I’ve looked over what I wrote yesterday and I see it…

““I’ve looked over what I wrote yesterday and I see it wasn’t as clear as it should be. It’s perfectly clear for any of us, I mean. But who knows? Maybe you unknown people who’ll get my notes when the INTEGRAL brings them—maybe you’ve read the great book of civilization only up to the page our ancestors reached about 900 years ago. Maybe you don’t even know the basics—like the Table of Hours, Personal Hours, Maternal Norm, Green Wall, Benefactor. It feels funny to me, and at the same time it’s very hard to talk about all this. It’s just as if a writer of the twentieth century, for instance, had to explain in his novel what he meant by “jacket” or “apartment” or “wife.” Still, if his novel was translated for savages, there’s no way he could write “jacket” without putting in a note. ... But what of that? After man’s tail fell off, it was probably some little while before he learned to shoo away the flies without a tail. I don’t doubt that during that first time he probably missed his tail. But now—can you even imagine yourself with a tail? Or: Can you imagine yourself walking down the street naked—without your “jacket”? (Maybe you still run around in “jackets.”) Well, it’s the same here: I can’t imagine a city that isn’t girdled about with a Green Wall. I can’t imagine a life that isn’t clad in the numerical robes of the Table.””

— Yevgeny Zamyatin