What Not: A Prophetic Comedy
Second impression, 1919
What Not: A Prophetic Comedy (1918) by Rose Macaulay is a pioneering feminist dystopian satire set in a post-war England governed by the authoritarian "Ministry of Brains," an agency that classifies citizens by intelligence and regulates marriage to engineer a more capable population. Written decades before Brave New World and Nineteen Eighty-Four, the novel anticipates both in its portrayal of eugenics, social control, and the bureaucratic management of private life.
This is the second impression, published by Constable in 1919, with the expurgated text. The original 1918 printing was withdrawn after a powerful newspaper magnate threatened a libel suit over passages depicting a press proprietor attempting political blackmail. The offending passages were excised before the book was reissued.
Hardcover. First Edition, Second Impression. Octavo, blue-gray cloth, front panel stamped in black and blind, spine panel stamped in black. London: Constable and Company Ltd., 1919. #10572.
Age darkening to cloth, especially along spine. Wear with shallow chipping at spine ends. Rear hinge and spine panel have been carefully repaired with glue. Overall a good example of this scarce early example of dystopian literature.
This is the second impression, published by Constable in 1919, with the expurgated text. The original 1918 printing was withdrawn after a powerful newspaper magnate threatened a libel suit over passages depicting a press proprietor attempting political blackmail. The offending passages were excised before the book was reissued.
Hardcover. First Edition, Second Impression. Octavo, blue-gray cloth, front panel stamped in black and blind, spine panel stamped in black. London: Constable and Company Ltd., 1919. #10572.
Age darkening to cloth, especially along spine. Wear with shallow chipping at spine ends. Rear hinge and spine panel have been carefully repaired with glue. Overall a good example of this scarce early example of dystopian literature.
Additional Details
What Not is Rose Macaulay’s early feminist dystopian satire of post–First World War England, a sharp and often prescient novel now recognized as a precursor to both Brave New World and Nineteen Eighty-Four. The story imagines a Britain governed by the Mental Progress Act, which requires all citizens to undergo intelligence testing and assigns them official grades. To prevent the birth of “stupid” children, lower-scoring individuals face punitive regulations, including taxes so severe that many infants are surrendered to the Ministry of Brains. Within this system, senior civil servant Kitty Grammont, certified as an A for breeding purposes, finds herself unable to marry the politically ambitious Nicholas Chester, who has concealed the fact that mental deficiency runs in his family, rendering him uncertificated for marriage under the Act's terms. That Chester, while publicly administering a system that bars others on exactly these grounds, has secretly married Kitty himself is the novel's central secret and the source of its climactic confrontation. Macaulay’s blend of near-future speculation and satirical wit places her among the earliest British writers, especially among women, to examine eugenics, state oversight, and the bureaucratic control of private life within a dystopian framework.
The novel’s publication history is a little dystopian in its own right. Constable printed the first edition in 1918, but the book was swiftly withdrawn after a powerful newspaper magnate took offense at passages that struck too close to home and threatened a libel suit. Speculation strongly suggests the offended figure was Lord Beaverbrook, whose political influence and control of major newspapers would have made this kind of threat credible. Beaverbrook was also serving as Minister of Information in 1918, underscoring the novel’s satire of propaganda and press influence.
Two sections were targeted for removal. On page 204, a single sentence originally made light of a newspaper that profited so handsomely from its scandalous stories that it could afford “a good round sum for libel now and then.” This was replaced with a more flattering sentence that portrayed the figure as “the People’s friend.” The more substantial cuts occur on pages 208–209, which originally included an extended scene of a newspaper editor attempting to blackmail a government official. Macaulay was instructed to alter the text without requiring the plates to be reset, and her solution is characteristically pointed: she replaces the missing scene with a self-aware aside noting that the conversation “will not be recorded in these pages,” followed by a dryly ironic catalogue of other historically consequential conversations similarly withheld from public view. The result reads as a thinly veiled protest against the censorship itself.
As a result of the suppression, the novel was not reissued until 1919, and with little advertising at the time it was largely overlooked. The episode likely contributed to Macaulay’s decision to leave Constable; her next book, Potterism (1920), another satire of media influence and public opinion, was published by Collins.
What Not stands as a remarkably early entry in British dystopian fiction, anticipating later works concerned with reproductive control, social engineering, and the intrusion of the state into private life. Its satirical treatment of propaganda, censorship, and the power of the press still resonates long after its original publication. Long overlooked, the novel drew renewed attention when Handheld Press restored the suppressed text for their 2019 unexpurgated edition, working from a single known evidentiary copy of the withdrawn 1918 issue, which is the Sadleir copy now in this collection.
The novel’s publication history is a little dystopian in its own right. Constable printed the first edition in 1918, but the book was swiftly withdrawn after a powerful newspaper magnate took offense at passages that struck too close to home and threatened a libel suit. Speculation strongly suggests the offended figure was Lord Beaverbrook, whose political influence and control of major newspapers would have made this kind of threat credible. Beaverbrook was also serving as Minister of Information in 1918, underscoring the novel’s satire of propaganda and press influence.
Two sections were targeted for removal. On page 204, a single sentence originally made light of a newspaper that profited so handsomely from its scandalous stories that it could afford “a good round sum for libel now and then.” This was replaced with a more flattering sentence that portrayed the figure as “the People’s friend.” The more substantial cuts occur on pages 208–209, which originally included an extended scene of a newspaper editor attempting to blackmail a government official. Macaulay was instructed to alter the text without requiring the plates to be reset, and her solution is characteristically pointed: she replaces the missing scene with a self-aware aside noting that the conversation “will not be recorded in these pages,” followed by a dryly ironic catalogue of other historically consequential conversations similarly withheld from public view. The result reads as a thinly veiled protest against the censorship itself.
As a result of the suppression, the novel was not reissued until 1919, and with little advertising at the time it was largely overlooked. The episode likely contributed to Macaulay’s decision to leave Constable; her next book, Potterism (1920), another satire of media influence and public opinion, was published by Collins.
What Not stands as a remarkably early entry in British dystopian fiction, anticipating later works concerned with reproductive control, social engineering, and the intrusion of the state into private life. Its satirical treatment of propaganda, censorship, and the power of the press still resonates long after its original publication. Long overlooked, the novel drew renewed attention when Handheld Press restored the suppressed text for their 2019 unexpurgated edition, working from a single known evidentiary copy of the withdrawn 1918 issue, which is the Sadleir copy now in this collection.
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