Stand On Zanzibar

Stand On Zanzibar is a Hugo Award-winning dystopian novel by John Brunner.

It's set in the year 2010, when the population of Earth has reached 7 billion. The Soviet Union is defunct as a superpower, but China is rapidly industrializing and increasing in power. Giant corporations have large enough economies to control entire countries. In-vitro fertilization and genetic mapping are becoming a reality. A computer the size of a large book is more powerful than the most massive supercomputers of the Sixties. Personalized digital avatars of yourself feature in everyday entertainment. Religious denominations are rapidly polarizing on moral issues like abortion. And ordinary people suddenly snap and go on killing sprees in schools, workplaces, and malls.

Sound familiar? Did we mention this book was written in 1968?

On the other hand, New York is encased in a giant dome, Puerto Rico and part of the Philippines are U.S. states, eugenics legislation has passed in 48 states, and the West has cured its addiction to oil.

Stand On Zanzibar isn't your ordinary dystopian novel; the plot is secondary to an intense world-building experience and exploring the many consequences of overpopulation. The chapters alternate between:


 * Context, background information, Paratext, incomprehensible transcripts of TV shows, and excerpts from the writings of rogue sociologist Chad Mulligan.
 * Continuity, the main plot, which follows roommates Corrupt Corporate Executive Norman House and mild-mannered perpetual student/spy Donald Hogan, as House tries to fix a computer and modernize an African nation, and Hogan infiltrates an Indonesia Expy to kidnap/rescue a brilliant scientist.
 * Tracking With Closeups, which gives vignettes about various ordinary people and their lives.
 * The Happening World, which gives brief updates on the status of the many, many, characters. Strangely prescient of Twitter. Also may contain random snippets of exposition thrown in, well, randomly.

": Christ, what an imagination I've got."
 * Balkanize Me: Inverted: several groups of African countries have merged into larger states.
 * Bittersweet Ending/Earn Your Happy Ending:
 * Bulungi: Beninia. Dahomalia and RUNG, too, but these latter two are conglomerations of already-extant IRL nations.
 * Cyberpunk: Contains enough elements to be considered a proto-example.
 * Deus Est Machina: Shalmaneser is getting there.
 * Domed Hometown
 * Emotion Bomb:.
 * Exposition Beam: EPTification has aspects of this.
 * Fantastic Drug: Triptine, Skullbustium, Yaginol and "Truth or Consequences" all of which are described as 'lifters' (uppers), and all of which seem to have at some hallucinogenic effects.
 * Free-Love Future: The "shiggy circuit".
 * Future Slang: Shiggies, codders, bleeders, muckers, Aframs, etc.
 * Genetic Engineering Is the New Nuke: A surprisingly early example of this trope.
 * He's Back: When we first meet Chad Mulligan, he's a drunken, surly wreck who hates everything. After learning about the situation that crashed Shalmaneser, he springs into action, fixes the world's most powerful computer in less than fifteen minutes, and is reinvigorated with life for the rest of the book.
 * High Octane Nightmare Fuel: EPTification and Don's fate.
 * Homage: The style is inspired by John Dos Passos's U.S.A. Trilogy.
 * Humans Are Flawed: But Chad loves them all anyway.
 * I Need a Freaking Drink: Chad says this after solving the Shalmaneser problem.
 * Instant AI, Just Add Water: Shalmaneser is rapidly approaching artificial intelligence as it gains processing power. Right now, he's at the level of The Stoner.
 * Loads and Loads of Characters
 * Mary Suetopia: Beninia, which is suspiciously devoid of many of the problems of the neighboring countries.
 * Master Computer: Shalmaneser, a helium-cooled supercomputer capable of managing the economies of entire countries.
 * Mega Corp: General Technics. "The difficult we did yesterday. The impossible, we're doing right now."
 * This announcement has been brought to you by the Prometheus Corporation, building a better world through the fire.
 * Neural Implanting: Being EPTified, or Educated for Particular Tasks.
 * Population Control: Eugenics is rapidly becoming the norm in developed countries, banning children of carriers of colorblindness, hemophilia, and other genetic disorders.
 * Positive Discrimination: The reason Norman became a vice-president of GT is because he's black.
 * The Professor: Chad Mulligan.
 * Reluctant Mad Scientist: Dr. Sugaiguntung.
 * Shout-Out: The override to make Shalmaneser accept invalid data is to say "I say it three times, it must be true".
 * Spy From Weights and Measures: Donald is employed by the US government, and our introduction to him is "Donald Hogan is a spy", but he really just sits around absorbing information while collecting a paycheck. At least until he's EPTified...
 * The Stoner: Bennie Noakes and company.
 * Superpowerful Genetics: The Yatakangi claim that they will create genetic supermen, which sets off a panic equivalent to Sputnik in other countries.
 * That Man Is Dead: At the end, Donald claims this of himself after a mental breakdown and refers to his previous self as "the other Donald Hogan". He still uses the name, since he figures the dead Donald won't complain.
 * Tear Jerker: at the end.
 * Title Drop: "You could stand us all on the six hundred forty square mile surface of the island of Zanzibar."
 * Two Lines, No Waiting: Between Donald and Norman's plots, which form the story of the book. Though there's several hundred pages unrelated to either of them in the book as well.
 * Walking the Earth: Chad Mulligan traveled around as a bum for a while.
 * Wham! Line: