EREWHON (Dystopian Classic): The Masterpiece that Inspired Orwell's 1984 by Predicting the Takeover of Humanity by AI Machines

Erewhon or, Over the Range is a novel by Samuel Butler which was first published anonymously in 1872. The title of the book refers to the name of a country, supposedly discovered by the protagonist. In the novel, it is not revealed where Erewhon is, but it is clear that it is a fictional country.

Butler meant the title to be read as NOWHERE backwards even though the letters h and w are transposed. At first glance, Erewhon appears to be a Utopia, yet it soon becomes clear that this is far from the case. In a 1945 broadcast, George Orwell praised and recommended the book and said that when Butler wrote Erewhon it needed imagination of a very high order to see that machinery could be dangerous as well as useful.

Samuel Butler (1835-1902) was an iconoclastic English author of a variety of works. He is also known for examining Christian orthodoxy, substantive studies of evolutionary thought, studies of Italian art, and works of literary history and criticism. Butler also made prose translations of Homer's Iliad and Odyssey that remain in use to this day.