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Dawn
The waters are rising—everywhere—and most of England is inundated by the surge, leaving isolated pockets of mankind to fight for survival—and for civilization!
"Dawn" is the sequel to Wright's "Deluge"
"Dawn" is the sequel to Wright's "Deluge"
269 pages, ebook
First published January 1, 1929
17 people want to read
About the author
S. Fowler Wright
116 books12 followersSydney Fowler Wright (January 6, 1874 – February 25, 1965) was a prolific British editor, poet, science fiction author, writer of screenplays, mystery fiction and works in other genres. Most of his work is published as by "S. Fowler Wright", and he also wrote as Sydney Fowler and Anthony Wingrave.
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Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews
April 2, 2022
Oh no! Another misfire for one of my favorite authors. Promoted as a sequel to S. Fowler Wright's bestseller "Deluge," this novel is more of a retelling of the same ecodisaster from different angles. It does feature the characters from the original, namely Tom, Claire, Martin, and Helen, as well as the villainous brute Bellamy, and a host of other characters that had only slight mention in the original story. But now we're mostly following a new heroine, 45-year-old Muriel Temple, who is a religious missionary with a supposed terminal illness.
I think that's part of the problem, as I'll discuss later. If readers had read the fist book, then they kind of know what happens to most of the characters, so why are we retreading the same ground?
But first let's talk about the positives. S. Fowler Wright is in the ranks of geniuses like Jack London who created post-apocalyptic literature that pre-dated and inspired contemporary works of writers like Cormac McCarthy and the creators of "The Walking Dead." Wright's novels about an unexpected storm of such ferocity that it destroys all the political, financial, and social safeguards of Great Britain society have the disturbing and brutal feel of modern apocalyptic pop entertainment.
Some of who have analyzed Wright's works point to "Deluge" and "Dawn" as examples of the author's philosophy that humans thrive better in a simpler society. I partially agree with that assessment. Wright was on the libertarian spectrum of politics, and he certainly had a healthy suspicion of big government. But I never got the sense that Wright thought we would be better off living in tribes and bartering fish for grain.
Instead, what "Dawn" makes clear is that Wright could play things forward with his uncanny empathy and foresight, and he didn't like what he was seeing in post-Industrial Britain and America. In reference to the ever expanding system of governmental regulations, taxes, licenses, zoning, and welfare states, look at what Wright says about his fellow English subjects in the opening chapters of "Dawn":
"They had been taught the ethics of slavery. They had not been encouraged to think, nor allowed to act. They were not permitted to build even their own houses to their own designs, or to teach their own children as they would. Everything was under the direction of appointed specialists. Even the money that they earned had been withdrawn from their control in ever-larger proportions, so that it might be spent for them more wisely than they would be likely to do themselves. It would be unjust not to recognize that there was often much of wisdom in the ways in which they were controlled and herded. We may say, as we please, either that they had been reduced or raised to the level of domestic animals. On the average they were better housed, better clothed, and better fed than their grandparents had been. Perhaps the advantages of liberty may be overrated."
I wonder what Wright would think about us if he were alive today? He'd probably see us as fattened calves, so helpless and brainwashed into dependence on government and corporate oligarchy. "Dawn" is a warning to those of us who haven't yet got the message from the COVID epidemic and soaring gas and food prices from turmoil across the globe.
Take Hurricane Katrina for example. I went through it firsthand, leaving me homeless and jobless for months. The deluge was over in a flash of the pan, just like in this book. But the aftermath was the real horror. All the systems of a civilized society failed. There were no police to take charge. There was no internet. There was no cellular service. There was no electricity. There were no banks. Your food turned to foul black ochre in your dead fridge and there were no grocery stores to replenish your supply. There was no potable water. I camped out in my gutted house in 105 degree August weather and defended what little remained of my belongings from looters with a small .32 caliber pistol. All of this was going on while our president was patting bureaucrats on the back and saying "Heck of a job, Brownie!" I never would have guessed I'd see such absolute chaos in my country, and it lasted for a full year with after effects that bled into a decade, long after the news media and the general public forgot about the whole thing.
My own experiences make post-apocalyptic novels, especially ones involving massive storms, difficult reads for me. But "Deluge" kept me engaged with a rather tight and engaging plot. "Dawn," on the other hand, was just a tedious mess.
Despite the good questions this book asks of us, I didn't find it offered much different from "Deluge." Perhaps I should reread the first book again, because I couldn't figure out what Wright wanted to add or to say differently to justify a sequel. This novel seemed to be just more of the same scrounging for survival and fighting over women that we saw in the earlier entry. The main difference I saw was that the writing wasn't as crisp and refreshing. Everything is told from a disengaged and clinical stance, with very little character development. We read about endless fighting over women in the most dull manner possible. And that's about it. I think both "Deluge" and "Dawn" are about the same length, but somehow the latter felt like it would never end, like that capful of cough syrup that seems to keep refilling with every timid sip. The narrative just drags much more with details already hashed out in "Deluge." No new answers were provided as far as what caused the storm, or why there are considerably less women alive after the devastation than men. And it got a bit dull to hear repetitively from unlikeable schmucks how unfair it was that one camp got all the women.
The book still retains some of Wright's impeccable dry wit. "Monty Beeston was sober. That was not his fault. It was the misfortune of poverty." But Wright also uses some unusual language that I hadn't noticed in other books of his. For example, he developed a habit of referring to children as neuter. I don't mean infants. There are two girls aged 10 or older, and he occasionally refers to each as "it." So when one of the children is gravely wounded in a train wreck, he says that at first "It had seemed unaware of its injury." There didn't seem to be any artistic purpose as to when he chose to write in this way, and it added to the discomfiting nature of the narrative.
So this was a sequel that wasn't needed. If he wanted to write more about the great storm in "Deluge," then he should have taken the story in a whole new direction. Instead, he just made a less meaningful, less engaging, and less entertaining rehash of content from a book that brought him some fame a decade earlier. It's not a full remake, but it's unoriginal.
"Deluge" is a classic that should be read by lovers of vintage sci-fi. Read the sequel if you are a completist, and maybe you'll get more out of it than I did. Copies of "Dawn" and "Deluge" are available on Kindle or as paperbacks from one of my favorite imprints, Borgo Press.
I think that's part of the problem, as I'll discuss later. If readers had read the fist book, then they kind of know what happens to most of the characters, so why are we retreading the same ground?
But first let's talk about the positives. S. Fowler Wright is in the ranks of geniuses like Jack London who created post-apocalyptic literature that pre-dated and inspired contemporary works of writers like Cormac McCarthy and the creators of "The Walking Dead." Wright's novels about an unexpected storm of such ferocity that it destroys all the political, financial, and social safeguards of Great Britain society have the disturbing and brutal feel of modern apocalyptic pop entertainment.
Some of who have analyzed Wright's works point to "Deluge" and "Dawn" as examples of the author's philosophy that humans thrive better in a simpler society. I partially agree with that assessment. Wright was on the libertarian spectrum of politics, and he certainly had a healthy suspicion of big government. But I never got the sense that Wright thought we would be better off living in tribes and bartering fish for grain.
Instead, what "Dawn" makes clear is that Wright could play things forward with his uncanny empathy and foresight, and he didn't like what he was seeing in post-Industrial Britain and America. In reference to the ever expanding system of governmental regulations, taxes, licenses, zoning, and welfare states, look at what Wright says about his fellow English subjects in the opening chapters of "Dawn":
"They had been taught the ethics of slavery. They had not been encouraged to think, nor allowed to act. They were not permitted to build even their own houses to their own designs, or to teach their own children as they would. Everything was under the direction of appointed specialists. Even the money that they earned had been withdrawn from their control in ever-larger proportions, so that it might be spent for them more wisely than they would be likely to do themselves. It would be unjust not to recognize that there was often much of wisdom in the ways in which they were controlled and herded. We may say, as we please, either that they had been reduced or raised to the level of domestic animals. On the average they were better housed, better clothed, and better fed than their grandparents had been. Perhaps the advantages of liberty may be overrated."
I wonder what Wright would think about us if he were alive today? He'd probably see us as fattened calves, so helpless and brainwashed into dependence on government and corporate oligarchy. "Dawn" is a warning to those of us who haven't yet got the message from the COVID epidemic and soaring gas and food prices from turmoil across the globe.
Take Hurricane Katrina for example. I went through it firsthand, leaving me homeless and jobless for months. The deluge was over in a flash of the pan, just like in this book. But the aftermath was the real horror. All the systems of a civilized society failed. There were no police to take charge. There was no internet. There was no cellular service. There was no electricity. There were no banks. Your food turned to foul black ochre in your dead fridge and there were no grocery stores to replenish your supply. There was no potable water. I camped out in my gutted house in 105 degree August weather and defended what little remained of my belongings from looters with a small .32 caliber pistol. All of this was going on while our president was patting bureaucrats on the back and saying "Heck of a job, Brownie!" I never would have guessed I'd see such absolute chaos in my country, and it lasted for a full year with after effects that bled into a decade, long after the news media and the general public forgot about the whole thing.
My own experiences make post-apocalyptic novels, especially ones involving massive storms, difficult reads for me. But "Deluge" kept me engaged with a rather tight and engaging plot. "Dawn," on the other hand, was just a tedious mess.
Despite the good questions this book asks of us, I didn't find it offered much different from "Deluge." Perhaps I should reread the first book again, because I couldn't figure out what Wright wanted to add or to say differently to justify a sequel. This novel seemed to be just more of the same scrounging for survival and fighting over women that we saw in the earlier entry. The main difference I saw was that the writing wasn't as crisp and refreshing. Everything is told from a disengaged and clinical stance, with very little character development. We read about endless fighting over women in the most dull manner possible. And that's about it. I think both "Deluge" and "Dawn" are about the same length, but somehow the latter felt like it would never end, like that capful of cough syrup that seems to keep refilling with every timid sip. The narrative just drags much more with details already hashed out in "Deluge." No new answers were provided as far as what caused the storm, or why there are considerably less women alive after the devastation than men. And it got a bit dull to hear repetitively from unlikeable schmucks how unfair it was that one camp got all the women.
The book still retains some of Wright's impeccable dry wit. "Monty Beeston was sober. That was not his fault. It was the misfortune of poverty." But Wright also uses some unusual language that I hadn't noticed in other books of his. For example, he developed a habit of referring to children as neuter. I don't mean infants. There are two girls aged 10 or older, and he occasionally refers to each as "it." So when one of the children is gravely wounded in a train wreck, he says that at first "It had seemed unaware of its injury." There didn't seem to be any artistic purpose as to when he chose to write in this way, and it added to the discomfiting nature of the narrative.
So this was a sequel that wasn't needed. If he wanted to write more about the great storm in "Deluge," then he should have taken the story in a whole new direction. Instead, he just made a less meaningful, less engaging, and less entertaining rehash of content from a book that brought him some fame a decade earlier. It's not a full remake, but it's unoriginal.
"Deluge" is a classic that should be read by lovers of vintage sci-fi. Read the sequel if you are a completist, and maybe you'll get more out of it than I did. Copies of "Dawn" and "Deluge" are available on Kindle or as paperbacks from one of my favorite imprints, Borgo Press.
June 2, 2012
3.5
ORIGINALLY POSTED AT Fantasy Literature.
Muriel Temple, a single woman who has recently returned to England after serving as a missionary in Africa, has learned that she doesn’t have much longer to live — maybe a year, maybe a little more or less. She is sad, but she is not afraid because her faith is strong. She wants only to serve God by helping others during the time she has left. Her current project involves trying to talk an unwed pregnant girl out of an abortion, but before she gets a chance to track down and confront the alleged father of the baby, disaster strikes.
Earthquakes shake England, storms arise, and soon most of England, and maybe the rest of the world, is under water. Only a couple hundred people remain, mostly from the lower classes. After the initial shock fades, the survivors band together around a few different leaders — mostly opportunistic men who’ve managed to gather some like-minded followers. Few women remain and most of them, including Muriel Temple, have attached to Tom Aldworth’s camp because Tom is a benevolent (if reluctant) leader who will try to protect them from the abusive men who lead the other groups.
Most of the survivors are content to do nothing but get some sort of roof over their heads and to raid abandoned gardens for their daily food. They are lazy and self-indulgent, making no effort to rebuild society or even to plan far enough ahead to prepare for the first winter. One survivor takes the opportunity to find and hoard all the goods that he knows others will need so he can sell them later at exorbitant prices. The biggest immediate problem, though, is the unequal distribution of women. The brutal men who lead the other camps want their share of the females and they’re willing to fight to get them. Tom, who doesn’t consider himself or any of the other men in his camp to be a leader, wishes to pass the reins to someone who’s better qualified. When a formerly successful barrister shows up, Tom’s camp will need to decide whether they’re willing to be governed under his terms.
Dawn, first published in 1929, is more than just an exciting disaster story. It’s also a treatise on human behavior and a condemnation of the political and educational systems of 19th century England. While at first it seems that S. Fowler Wright criticizes the lower classes for being lazy, undisciplined, and cowardly by waiting for the government to take care of them, he also denounces the government and the upper classes for making them this way:
"Vaguely they realized that there was no help but in themselves, and they were untrained in self-reliance, as they were unpractised in self-discipline. All their customs, all the tendency of their laws for a generation, had discouraged their initiatives and reduced their freedoms. They had been taught the ethics of slavery. They had not been encouraged to think, nor allowed to act. They were not permitted to build even their own houses to their own designs, or to teach their own children as they would. Everything was under the direction of appointed specialists. Even the money that they earned had been withdrawn from their control in ever-larger proportions, so that it might be spent for them more wisely than they would be likely to do themselves."
S. Fowler Wright acknowledges that many social programs were just and raised the average standard of living, but now, after disaster strikes, the leaderless people have no idea how to take care of themselves. They need a leader, but they’re suspicious of laws and regulations. What kind of government will work best for this new civilization? Should there be a class structure? Private property? Regulations against hoarding and price-fixing? How do you regulate business without discouraging economic growth? What should be the role of women in this new world? Should all knowledge be made known to everyone, or is there some information which needs to remain hidden from some people? Which should be of paramount concern: the good of the individual, or the good of society as a whole? Is the majority always right? In the end, Wright doesn’t answer these questions, but he gives us plenty to think about.
There is some nice characterization in Dawn. Muriel, who is insufferably self-righteous in the beginning, comes to see that her ideas about God’s laws have been corrupted by bad doctrine and England’s religious traditions. She eventually realizes that some of her rigid views must become more flexible, tolerant, and Christ-like in this new world.
There is also some satirical humor and some lovely writing — especially the descriptions of the treacherous sea:
"A man can learn to love the sea, as he loves a woman. He can love the wind also, but not quite in the same way. Air is not feminine, like water. The wind can be quiet and loving. It can be fierce and merciless as a wolf in its hunger. But not as a cat. It will not purr against your feet in the same way; it will not bite without barking. The sea does not seek its prey like a dog; it does not hunt as the wind hunts. It may crouch very still the while it waits for its victims. It can be quiet and swift in its treacheries. It can caress with smooth and deadly paws.
It loves to lie in the sun’s warmth, purring lazily, and half asleep, till it has lured its victims to its reach, as a fly will settle within range of a lizard’s tongue. You may do well to love, but it is always folly to trust it. Even though it respond to your wooing with the surrenders which its lovers know, it will not be loyal. It will turn with cold and cruel teeth, even on those to whom it has bared its beauty. It has the heart of a harlot."
Dawn is actually a sequel to S. Fowler Wright’s novel Deluge, though it also stands alone. Dawn was originally published in 1929, decades before scientists started talking about global warming, yet Wildside Press has appended the subtitle A Novel of Global Warming to the title. Wright’s disaster was caused by geological changes in the Earth’s crust — not global warming, so this subtitle seems ridiculous and I can only explain it as a shameless attempt to sell an old disaster novel by modernizing its title. It didn’t need that.
There is something else that annoys me, and I’m assuming that this is also the publisher’s decision, though I could be wrong since I do not have the text of the original novel: in the front of the book they have misquoted from anthropologist Sir James George Frazer’s 1908 lecture entitled “The Scope of Social Anthropology.“ Frazer says “No abstract doctrine is more false and mischievous than that of the natural equality of men” but in this edition of Dawn, the quote has been changed; the word “quality” is used instead of “equality.” Later in the book, it is quoted correctly by one of the characters. (The wrong quote at the beginning of the book is attributed to Sir James Fraser rather than Sir James Frazer.) As intolerable as Frazer’s quote is, it’s even more intolerable to misquote him. Instead of trying to “fix” Sir Frazer, why don’t they just ignore him by not quoting him?
Anyway, none of that is the fault of Audible Frontiers who produced the audiobook version of Wildside Press’s text. They chose Susan Ericksen to narrate. I’d never heard her before, but I thought she was excellent. Her deep voice is attractive and she handles male and female voices beautifully with just the right amount of enthusiasm. I definitely want to listen to her again and I recommend this version of Dawn.
ORIGINALLY POSTED AT Fantasy Literature.
Muriel Temple, a single woman who has recently returned to England after serving as a missionary in Africa, has learned that she doesn’t have much longer to live — maybe a year, maybe a little more or less. She is sad, but she is not afraid because her faith is strong. She wants only to serve God by helping others during the time she has left. Her current project involves trying to talk an unwed pregnant girl out of an abortion, but before she gets a chance to track down and confront the alleged father of the baby, disaster strikes.
Earthquakes shake England, storms arise, and soon most of England, and maybe the rest of the world, is under water. Only a couple hundred people remain, mostly from the lower classes. After the initial shock fades, the survivors band together around a few different leaders — mostly opportunistic men who’ve managed to gather some like-minded followers. Few women remain and most of them, including Muriel Temple, have attached to Tom Aldworth’s camp because Tom is a benevolent (if reluctant) leader who will try to protect them from the abusive men who lead the other groups.
Most of the survivors are content to do nothing but get some sort of roof over their heads and to raid abandoned gardens for their daily food. They are lazy and self-indulgent, making no effort to rebuild society or even to plan far enough ahead to prepare for the first winter. One survivor takes the opportunity to find and hoard all the goods that he knows others will need so he can sell them later at exorbitant prices. The biggest immediate problem, though, is the unequal distribution of women. The brutal men who lead the other camps want their share of the females and they’re willing to fight to get them. Tom, who doesn’t consider himself or any of the other men in his camp to be a leader, wishes to pass the reins to someone who’s better qualified. When a formerly successful barrister shows up, Tom’s camp will need to decide whether they’re willing to be governed under his terms.
Dawn, first published in 1929, is more than just an exciting disaster story. It’s also a treatise on human behavior and a condemnation of the political and educational systems of 19th century England. While at first it seems that S. Fowler Wright criticizes the lower classes for being lazy, undisciplined, and cowardly by waiting for the government to take care of them, he also denounces the government and the upper classes for making them this way:
"Vaguely they realized that there was no help but in themselves, and they were untrained in self-reliance, as they were unpractised in self-discipline. All their customs, all the tendency of their laws for a generation, had discouraged their initiatives and reduced their freedoms. They had been taught the ethics of slavery. They had not been encouraged to think, nor allowed to act. They were not permitted to build even their own houses to their own designs, or to teach their own children as they would. Everything was under the direction of appointed specialists. Even the money that they earned had been withdrawn from their control in ever-larger proportions, so that it might be spent for them more wisely than they would be likely to do themselves."
S. Fowler Wright acknowledges that many social programs were just and raised the average standard of living, but now, after disaster strikes, the leaderless people have no idea how to take care of themselves. They need a leader, but they’re suspicious of laws and regulations. What kind of government will work best for this new civilization? Should there be a class structure? Private property? Regulations against hoarding and price-fixing? How do you regulate business without discouraging economic growth? What should be the role of women in this new world? Should all knowledge be made known to everyone, or is there some information which needs to remain hidden from some people? Which should be of paramount concern: the good of the individual, or the good of society as a whole? Is the majority always right? In the end, Wright doesn’t answer these questions, but he gives us plenty to think about.
There is some nice characterization in Dawn. Muriel, who is insufferably self-righteous in the beginning, comes to see that her ideas about God’s laws have been corrupted by bad doctrine and England’s religious traditions. She eventually realizes that some of her rigid views must become more flexible, tolerant, and Christ-like in this new world.
There is also some satirical humor and some lovely writing — especially the descriptions of the treacherous sea:
"A man can learn to love the sea, as he loves a woman. He can love the wind also, but not quite in the same way. Air is not feminine, like water. The wind can be quiet and loving. It can be fierce and merciless as a wolf in its hunger. But not as a cat. It will not purr against your feet in the same way; it will not bite without barking. The sea does not seek its prey like a dog; it does not hunt as the wind hunts. It may crouch very still the while it waits for its victims. It can be quiet and swift in its treacheries. It can caress with smooth and deadly paws.
It loves to lie in the sun’s warmth, purring lazily, and half asleep, till it has lured its victims to its reach, as a fly will settle within range of a lizard’s tongue. You may do well to love, but it is always folly to trust it. Even though it respond to your wooing with the surrenders which its lovers know, it will not be loyal. It will turn with cold and cruel teeth, even on those to whom it has bared its beauty. It has the heart of a harlot."
Dawn is actually a sequel to S. Fowler Wright’s novel Deluge, though it also stands alone. Dawn was originally published in 1929, decades before scientists started talking about global warming, yet Wildside Press has appended the subtitle A Novel of Global Warming to the title. Wright’s disaster was caused by geological changes in the Earth’s crust — not global warming, so this subtitle seems ridiculous and I can only explain it as a shameless attempt to sell an old disaster novel by modernizing its title. It didn’t need that.
There is something else that annoys me, and I’m assuming that this is also the publisher’s decision, though I could be wrong since I do not have the text of the original novel: in the front of the book they have misquoted from anthropologist Sir James George Frazer’s 1908 lecture entitled “The Scope of Social Anthropology.“ Frazer says “No abstract doctrine is more false and mischievous than that of the natural equality of men” but in this edition of Dawn, the quote has been changed; the word “quality” is used instead of “equality.” Later in the book, it is quoted correctly by one of the characters. (The wrong quote at the beginning of the book is attributed to Sir James Fraser rather than Sir James Frazer.) As intolerable as Frazer’s quote is, it’s even more intolerable to misquote him. Instead of trying to “fix” Sir Frazer, why don’t they just ignore him by not quoting him?
Anyway, none of that is the fault of Audible Frontiers who produced the audiobook version of Wildside Press’s text. They chose Susan Ericksen to narrate. I’d never heard her before, but I thought she was excellent. Her deep voice is attractive and she handles male and female voices beautifully with just the right amount of enthusiasm. I definitely want to listen to her again and I recommend this version of Dawn.
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