Darrow is a Red, a member of the lowest caste in the color-coded society of the future. Like his fellow Reds, he spends his days working below ground, believing that the blood and sweat of his people are making the surface of Mars livable for future generations.
But Darrow and his kind have been betrayed. Discovering that humanity colonized the surface generations ago--establishing vast cities and lush wilds--Darrow realizes that he and his fellow Reds are nothing more than slaves to a decadent ruling class. Driven by a longing for justice and the memory of lost love, Darrow sacrifices everything to infiltrate the legendary Institute, a proving ground for dominant Gold caste, where the next generation of humanity's overloads struggle for power. There he will be forced to compete for his life and the very future of civilization against the best and most brutal of Society's elite. But he will stop at nothing to bring down his enemies...even if he must become one of them to do so. |
Group Members: Jake, Jacob, Damon, Crystal, Ryan
The Society
The society in Red Rising is split into many different factions that are all based on color. For example the main character’s faction, the Reds, are all miners, the Silvers, are essentially the law enforcement of Mars, and the Golds are the undisputed leaders of the entire human race. The Red’s job is to mine Helium-3 from Mars so that it can be terraformed and the other civilizations can live there. The Silver’s job is to make sure that the Reds are all working by either motivating them with the laurel, or whipping them for insubordination. The Golds have decreed themselves the absolute rulers of everything because they want to, and have sent the Reds to Mars so that they can prepare the planet for their arrival.
The setting of Red Rising is a series of caves under the surface of Mars. The Reds all live in villages that they have built underground while simultaneously mining out the Helium-3 in even deeper caves outside of their village. The Reds are confined to a set of boundaries that they have to stay within in order to maintain balance in the society.
Struggles the main character is facing Darrow, the main character of Red Rising, has basically been jumping from one conflict to another. In the beginning of the book he was at conflict with his lazy uncle, and the neighboring clan (the Gammas). Once these conflicts are resolved Darrow starts to war with the elites of his civilization, the Golds. Finally after the death of his wife Darrow’s major internal struggle is a conflict with his identity.
At the start of the book Darrow is constantly at odds with his Uncle Narol because he believes Narol to be old and lazy. Darrow’s position as the Helldiver of his clan causes him to be very decisive and he is used to making snap judgements, and often puts himself at risk; Narol who is in charge of Darrow constantly tells him to exercise caution and hold back, “my uncle is weak. He is cautious and immoderate in his drink, a pale shadow of my father” (Brown, 7). Their two conflicting personalities cause them to constantly be at odds. The other main conflict in the book is the conflict between Darrow and the Gamma clan. Darrow’s issue with the Gammas came about because they are the only ones in living memory to ever win The Laurel, (a reward giving to the clan who are the most efficient when working in the mines,) and Darrow is the greatest Helldiver so he believes that he can beat the Gammas. While he never does actually beat the Gammas it is not because of his own lack of ability, the government that awards The Laurel just gives it to the same clan every time. The Arch Governor of Mars sends the Cooper to give out The Laurel, Darrow and all the other miners are ready to receive this outstanding gift. However, The Laurel is handed right over to the Gamma, (Brown, 27). This only increases the tension between the Reds and the Gammas. All of the clan’s hatred is focused on the Gammas and not on the oppressive government that have them spending their entire lives in the mines.
Darrow’s conflict with society begins with the death of his wife. After she is executed for singing a song that is forbidden by her society she is put to death. After she is executed all of Darrow’s conflicts with his Uncle and the Gammas are quickly forgotten and his true enemy is revealed to be the elite’s of his civilization known as the golds. This prompts Darrow to take his wife’s body and bury her on the forbidden surface of the planet, causing Darrow to get sentenced to death. Darrow survives and is recruited by a supposed terrorist organization known as The Sons of Ares. After joining the Sons, his plan to take down the entire civilization is revealed, he must transform his body, become a Gold, and take down their hierarchy from within. His intentions are revealed when he states that, “Soon I’ll suffer the rage. Feel the fire lick over my heart as I see him in person once again,” (Brown, 120). This conflict is the book’s major external conflict.
As for Darrow’s internal struggles he suffers from a horrible struggle with his identity. After his wife is executed he is recruited by The Sons of Ares. When he is recruited they tell him that he is going to infiltrate the Gold’s society and rise through the ranks to take it down from within. In order to become a Gold, Darrow’s entire body needed to be surgically modified. After months of surgeries and unimaginable pain, Darrow looks like a Gold, “it’s hard to look at myself in the mirror. I’m what I know the devil to be. I am arrogance and cruelty, the sort of man who killed my wife. I am Gold. And am as cold as it,” (Brown, 93). With his new appearance however, he struggles with a complete loss of identity, with his new face he realizes that he is no longer himself and if his wife were alive she would be unable to recognize him. At the point we are at he has infiltrated the Gold’s society and is still struggling to figure out who the new Darrow is.
In conclusion, Red Rising has been full of conflict. In the beginning Darrow’s personality conflicted with his uncle’s and he as a person conflicted with the Gamma clan. After the death of his wife Darrow’s major external conflict shifted to the structure of society itself and focused on its elite, the Golds. Finally his internal struggle has been one of identity, with his new body he does not know who he is and is torn between his former life as a Helldiver and a loving husband, and his new life as a terrorist pretending to be one of society’s elites so that he may change the entire social structure of civilization.
Safety vs. Freedom
In Red Rising the trade-off between safety and freedom is, the free will of the lower class. In the novel the upper class (known as the Golds) hold themselves above the other colors and believe themselves superior. In order to save themselves from destruction by the Golds, the lower colors give up their free will, to the Golds. The struggle between safety and freedom comes in the form of the terrorist group, the Sons of Ares. This struggle is the major conflict of the book and the reason for Darrow to infiltrate the Golds. In our own society we see the concept of safety vs. freedom playing out with the controversy that surrounded the NSA a few years ago. Americans didn’t want to sacrifice the freedom of their privacy for the supposed safety they offered. In Red Rising the Golds have been in power ever since they conquered the planet Earth and have placed themselves at the top of society. The lower colors have been selectively bred to have traits that suite the golds. In this new society Blacks are the muscle, Greens are the brains, and Reds are the miners/slaves. All of the lower colors have purposes that make the Gold’s lives easier. The lower colors settle for this type of tyrannical treatment because they know that this is the cost of safety. If the lower colors ever cut themselves free of the Golds, the Golds would obliterate them. In the case of the Reds however the paradigm is slightly altered. The Reds are kept as slaves without knowing it, they believe they are creating a planet that is safe for the other colors to live on. Though as the book has shown, all of the other colors already live on the planet and the Reds are just kept as slaves for the society. They are unaware of the trade-off yet they are the ones most affected by it. If the Reds as a whole ever found out their society were being kept as slaves they would be eliminated by the Golds regardless of their usefulness. Eo saw right through the Gold’s plan, she saw that they were slaves to the Golds. Eo realized that they needed to break the chains and take charge. However, when Eo took her first act to doing this she was murdered by some of the highest Golds, (Brown, 34, 42, 43). The conflict in the safety/freedom trade-off is the Sons of Ares as well as Darrow himself. Much like District 13 in The Hunger Games the Sons are not strong enough to directly attack the society so they find a champion for their rebellion, Darrow is their champion. Unlike District 13 however their champion does not lead an open rebellion. Darrow infiltrates the Gold society and enrolls in their most prestigious school (that teaches children by dropping them in medieval-like castles and telling them to conquer all other castles). While in the school’s death game Darrow changes the very idea of the game. Originally when an enemy castle is conquered all of the enemy soldiers were turned into slaves and had to obey the commands of their conquerors. Darrow was exiled from his castle and he set about freeing conquered slaves and using them to build an army based on loyalty, instead of subservience. With this unique approach Darrow was able to conquer all other castles and win the game, all with the loyalty of his army, “‘would you let me whip you bloody, Apollo? Darrow did. Let me whip you, and I’ll obey like a Pink. Promise on the graves of my ancestors,” (Brown, 323). This shows that even as a gold he revolts against the values of the Golds, he shows the inferiority of their society by conquering their game with a new way of leadership. In our own society we see the line between freedom and safety drawn firmly in our emails and browser histories. Several years ago when details of the NSA’s actions were leaked to the public the country was in an uproar. The American people did not want their digital lives to be read by anyone, whether or not this could possibly assist with the fight against terrorism. This really says a lot about the real world tradeoff between safety and freedom. People would rather their interactions online not be in any way monitored because they believe it infringes on their personal rights more than it aids a war on terror. This really speaks to the differences between fiction and real life. In Red Rising the lower colors have completely submitted to the Golds, granted this is to save themselves from utter destruction by the Golds, but the thought of rebellion has hardly even entered their minds. This seems to show that in order for the trade-off of safety and freedom to be considered worthwhile, lives must be tangibly at stake. On the local scale the safety freedom trade off is probably most obvious with the school’s new security systems. Only a few years ago, the majority of the school’s doors were unlocked all during school hours and there was a side door available for students to get directly into the high school wing. Since then the tragedies at schools have begun happening more and more frequently, security has been tightened, doors are locked, and the high schooler’s easy way into the school is now closely monitored. This seems like the most worthwhile tradeoff between power and safety, the enhanced security only comes as a mild inconvenience to the school, and it does increase the relative safety of the students.
Exploring Utopian Society: What makes this society Utopian? In Red Rising the society has a very skewed definition of utopia. The society has advanced technology and space travel is commonplace which, in lots of dystopian novels is incredibly common. The societal hierarchy also contributes to a very odd type of utopian society, initially it seems that they have built the ultimate Marxist-communistic community. In their society everyone has their role, they are defined by their color, there is no legitimate government, and payment usually isn’t monetary, at least with the Reds, they seem to have their own type of barter system. Throughout this book it shows that humans aren’t inherently good or inherently bad, they just seem to be inherently selfish, any sort of empathy is learned. It seems that utopian societies don’t actually collapse, when they collapse they aren’t necessarily utopian societies, they simply seemed perfect and as the flaws began to show themselves the society starts to crumble.
The utopian society in Red Rising is built on two very distinct features. First is technology, the society has advanced so far that space travel is not only common, but they have colonized the entire solar system. The advanced technology is most likely what allowed for the Golds to conquer the rest of society and install their semi-marxist government. The semi-marxist government is the second feature. In their society everyone has their own role, or “color”, that they are born to, even if the colors don’t know why they have these roles, they simply do as they were born to do. For example, the Reds are the lowborn of society, the high-Reds, or the elites, are those that get to live on the surface of the planet as garbagemen, or janitors. On the other hand the low-Reds are the miners of Mars and the dregs of society, they live below the surface of the planet mining for their entire lives, and don’t even know that theirs is a civilization of slaves.
The society began to crumble as soon as the Laurel was passed off to the Gammas once again. This is when the fire was ignited in Darrow’s mind. He had worked so hard for absolutely nothing. However, this was only the first spark towards the rising of Reds, it was pushed further once Eo and Darrow saw the surface of Mars for the first time. Eo started implanting ideas of living for more and pushing past the known boundaries into Darrow’s mind. Darrow however, didn’t buy any of these ideas until it was too late. The final straw was when Darrow saw his wife whipped for setting foot on the surface of Mars, and later on hung for singing a song. Darrow finally saw what the Golds really were, monsters, they took everything he cared about.
In conclusion, Red Rising is not a textbook dystopia. The book’s seemingly utopian society is based upon two tenants, advanced technology and a pseudo-marxist communistic society. The advanced technology in the book allowed for the Golds to assert their dominance over the rest of society and make sure their rule is unchallenged. The communist society reflects Karl Marx’s view of a utopia, no formal government, everyone is born to their role, and there is little to no monetary significance. The utopian facade starts to crumble when the low-Red miner Darrow, joins the only resistance to the “utopian” society. Through his journey you discover that humans are not inherently good or evil, humans are simply born selfish, and must learn to care. In terms of the collapse of utopian society, perfection is inherently unstable, the only type of utopian society that has the power to stay, is one that is not a utopian society at all, but a very misunderstood dystopia.
The utopian society in Red Rising is built on two very distinct features. First is technology, the society has advanced so far that space travel is not only common, but they have colonized the entire solar system. The advanced technology is most likely what allowed for the Golds to conquer the rest of society and install their semi-marxist government. The semi-marxist government is the second feature. In their society everyone has their own role, or “color”, that they are born to, even if the colors don’t know why they have these roles, they simply do as they were born to do. For example, the Reds are the lowborn of society, the high-Reds, or the elites, are those that get to live on the surface of the planet as garbagemen, or janitors. On the other hand the low-Reds are the miners of Mars and the dregs of society, they live below the surface of the planet mining for their entire lives, and don’t even know that theirs is a civilization of slaves.
The society began to crumble as soon as the Laurel was passed off to the Gammas once again. This is when the fire was ignited in Darrow’s mind. He had worked so hard for absolutely nothing. However, this was only the first spark towards the rising of Reds, it was pushed further once Eo and Darrow saw the surface of Mars for the first time. Eo started implanting ideas of living for more and pushing past the known boundaries into Darrow’s mind. Darrow however, didn’t buy any of these ideas until it was too late. The final straw was when Darrow saw his wife whipped for setting foot on the surface of Mars, and later on hung for singing a song. Darrow finally saw what the Golds really were, monsters, they took everything he cared about.
In conclusion, Red Rising is not a textbook dystopia. The book’s seemingly utopian society is based upon two tenants, advanced technology and a pseudo-marxist communistic society. The advanced technology in the book allowed for the Golds to assert their dominance over the rest of society and make sure their rule is unchallenged. The communist society reflects Karl Marx’s view of a utopia, no formal government, everyone is born to their role, and there is little to no monetary significance. The utopian facade starts to crumble when the low-Red miner Darrow, joins the only resistance to the “utopian” society. Through his journey you discover that humans are not inherently good or evil, humans are simply born selfish, and must learn to care. In terms of the collapse of utopian society, perfection is inherently unstable, the only type of utopian society that has the power to stay, is one that is not a utopian society at all, but a very misunderstood dystopia.
Discuss the ways in which your novel is dystopian. How did your novel move from a utopian society to a dystopian society? Why do you think this utopian society was unsuccessful?