Free Will In Escape From Spiderhead By George Saunders

The short story, Escape from Spiderhead by George Saunders follows the use of emotion-altering experimental drugs such as, “Verbaluce™,” “Vivisif ™,” “Darkenfloxxon™,” “ED556” and “VeriTalk™,” on inmates in a New York facility. The story is narrated by a prisoner at the institution named Jeff. Jeff describes his experiences throughout several trials run by the leading scientist known as Abnesti. George Saunders uses pathos to probe at the theme of free will in a dystopian society in which inmates are subjected to pharmaceuticals that alter their emotions, effectively acting as a social commentary on free will and lack thereof. Chiefly, Saunders's choice of wording throughout the work alludes to a lack of free will. In order to inject subjects

Abnesti, disregards this and sends out a waiver to be approved by Albany. This is seen in the quote, “’See, that, to me, makes zero sense,’ Abnesti said. ‘What good’s an obedience drug if we need his permission to use it?”. ‘We just need a waiver’, Verlaine said”. (Saunders) Evidently, this makes it clear that Jeff was never in control, he only had the illusion of control of the emotions he was feeling. Again, this does not truly differ from the usage of drugs to inflict emotions and natural emotions. Both were being inflicted without the consent of Jeff. The uncontrollable and natural emotion of guilt quickly takes over within Jeff. Jeff explains that doing nothing would make him a “killer”. The guilt of being a killer fueled him to commit suicide rather than watch Rachel be killed infront of him. This is clearly shown in the quote, “I joined them, flew among them, they did not recognize me as something apart from them, and I was happy, so happy, because for the first time in years, and forevermore, I had not killed, and never would.” In this, it is shown that Jeff would prefer death than to live with his own guilt. Meaning that guilt is a powerful emotion that in not able to be controlled, fueling the theme of free