BILLENIUMBy James G Ballard

Camila Kos & Jimena Timpanaro

Meeting James G Ballard

James Graham Ballard was born on November the 15th, 1930 and died on April the 19th, 2009. He was an english novelist, short story and essayst. He was born in Shangai, China during the 2WW. He was taken to a concentration camp. In 1946 he and his family moved to Great Britain and he started to study medicine but he didn’t complete the studies. Years after, he started working as a writer.

Characters Ward: He is a lonely character. He is faraway from his family. He works in a

library and at the beginning of the stor, he lived in a cublicle. He is friend of Rossiter. Then he goes to live to his house because he had an argument with the cublicle’s landlord. There he discovers tghe secret room breaking the wall as a result of his anger after the discussion. At the end of the story he regrets of the idea they had of letting the girls and their family live with them, becoming a powerful landlord.

Rossiter: He is friend of Ward and he lives in a kind of a cubicle but bigger. He is the one who has the idea of inviting the girls to live in the large roomwith Ward snd him asking for a small rent. He finishes feeling like the owner of the room when he wasn’t.

Helen and Judith: They were Ward’s workmates. The girls had an argument with the landlords of their cubicles so they were living in a broom cupboard. Finally they lived with Rossiter, Ward, John and one of the girl’s parents.

Relevance of the title

The amount of people living in the city The time in the future that these people will be living where overpopulation

will be the biggest problem or threat to human race. The story describes a situation of a moment in the future when the

population of the world has grown so much that there’s no space for people to live a normal life

This is so abnormal that even the space that each person can occupy is regulated by the city council.

Tone

Pessimistic: This is pessimistic because of the kind of life they have. Also because we can see that the characters live under quite negative conditions and they can’t have any hope for the future because they know that the situation that they are living is never going to improve. The idea that the cubicles will be smaller, also show us pessimism in the story. “Over a hundred people lived in the top of three floors of the old rooming house”

Themes

Overpopulation/ Lack of social responsibility: This theme is perfectly shown all along the story because the main topic of the story is overpopulation. There´s a lot of people living in the city so people have to live in small cubicles and they have no privacy. Overpopulation is a result of lack of social responsibility because of the government. Many actions in the past made them be how they are living now. It is late to change things now. The government should take control of the situations and stop encouraging people to have four children. “The world population had reached a plateau, levelling off at a 20.000 million.”

Themes

Power and loss of privacy: In this story the ones that play the role of power are the landlords. They are greedy people that own lands and that´s really important in the city. At the end of the story Rossiter and Ward became landlords. Loss of privacy refers to all the people living in the city. People don´t have space to live neither privacy because of the amount of people in the city. In the middle of the story Rossiter and Ward found a big room to stay. This made them powerful and they became landlords. Finally they lose their privacy because of the people they invited to live with them. “The partition pressed against his knees and he could hardly move”

Themes

Destruction of beauty: This is shown in the city. As their is so many people and cubicles, the beauty of the city is lost. We can also see the destruction of beauty in the room when the boys had to sell all the pieces of furniture and more specific the wardrobe that was the most beautiful furniture they had in the room. The story explores how beauty was destroy because of overpopulation. But not only with the wardrobe but also with the important buildings that they needed them to put people there to live. “Now, of course, the older buildings ad benn torn down and replaced by the housing batteries, or converted into apartment blocks”

Symbolism

The wardrobe: The Victorian wardrobe that Ward and Rossiter bought was a symbol of privacy and space for them. It’s size emphasizes the emptiness of the place. But when they started to rent the room to the girls and their relatives, they have to sell it. Days after, they realised how beautiful it was and what it meant to them, regreting their action. “It was a beautiful wardrobe, without doubt, but when it was gone it would make the room seem even larger.”

The cublcle: It symbolises something insignificant. It was the only thiing they could have and the small rivacy they had. However, in a way finally Ward loses it so he couldn’t even have that. It also symbolises the amount of people and the city overcrowded. As a conclusion, it symbolises honor and a bit of privacy. Although Ward couldn’t have that and he mises it. “’I hear they may reduce the allocation to three and a half metres.’ Rossiter remarked.”