Ecotopia: An Audio Novel

The importance of this book isn’t so much to be found in its literary form as in the lively imagination of an alternative & ecologically sound lifestyle on a greater scale, presented more or less realistically. It expressed on paper the dream of an alternative future held by many in the movements of the 1970s & later. Even the names of the two characters most reflective of their respective viewpoints–“Will West(on)”, the representative for materialist American culture & “Vera Allwen” (“Truth for All Time”), the President & spokeswoman for Ecotopia–suggest the degree to which the author intended the book to be a reflection of American ecological & cultural deficiencies.
Worth mentioning is Callenbach’s speculation on the roles of TV in his envisioned society. In some ways anticipating C-SPAN, which would 1st be broadcast in 1979, & reality tv, which would not emerge as a fact for another two decades, the story mentions that the daily life of the legislature & some of that of the judicial courts is televised in Ecotopia, & even highly technical debates addressed the needs & desires of the viewers.
Another interesting feature in the novel is “print on demand” (POD) publishing. In the novel, customers could choose a literary work from a jukebox-like device that would then print & bind the book. In the 21st century, POD services such as Lulu.com that print, bind & ship books for customers who order on-line, have become commonplace.
In contrast to much of the Green movement in contemporary America with its preference for regulation, however, Callenbach’s Ecotopia has relatively laissez-faire economic tendencies.
In 1981, Callenbach published Ecotopia Emerging, a multi-strand prequel suggesting how the sustainable nation of Ecotopia could have come into existence.
In 1990, Audio Renaissance released a partial dramatization of Ecotopia on audiocassettes in the form of recordings of a radio network broadcast (Allied News Network replacing the Times-Post). The tape-recorded diaries of William Weston were read by the book’s author, Ernest Callenbach. Weston’s reports were read by veteran news reporter Edwin Newman.
Ecotopia is now required reading in a number of colleges (see NY Times article The Novel That Predicted Portland),