There are two generic and invariable features that characterize utopias. One is the content: the authors of utopias paint what they consider to be ideal societies; translating this into the language of mathematics, we might say that utopias bear a + sign. The other feature, organically growing out of the content, is to be found in the form: a utopia is always static; it is always descriptive and has no, of almost no, plot dynamics.
Yevgeny ZamyatinWhen we remove the snowdrift piled up over Chekhov in recent years, we uncover a man profoundly agitated by social problems; a writer whose social ideals are the same as those we live by; a philosophy of the divinity of man, of fervent faith in man - the faith that moves mountains.
Yevgeny ZamyatinTo reflect the entire spectrum, the dynamics of the adventure novel must be invested with a philosophic synthesis of one kind or another.
Yevgeny ZamyatinThe lilac branches are bowed under the weight of the flowers: blooming is hard, and the most important thing is - to bloom. (โA Story About The Most Important Thingโ)
Yevgeny ZamyatinRevolution is everywhere, in everything. It is infinite. There is no final revolution, no final number. The social revolution is only one of an infinite number of numbers: the law of revolution is not a social law, but an immeasurably greater one. It is a cosmic, universal law - like the laws of the conservation of energy and of the dissipation of energy (entropy).
Yevgeny Zamyatin