ABSTRACT
This chapter begins with an exploration of allegory and allegorical criticism in order to explain their importance to dystopian fiction. Re-centring the relationship between the concept of allegory and the act of interpretation, I argue that we need to move beyond a rigid opposition of allegory and symbol in order to see how politically committed allegorical dystopias of the 1930s function as political critique. I then explore three allegorical novels in turn: first, Rex Warner’s (1937) fascinating fantastical novel The Wild Goose Chase, in which modernistic formal experimentation collides with a flawed attempt at producing a Marxist politically committed allegory. Next, I turn to (Margaret) Storm Jameson’s (1936) In the Second Year, which produces a sharp critique of liberalism in its near-future allegorising of both the Night of the Long Knives and the fall of the 1929–1931 Labour Government. Finally I examine Warner’s The Professor (1938), a novel which mirrors events leading up to the Anchsluss between Germany and Austria and also condemns liberal values as quietism. These novels assert the importance of forceful resistance to fascism. The re-emergence of allegory in political committed writing of the 1930s allowed writers such as Rex Warner and Margaret Storm Jameson to interrogate specific historical threats as well as broader questions of political and social values.
