Comparing Delirium And V For Vendetta

In the novel Delirium (2011) by Lauren Oliver and the film V for Vendetta (2005), each author uses a narrator to provide a view of the individual’s role in their own totalitarian society. In each population, all except those in control, share a common fear for which those in power claim to provide the only solution to that fear. Three themes that both texts share are: the illusion of a perfect utopian world, an expectancy for citizens to conform to uniform expectations, and propaganda.

Inside both dystopian texts, power is maintained by the illusion of a perfect utopian world. The citizens of V for Vendetta turned to the High Chancellor because “he promised order, he promised peace” [20:52]. From the outside, the society looks as though they

In V for Vendetta, propaganda is constantly in the background of people’s lives. There are posters all around London with the government’s recurring motto ‘Strength through unity, unity through faith’. Along with the fact that there is only one TV channel on people’s televisions which is the BTN, where the government controls what is allowed to be shown. Through this media, the people of Britain are continually fed fabricated lies. This can be seen through the news announcer Lewis Prothero, when his speech included “It wasn't the war [America] started. It wasn't the plague they created. It was judgement.” [3:26] showing that everybody is under the impression that the Saint Mary’s Virus was formed by American terrorists. Also when V destroyed the Old Bailey and one of the Chancellor’s employees covered it up saying “We're calling it an ‘emergency demolition’. We have spin coverage on the network and throughout the Interlink, and several experts have been lined up to testify against the Bailey's structural integrity” [11:33]. Hence the government spreads propaganda amongst it’s citizens to eliminate any chance of defiance and an uprising, ensuring the citizens of England feel as though they needed the government to survive. Propaganda is also very relevant in Delirium. The government uses fear and bureaucratic control to scare the people of Portland into getting the ‘cure’. Their bible in a sense is known as The Safety, Health, and Happiness Handbook or more commonly known as The Book of Shhh. It is propaganda in the form of a book, that is effectively an anti-love guidebook that lists the symptoms of ‘deliria’ as well as the rules, quotes, prayers, and mottos that are the foundation of Lena’s dull society. An excerpt being ‘human beings, in their natural state, are unpredictable, erratic, and unhappy. It is only once their animal instincts are controlled that they can be