ABSTRACT
Dystopian realism thus contributes to pressures for improvements to material conditions – from sewers to model housing and model prisons – in the mid-nineteenth century. Although improvements had other benefits for the established order, including increased productivity and a lessening of the likelihood of insurrection. The chapter argues that dystopian views of industrial cities contribute to an anti-urbanism that becomes ingrained in English culture. It discusses the form of negativity changes through the century from a depiction of material conditions to an internalisation of dystopia as a state of psyche. The chapter describes dystopian literature retains a temporal dimension, especially after Charles Darwin's theories on the origin of species establish that human evolution is a process of permanent mutation. Dystopian views of industrial cities contribute to pressure for reform but also to an underlying anti-urbanism in which the answer to the city is the incorporation of the cleanliness of the countryside.
