Literature for a Post-<em>Roe</em> World
Dystopian novels, even when their plots seem fantastical, simulate a deeply human experience: the feeling of being at the mercy of your circumstances, your personal control slipping away. When the Supreme Court struck down Roe v. Wade on Friday, I itched to dive into some speculative fiction, to find my grief and anger reflected in a setting both horrifying and familiar.
Margaret Atwood exemplified dystopia with her 1985 book, , in which a theocratic dictatorship bars women from reading, writing, or controlling their own reproduction. But more recent novels the rise of “feminist dystopia” set in worlds where reproductive rights are demolished. In Bina Shah’s , for instance, women who have survived a deadly strain of HPV are forced to have children with multiple husbands; in Louise Erdrich’s , pregnant women are taken into government custody.
