collapse. The sad irony: the only way out of oppression is destitution and, even, death.  

Glimpses of the sun is finally seen again by Principal City with the collapse of Upper City. Upper City members shoot bullets down to Principal City and even pour hot cement to kill the rebels and attempt a hasty new foundation to their city. In the end, Upper City collapses entirely, with most residents flying out on their planes back to wherever they came from. The suffering and death detailed by the author is disturbing and immensely heartbreaking for the Principal City residents. He leaves us with this final image of a holocaust of bones and ruin:

“Many of them were wounded, many dying; many were dancing, bereft of their sanity; but the wounded and the dying and the mad alike were singing, joyously and loudly, songs in honor of the rising and dazzlingly indifferent sun” (p. 75).

The devastating, honest and realistic ending of this sad story evokes the famous quote, “Give me liberty or give me death!” by Patrick Henry. Better than that, perhaps, is a quote that still haunts me years after I heard it in Black Panther (2018): “Death is better than bondage.”

Principal City essentially becomes a graveyard—figuratively at first, by being hidden, silenced, dehumanized and “buried” under Upper City, and then literally. This underrated gem of a dystopian story made me consider these questions:

·    Why did Yefim Zozulya title his story, “The Doom of Principal City”? What does “doom” refer to—Principal City’s choice to rebel against their oppressors, or rather, the fact that Principal City was conquered in the first place?

·       What price is too high to pay for political freedom?

·       Is it better to live in oppression than die in violence?

·       What similarities can you find between this story and real historical or present events?

Where to read the short story:

I read “The Doom of Principal City” in The Big Book of Science Fiction (2016) anthology, edited by Jeff and Ann VanderMeer. It contains a host of popular and underrated stories by various writers. Some stories are centuries old, some are decades, and some are more recent. I highly recommend it!