Caesar's Column
Encyclopedia
Caesar's Column: A Story of the Twentieth Century is a novel by Ignatius Donnelly
, famous as the author of Atlantis: The Antediluvian World
. Caesar's Column was published pseudonymously
in 1890
. The book has been variously categorized as science fiction
, speculative fiction
, dystopian fiction
, and/or apocalyptic fiction; one critic has termed it an "Apocalyptic Utopia."
The book is also a political novel, and a romance. It was a popular success as well, selling 60,000 copies upon its initial publication. Its sales eventually comprised 250,000 copies. Donnelly's novel was one element of the great wave of utopian and dystopian literature during the later nineteenth century and the early twentieth, exemplified by works like Edward Bellamy
's Looking Backward
and Jack London
's The Iron Heel
.
Populism
. During 1892, two years after the publication of his novel, Donnelly drafted the platform of the Populist Party
, in which he wrote,
This is the world view
of Caesar's Column: a man comes from his rural environment to the heart of a brutal capitalist
oligarchy
; he sees its corruptions firsthand, and witnesses its destruction.
Donnelly's novel partly concerns the debated question of the alleged anti-Semitism
of the Populist movement. Donnelly's villain is an Italian Jew — but his protagonist has a name, Weltstein, that must have suggested a Jewish identity to many readers.
is a contemporaneous example), Donnelly cast his fiction in the form of an epistolary novel
. His first-person narrator Gabriel Weltstein writes a series of letters to his brother, recounting his experiences during a 1988 visit to New York. Weltstein is a wool merchant from Uganda
(early Zionist
thinkers considered the possibility of founding a Jewish state in Uganda). Weltstein wants to avoid dealing with an international cartel and sell wool directly to American manufacturers.
Like many utopian/dystopian writers, Donnelly dwells on the technological changes of the future. Weltstein travels to New York by airship
; he is dazzled by the city's brilliant illumination, powered by tapping into the Aurora Borealis
. In the city, subways operate below transparent sidewalks. At the Hotel Darwin, Weltstein finds a televised menu to guide him among exotic choices, from edible spiders to bird's nests from China. Televised newspapers are readily available.
Weltstein soon gets into trouble, when he stops a coachman from beating a beggar. The coach belongs to Prince Cabano, formerly Jacob Isaacs, a prime figure of the ruling oligarchy; the beggar is Max Petion, actually a leader of a secret resistance organization called the Brotherhood of Destruction. Weltstein has to accept Petion's guidance into proletarian society of New York, where he learns the truth of the rapacious and oppressive social and economic order.
Gabriel meets the president of the brotherhood, Caesar Lomellini, a dangerous and ruthless fanatic and an imposing physical presence, half Italian and half Negro. (Donnelly's treatment of the character suffers from the racism
dominant in his era.) The middle section of the novel devotes attention to the romantic involvements of Gabriel and Max Petion, who rescue young women from exploitation. The two couples marry in a bucolic episode that counterpoints the scenes of urban oppression and violence that bracket it. (The four characters escape New York for Uganda at the end of the book, providing a sort of happy ending, which likely enhanced the novel's popularity.)
The Brotherhood of Destruction finally organizes a rebellion, which succeeds in deposing the oligarchs, though at the cost of massive casualties. (Technology has produced advanced weapons like "dynamite bullets" that increase the carnage.) Lomellini orders the corpses piled high in Union Square
and entombed in layers of concrete — though Lomellini himself is murdered as the mass grave is started. Gabriel Weltstein, fleeing New York by airship, looks back to see the vast cityscape in flames, while the mass grave — Caesar's column — rises through the smoke.
Ignatius Donnelly
Ignatius Loyola Donnelly was a U.S. Congressman, populist writer and amateur scientist, known primarily now for his theories concerning Atlantis, Catastrophism , and Shakespearean authorship, all of which modern historians consider to be pseudoscience and pseudohistory...
, famous as the author of Atlantis: The Antediluvian World
Atlantis: The Antediluvian World
Atlantis: The Antediluvian World is a book published during 1882 by Minnesota populist politician Ignatius L. Donnelly, who was born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania during 1831...
. Caesar's Column was published pseudonymously
Pseudonym
A pseudonym is a name that a person assumes for a particular purpose and that differs from his or her original orthonym...
in 1890
1890 in literature
The year 1890 in literature involved some significant new books.-Events:* Bram Stoker begins work on Dracula.*Arthur Morrison joins the staff of the Evening Globe newspaper.-New books:*Rolf Boldrewood - The Squatter's Dream...
. The book has been variously categorized as science fiction
Science fiction
Science fiction is a genre of fiction dealing with imaginary but more or less plausible content such as future settings, futuristic science and technology, space travel, aliens, and paranormal abilities...
, speculative fiction
Speculative fiction
Speculative fiction is an umbrella term encompassing the more fantastical fiction genres, specifically science fiction, fantasy, horror, supernatural fiction, superhero fiction, utopian and dystopian fiction, apocalyptic and post-apocalyptic fiction, and alternate history in literature as well as...
, dystopian fiction
Utopian and dystopian fiction
The utopia and its offshoot, the dystopia, are genres of literature that explore social and political structures. Utopian fiction is the creation of an ideal world, or utopia, as the setting for a novel. Dystopian fiction is the opposite: creation of a nightmare world, or dystopia...
, and/or apocalyptic fiction; one critic has termed it an "Apocalyptic Utopia."
The book is also a political novel, and a romance. It was a popular success as well, selling 60,000 copies upon its initial publication. Its sales eventually comprised 250,000 copies. Donnelly's novel was one element of the great wave of utopian and dystopian literature during the later nineteenth century and the early twentieth, exemplified by works like Edward Bellamy
Edward Bellamy
Edward Bellamy was an American author and socialist, most famous for his utopian novel, Looking Backward, set in the year 2000. He was a very influential writer during the Gilded Age of United States history.-Early life:...
's Looking Backward
Looking Backward
Looking Backward: 2000-1887 is a utopian science fiction novel by Edward Bellamy, a lawyer and writer from western Massachusetts; it was first published in 1887...
and Jack London
Jack London
John Griffith "Jack" London was an American author, journalist, and social activist. He was a pioneer in the then-burgeoning world of commercial magazine fiction and was one of the first fiction writers to obtain worldwide celebrity and a large fortune from his fiction alone...
's The Iron Heel
The Iron Heel
The Iron Heel is a dystopian novel by American writer Jack London, first published in 1908.Generally considered to be "the earliest of the modern Dystopian", it chronicles the rise of an oligarchic tyranny in the United States. It is arguably the novel in which Jack London's socialist views are...
.
Politics
Caesar's Column is partly based on Donnelly's commitment to agrarianAgrarianism
Agrarianism has two common meanings. The first meaning refers to a social philosophy or political philosophy which values rural society as superior to urban society, the independent farmer as superior to the paid worker, and sees farming as a way of life that can shape the ideal social values...
Populism
Populism
Populism can be defined as an ideology, political philosophy, or type of discourse. Generally, a common theme compares "the people" against "the elite", and urges social and political system changes. It can also be defined as a rhetorical style employed by members of various political or social...
. During 1892, two years after the publication of his novel, Donnelly drafted the platform of the Populist Party
Populist Party (United States)
The People's Party, also known as the "Populists", was a short-lived political party in the United States established in 1891. It was most important in 1892-96, then rapidly faded away...
, in which he wrote,
- "A vast conspiracy against mankind has been organized on two continents, and it is rapidly taking possession of the world. If not met and overthrown at once it forebodes terrible social convulsions, the destruction of civilization, or the establishment of an absolute despotism."
This is the world view
World view
A comprehensive world view is the fundamental cognitive orientation of an individual or society encompassing the entirety of the individual or society's knowledge and point-of-view, including natural philosophy; fundamental, existential, and normative postulates; or themes, values, emotions, and...
of Caesar's Column: a man comes from his rural environment to the heart of a brutal capitalist
Capitalism
Capitalism is an economic system that became dominant in the Western world following the demise of feudalism. There is no consensus on the precise definition nor on how the term should be used as a historical category...
oligarchy
Oligarchy
Oligarchy is a form of power structure in which power effectively rests with an elite class distinguished by royalty, wealth, family ties, commercial, and/or military legitimacy...
; he sees its corruptions firsthand, and witnesses its destruction.
Donnelly's novel partly concerns the debated question of the alleged anti-Semitism
Anti-Semitism
Antisemitism is suspicion of, hatred toward, or discrimination against Jews for reasons connected to their Jewish heritage. According to a 2005 U.S...
of the Populist movement. Donnelly's villain is an Italian Jew — but his protagonist has a name, Weltstein, that must have suggested a Jewish identity to many readers.
The plot
As some other speculative writers did (Anna Bowman Dodd's 1887 book The Republic of the FutureThe Republic of the Future
The Republic of the Future: or, Socialism a Reality is a novella by the American writer Anna Bowman Dodd, first published in 1887. The book is a dystopia written in response to the utopian literature that was a dramatic and noteworthy feature of the second half of the nineteenth...
is a contemporaneous example), Donnelly cast his fiction in the form of an epistolary novel
Epistolary novel
An epistolary novel is a novel written as a series of documents. The usual form is letters, although diary entries, newspaper clippings and other documents are sometimes used. Recently, electronic "documents" such as recordings and radio, blogs, and e-mails have also come into use...
. His first-person narrator Gabriel Weltstein writes a series of letters to his brother, recounting his experiences during a 1988 visit to New York. Weltstein is a wool merchant from Uganda
Uganda
Uganda , officially the Republic of Uganda, is a landlocked country in East Africa. Uganda is also known as the "Pearl of Africa". It is bordered on the east by Kenya, on the north by South Sudan, on the west by the Democratic Republic of the Congo, on the southwest by Rwanda, and on the south by...
(early Zionist
Zionism
Zionism is a Jewish political movement that, in its broadest sense, has supported the self-determination of the Jewish people in a sovereign Jewish national homeland. Since the establishment of the State of Israel, the Zionist movement continues primarily to advocate on behalf of the Jewish state...
thinkers considered the possibility of founding a Jewish state in Uganda). Weltstein wants to avoid dealing with an international cartel and sell wool directly to American manufacturers.
Like many utopian/dystopian writers, Donnelly dwells on the technological changes of the future. Weltstein travels to New York by airship
Airship
An airship or dirigible is a type of aerostat or "lighter-than-air aircraft" that can be steered and propelled through the air using rudders and propellers or other thrust mechanisms...
; he is dazzled by the city's brilliant illumination, powered by tapping into the Aurora Borealis
Aurora (astronomy)
An aurora is a natural light display in the sky particularly in the high latitude regions, caused by the collision of energetic charged particles with atoms in the high altitude atmosphere...
. In the city, subways operate below transparent sidewalks. At the Hotel Darwin, Weltstein finds a televised menu to guide him among exotic choices, from edible spiders to bird's nests from China. Televised newspapers are readily available.
Weltstein soon gets into trouble, when he stops a coachman from beating a beggar. The coach belongs to Prince Cabano, formerly Jacob Isaacs, a prime figure of the ruling oligarchy; the beggar is Max Petion, actually a leader of a secret resistance organization called the Brotherhood of Destruction. Weltstein has to accept Petion's guidance into proletarian society of New York, where he learns the truth of the rapacious and oppressive social and economic order.
Gabriel meets the president of the brotherhood, Caesar Lomellini, a dangerous and ruthless fanatic and an imposing physical presence, half Italian and half Negro. (Donnelly's treatment of the character suffers from the racism
Racism
Racism is the belief that inherent different traits in human racial groups justify discrimination. In the modern English language, the term "racism" is used predominantly as a pejorative epithet. It is applied especially to the practice or advocacy of racial discrimination of a pernicious nature...
dominant in his era.) The middle section of the novel devotes attention to the romantic involvements of Gabriel and Max Petion, who rescue young women from exploitation. The two couples marry in a bucolic episode that counterpoints the scenes of urban oppression and violence that bracket it. (The four characters escape New York for Uganda at the end of the book, providing a sort of happy ending, which likely enhanced the novel's popularity.)
The Brotherhood of Destruction finally organizes a rebellion, which succeeds in deposing the oligarchs, though at the cost of massive casualties. (Technology has produced advanced weapons like "dynamite bullets" that increase the carnage.) Lomellini orders the corpses piled high in Union Square
Union Square
Union Square may refer to:Asia* Union Square * Union Square station on Dubai MetroCanada* Union Square, Nova ScotiaUnited States* Union Square, Baltimore, Maryland* Union Square * Union Square, San Francisco, California...
and entombed in layers of concrete — though Lomellini himself is murdered as the mass grave is started. Gabriel Weltstein, fleeing New York by airship, looks back to see the vast cityscape in flames, while the mass grave — Caesar's column — rises through the smoke.