Man's World - (Mit Press / Radium Age) by Charlotte Haldane (Paperback)

About the Book

"In the not-too-distant future, the world is ruled by a male scientific elite. Eugenics has triumphed in this fertility dystopia; from adolescence, women are either made into "vocational mothers," or, if they have no interest in motherhood, they are sterilized by the government and become "neuters." The story introduces a young woman who rebels against this system, and a young man who resists the "happy" norm - a resistance which culminates, like the Savage's in Aldous Huxley's Brave New World, in suicide"--

Book Synopsis

In a eugenics-driven future society, will one young woman's defiance make a difference?

In the not-too-distant future, England's population quality and quantity are under scientific control: Only those deemed the fittest are permitted to procreate. Women are groomed to be "vocational mothers"--or else sterilized and put to other uses. Written by an author married to one of the world's most prominent eugenics advocates, this ambivalent adventure anticipates both Brave New World and The Handmaid's Tale. When a young woman rebels against her conditioning, can she break free?

Review Quotes

"Haunting, complex, profound, and relevant, Man's World is a compelling novel that forwards intriguing commentary on questions of gender, race, and social order."
--Foreword Reviews

"Remains deeply relevant nearly a century after it was first published."
--Reactor Magazine

"A dystopian conundrum and an alarming read. . . . A book over which Marjorie Taylor Greene and Judith Butler could break bread, and then invite the ghosts of Michel Foucault, Margaret Sanger, and Hugh Hefner for an after-dinner digestif. It's that weird."
--The New York Sun

"MIT Press's splendid Radium Age imprint of science fiction spotlights yet another eerily resonant title. . . . The new foreword is essential context."
--Zoomer Magazine

About the Author

Charlotte Haldane (1894-1969) was a journalist who advocated for divorce reform and married women's employment . . . while also idealizing motherhood. In 1926, the year that Man's World was published, she married the eminent biologist J. B. S. Haldane. Her 1927 book, Motherhood and Its Enemies, made a progressive argument for easier access to contraceptives for women . . . while enraging feminists by arguing that only after having borne children could a woman be regarded as "normal." She went on to found the Science News Service, and reported on World War II from the Russian Front.

Philippa Levine is Walter Prescott Webb Chair in History and Ideas, and Director of British, Irish, and Empire Studies at the University of Texas at Austin. She is the author of, among other books, Eugenics: A Very Short Introduction (2017), The British Empire: Sunrise to Sunset (3rd edition, 2019), and the forthcoming The Tree of Knowledge: Science, Art and the Naked Form. With Alison Bashford, she is coeditor of The Oxford Handbook of the History of Eugenics (2010).