''The Last American'' is a short illustrated

future history A future history is a postulated history of the future and is used by authors of science fiction and other speculative fiction to construct a common background for fiction. Sometimes the author publishes a timeline of events in the history, whi ...

novel by

John Ames Mitchell John Ames Mitchell (January 17, 1845 – June 29, 1918) was an American publisher, architect, artist and novelist. He was co-founder, editor, and publisher of the original ''Life'' magazine, in which he was a contributing artist, and the au ...

(1845–1918).

Overview

First published in 1889, the novel is the fictional journal of a

Persian Persian may refer to: * People and things from Iran, historically called ''Persia'' in the English language ** Persians, the majority ethnic group in Iran, not to be conflated with the Iranic peoples ** Persian language, an Iranian language of the ...

explorer named Khan-Li, who sails across the

Atlantic The Atlantic Ocean is the second-largest of the world's five oceans, with an area of about . It covers approximately 20% of Earth's surface and about 29% of its water surface area. It is known to separate the " Old World" of Africa, Europe an ...

in 2951 and rediscovers America. Beginning around 1960, the world was devastated by drastic climatic changes, with

North America North America is a continent in the Northern Hemisphere and almost entirely within the Western Hemisphere. It is bordered to the north by the Arctic Ocean, to the east by the Atlantic Ocean, to the southeast by South America and the Car ...

becoming virtually uninhabitable; these had later partially reversed themselves, though the Persian explorers find the East Coast at the latitude of New York unbearably hot. Most of the narrative consists of a satirical and unflattering view of late 19th-century American society through the eyes of the Persians, who are simultaneously impressed by its grandeur and contemptuous of social developments Mitchell did not approve of; these included the equality of the sexes and the presence in America of the Irish, who apparently came to dominate it after a "Massacre of the Protestants" in 1927. During its final decades, the US had been ruled by a "Murphy Dynasty," with the Persians finding a late coin from 1957 bearing a harp on one side and the portrait of an Irish dictator on the other. The 1893 edition is a small hardcover book with 78 numbered pages. It is illustrated with half-page etchings inserted into the text and a few full-page etchings. One shows a reconstructed street scene with "costumes and manner of riding... taken from metal plates now in the museum at

Teheran Tehran (; fa, تهران ) is the largest city in Tehran Province and the capital of Iran. With a population of around 9 million in the city and around 16 million in the larger metropolitan area of Greater Tehran, Tehran is the most populo ...

"; clearly indicating newspaper advertisements from a print shop. Another, "The Wooden God," is a

cigar store Indian The cigar store Indian or wooden Indian is an advertisement figure, in the likeness of a Native American, used to represent tobacconists. The figures are often three-dimensional wooden sculptures several feet tall – up to life-sized. They are ...

; and "The Ruins of the Great Temple" shows a devastated Capitol Building.

Analysis

The book is, on the one hand, a

satirical Satire is a genre of the visual, literary, and performing arts, usually in the form of fiction and less frequently non-fiction, in which vices, follies, abuses, and shortcomings are held up to ridicule, often with the intent of shaming or e ...

look at ways and customs of the United States as reconstructed from the ruins and the Persians' own spotty histories of the long-past era. It also seems to be a

spoof Spoof, spoofs, spoofer, or spoofing may refer to: * Forgery of goods or documents * Semen, in Australian slang * Spoof (game), a guessing game * Spoofing (finance), a disruptive algorithmic-trading tactic designed to manipulate markets __NOTOC__ ...

of the archaeological discoveries that were being made at the time. All of the Persians have

farcical Farce is a comedy that seeks to entertain an audience through situations that are highly exaggerated, extravagant, ridiculous, absurd, and improbable. Farce is also characterized by heavy use of physical humor; the use of deliberate absurdity or ...

names (Nōz-yt-ahl is the name of a historian, for example) and often speak in breathless wonder at what they see. ''The Last American'' is among the anti-utopian disaster literature published in the late 19th century, along with

Ignatius Donnelly Ignatius Loyola Donnelly (November 3, 1831 – January 1, 1901) was an American Congressman, populist writer, and fringe scientist. He is known primarily now for his fringe theories concerning Atlantis, Catastrophism (especially the idea of an a ...

's ''

Caesar's Column ''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 categorize ...

'' and Park Benjamin Jr.'s ''The End of New York''.

Montesquieu Charles Louis de Secondat, Baron de La Brède et de Montesquieu (; ; 18 January 168910 February 1755), generally referred to as simply Montesquieu, was a French judge, man of letters, historian, and political philosopher. He is the principa ...

's ''

Persian Letters ''Persian Letters'' (french: Lettres persanes) is a literary work, published in 1721, by Charles de Secondat, baron de Montesquieu, recounting the experiences of two fictional Persian noblemen, Usbek and Rica, who spend several years in France ...

'' may have provided some degree of inspiration. In its own turn, the book seems to have been a rough model for

Aldous Huxley Aldous Leonard Huxley (26 July 1894 – 22 November 1963) was an English writer and philosopher. He wrote nearly 50 books, both novels and non-fiction works, as well as wide-ranging essays, narratives, and poems. Born into the prominent Huxley ...

's ''

Ape and Essence ''Ape and Essence'' (1948) is a novel by Aldous Huxley, published by Chatto & Windus in the UK and Harper & Brothers in the US. It is set in a dystopia, as is ''Brave New World'', Huxley's more famous work. It is largely a satire of the rise ...

''.

Dedication

The dedication on the novella changed between the first edition in 1889 and the edition of 1902: the first through eighth editions have the following dedication:

TO THE AMERICAN WHO IS MORE THAN SATISFIED WITH HIMSELF AND HIS COUNTRY THIS VOLUME IS AFFECTIONATELY DEDICATED.

...In the 1902 edition, this was changed to:

TO THOSE THOUGHTFUL PERSIANS WHO CAN READ A WARNING IN THE SUDDEN RISE AND SWIFT EXTINCTION OF A FOOLISH PEOPLE THIS VOLUME IS DEDICATED

References

External links

* * 1889 American novels 1889 science fiction novels American science fiction novels Post-apocalyptic novels Novels set in the 30th century {{specf-novel-stub