“After all, company loyalty is attractive in a man”

Joshua Krook is an emerging Australian writer and academic. He has been described as “softly spoken, very smart” by The Guardian. He can be located on Twitter at: https://twitter.com/JoshKrook
Since his early twenties, Krook has been heavily influenced by the Western classics, and new forms of rhythmic, sparse prose. He grew up reading a range of authors, including F. Scott Fitzgerald, Lily King and Haruki Murakami. Krook studied history and law at the University of Sydney, before going on to study a PhD in law at Adelaide. His travels to foreign cities, including Berlin, London, Oxford and Guilin, have had a big impact on his writing themes.

Joshua Krook’s Black Friday 2050 is everything a contemporary reader wants. It’s a cry at the state of the world, an exaggerated and exasperated howl at the capitalist abuse of the lower classes and the absolute legacy of reproductive labour-power our society thrives so desperately on… but I am getting ahead of myself. First and foremost this novel embraces what we love so enthusiastically about draconian dystopian fiction. The fear that society will end up brainwashed and unable to escape from the totalitarianism of corrupt governments and corporations, whilst there also being that unnecessary but ever-present curiosity within us that want’s to explore.. what if? Black Friday 2050 wreaks havoc on your self-doubts and curiosity, paying homage to Orwell’s 1984 in a drastic yet nostalgic way. From 1984 to 2050, nothing is as it seems, and no one is safe. 

‘I found a paper note stuck on my fridge door.

THEY ARE WATCHING YOU

BLACK FRIDAY 2050′

‘In 2050, pleasure if the drug of choice,’ reads the first line of the blurb on Goodreads. I disagree. In 2050, pleasure and instant gratification is the drug you have thrust upon you. There is no choice.

In 2050, you are never alone. Your technology is an ever-present and all-consuming aspect of your life. Controlled by the gratification of notifications, mind-numbing content being streamed all-over the walls in your stair well and surfaces inside your home, the Black-Mirror-esc design of protagonist Jack Preston’s world sounds terrible at best. 

‘Dr. Postman killed on the way to work. Now this. Woman marries dolphin. Now this. Tsunami hits India. Now this. Seleucia loses ten kilos. Now this. Now this.’

But Jack is trying his best. Unlike the gormless drones around him, Jack has had an accident which effects his dopamine levels. He struggles to connect with those around him and finds it difficult to get excited by technology and the ‘next-big-thing.’ Whilst his wife, friends, and colleagues all thrive off work, technology and whatever the newest thing to buy happens to be, Jack seems to long for something different, and quickly his bosses notice this, and decide that something must be done. Those who lose touch with technology are called the disconnected, and they are treated as freaks and rejected from society.

‘I would go to bed feeling stressed and anxious and wake up the same way. Empty of ambition. Indecisive. Paralysed by life.

Freak

Outcast

In the last few years, people had been lynched for less. The disconnected, they were called – people who could not or would not connect with new technologies.’

From Jack’s wife cheating on him and treating him terribly, his bosses manipulating him as well as his co-workers and the poorest in society living under ground or in abandoned buildings being controlled and manipulated by marketing campaigns, Krook’s future world is daunting and disturbing.

‘When your life if empty, even a cigarette feels like company. The poor were vulnerable to low-end addictive products. Anything that gave them that instant hit of joy was a winner. If only I had come up with the campaign myself.’

However, pretty much immediately one recognises parts of the story as something entirely Orwellian. Krook plays with some of the same concepts as Orwell’s ‘1984’ in an obvious but genius way, turn away from hatred and leaning more into sex and gratification as a way to control society at large.

‘For one hour a day, there was no rules – you could be whoever you wanted to be and do whatever you wanted to do.’

In Orwells 1984 a famous part of protagonist Winston’s day includes the 3-minute hate, where all employees and members of ‘The Party’ are encouraged to get severely angry at the traitors and terrorists who threaten the party. For three minutes everyone enters a room, stomps around yelling and infecting each other with their rage, then calmly heading back to work. All emotions released for one day, and then they must wait for the next day to get angry all over again. Krook inserts something a little more satisfying into his novel… The Pleasure Hour. Whilst this hour has connotations of something like ‘The Purge,’ it appears most people opt to eat too much, do loads of drugs, drink too much or have sexual encounters with whoever they want (married or not). The pleasure hour is designed to give everyone instant gratification, then when the hour is up, they head straight back to their desks, pulling on their attire and donning their usual appearances as though nothing had occurred.

‘A loud bell interrupted my thoughts. It sounded three times before anyone moved. Then, as one, my colleagues and I stood up, making our way towards the stairs. The stairs led down into a central dining hall. […] I usually found Pleasure Hour alluring but today there was something grotesque about it.’

Alongside Pleasure hour and the 3-minute hate, there are a myriad of similarities between the two novels that one cannot ignore (if you know 1984 as well as I do that is), however I do not think this is a case of ‘re-doing what Orwell did,’ on the contrary, I see Krook’s novel as a revival of literature acknowledging capitalist abuse of the lower classes. Krook takes a ruddy big highlighter pen and scribbles a huge circle around: Marketing constructs, social media, and how our use of technology is addictive and can ruin lives. A topic that is mostly ignored in day-to-day society. But as more and more people delete Facebook or remove snap-chat or instragram apps from their phone due to the incessant and never-ending marketing material and adverts being rammed down their throats, society is slowly and quietly dividing. Krook has noticed this, as well as plenty of other societal flaws that he has stitched into this novel. 

‘Eat less, eat more, win the lottery, give to charity, pollute the earth, save the earth, be emotional, be cold, be fearless, be alive, have a funeral, have a baptism, join the army, join the peace corps, get a haircut, get a lobotomy.’

Krook’s novel is a revival of a particular type of fiction; a loud dystopian endo-text which seeks to show us the problems in our society. From the perennial reproduction of labour-power to the capitalist abuse marketing companies inflict on the world, Krook has inspired me. This novel is something powerful, poignant, and speaks of awkward and disturbing societal truths. Krooks is the Orwell of 2022, and nothing could tell me otherwise.

‘Black Friday 2050.

Come and Fulfil your hearts desire.

We know what you want.

We have been watching you.’