Point of View

"The Sheep Look Up" is set in the near future from the point of view of the early 1970s, when the book was written. It presents a pessimistic point of view of the future of the country, in terms of the stability of the natural environment and the ability for humans to continue to live as they are.

The novel imagines what the world might be like if people continue to expand their use of cars and other polluting forms of transportation, and concludes that eventually the air pollution will be so great that the sun no longer shines through the permanent clouds and the air stings the lungs. Other forms of pollution result in acidic rainfall and unproductive farmland. The continued use of antibiotics and pesticides have caused dangerous resistant strains of disease and pests to evolve.

Although measures have been taken to curb these...