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A review by beckylbrydon
Tenth of December: Stories by George Saunders
5.0
I read this after a housemate recommended it, having read it for an essay, during a discussion on the relationship of post-human depictions in fiction and dystopian settings. In Escape from Spiderhead , criminals have the opportunity to serve their sentences by opting to be experiment subjects. This takes place in the form of various drugs pumped into their circulation, for which they have to acknowledge. These drugs include being able to make users much more eloquent in their speech, of lowering inhibitions, of creating and removing emotions. The short story focuses on Jeff as he reluctantly takes part in a new experiment, the testing of a new drug combination that can incite deep romantic love followed by completely removing it and returning the users to ‘baseline’, as if they had never been in love at all. The experiment is designed and carried out by Abnesti as he seeks to prove that the “love” the participants feel is truly temporary, going so far as threatening and giving a drug which fills users with overwhelming despair.
Through Jeff’s eyes and experiences, Escape from Spiderhead acts as an examination of morals and ethics. Abnesti portrays a utilitarianism view of their experiment, choosing to focus on the end goal of “most amount of benefit for the most people”, while Jeff portrays the deontological view as the unwilling volunteer of “is what is happening/about to happen right?” In a situation that almost emulates the boat scene from The Dark Knight in which the Joker plays his social experiment, the two views and the values each person puts on human life, no matter the history, are tested through how and why they react the way they do. In doing so, Escape from Spiderhead also forces the reader to confront where they lay the responsibilities of their actions; do we take it on ourselves even if someone else is pulling our strings, or do we put it on someone/something else as we pull the strings of others.
A beautifully disturbing short story, which gives the reader so much to think about while truly making us sympathetic for Jeff. In particular, the ending monologue by Jeff leaves the reader reeling as in his own personal eloquence he examines the decisions he has made as well as those of his fellow criminals, and where he finally receives the unspoken wish that is an undercurrent in his narration - freedom.
Through Jeff’s eyes and experiences, Escape from Spiderhead acts as an examination of morals and ethics. Abnesti portrays a utilitarianism view of their experiment, choosing to focus on the end goal of “most amount of benefit for the most people”, while Jeff portrays the deontological view as the unwilling volunteer of “is what is happening/about to happen right?” In a situation that almost emulates the boat scene from The Dark Knight in which the Joker plays his social experiment, the two views and the values each person puts on human life, no matter the history, are tested through how and why they react the way they do. In doing so, Escape from Spiderhead also forces the reader to confront where they lay the responsibilities of their actions; do we take it on ourselves even if someone else is pulling our strings, or do we put it on someone/something else as we pull the strings of others.
A beautifully disturbing short story, which gives the reader so much to think about while truly making us sympathetic for Jeff. In particular, the ending monologue by Jeff leaves the reader reeling as in his own personal eloquence he examines the decisions he has made as well as those of his fellow criminals, and where he finally receives the unspoken wish that is an undercurrent in his narration - freedom.