Animal Farm is without a doubt the single most brilliant satire of a political ideology since the works of Jonathon Swift
Charles Kinbote on
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StraightziHere we may reign secure, and in my choice,To reign is worth ambition though in HellRegistered Userregular
edited February 2008
Anthony Burgess is probably my favorite author. If you liked A Clockwork Orange, do yourself a favor and pick up The wanting Seed. It is probably better, and it is still hella dystopia if you are digging that.
Thats a pretty straightforward message. I vaguely remember it being about those in power always wanting more/ abusing the power as well. Thus, demeaning the working class and causing problems for all...
humm... sounds a lot like the current Gov't in the US of A.
Thats a pretty straightforward message. I vaguely remember it being about those in power always wanting more/ abusing the power as well. Thus, demeaning the working class and causing problems for all...
Yes that is Soviet Russia for you when Stalin takes power.
I will agree with you there, Shank. It's just not all that great if you read it as pure fiction. It pretty much only works as satire.
1984, however, makes a good political read, a good character drama, a good pulp-ish sci-fi, and so on. It covers pretty much any genre I'm likely to be in the mood for at any given moment, and covers them all well.
I like Brave New World as a counterpoint(?) to 1984, and possibly a more realistic one, but the story itself and the writing leave a lot to be desired.
I loved Animal Farm. It's probably one of my favorite books.
I've almost finished Crooked Little Vein already. Are there any other books like this out there?
well I also kinda feel like Gulliver's Travels is not at all an interesting read if one doesn't know about 19th century Britain
I am not disagreeing with you, and I don't want you to quote my post saying "Yeah, but" because I am in complete agreement with you, but I think satires are the only popular form of fiction able to say "if you don't know the context, don't judge the book"
also I think vonnegut is my favorite author. He doesn't really depict dystopian societies much (I mean, Cat's Cradle and your personal opinion about modern-day America aside) but there's still something significantly dystopian about his settings and prose.
Charles Kinbote on
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BusterKNegativity is Boring Cynicism is Cowardice Registered Userregular
well I also kinda feel like Gulliver's Travels is not at all an interesting read if one doesn't know about 19th century Britain
I am not disagreeing with you, and I don't want you to quote my post saying "Yeah, but" because I am in complete agreement with you, but I think satires are the only popular form of fiction able to say "if you don't know the context, don't judge the book"
also I think vonnegut is my favorite author. He doesn't really depict dystopian societies much (I mean, Cat's Cradle and your personal opinion about modern-day America aside) but there's still something significantly dystopian about his settings and prose.
My Junior-year Lit class is a perfect example of that. Most of them didn't get Proposal at all. The handful of us who already knew the background (how bad is it when your a lit geek relative to an honors lit class?) played on their perceptions for a while in the 'open discussion' period. This was during the height of the 'dead baby joke' fad, and we had the 'dead baby joke' king in our class. It was pretty hilarious. Then the teacher explained it, and they probably forgot about it by next week.
I mean I understand that it is either brilliant satire or depressingly retarded views on socioeconomic conduct
but that doesn't forgive tiresome prose and and overall bland way of expressing ideas
Charles Kinbote on
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BusterKNegativity is Boring Cynicism is Cowardice Registered Userregular
edited February 2008
We read Utopia and The Prince in my Senior English Seminar
I enjoyed comparing the two and explaining why I thought being a succesful tyrant and running "Utopia" were actually the same thing.
I've never read Utopia, but I've read summaries and references and the like.
None of them really make me want to slog through 200 pages of high-styled archaic English. It's fun in small doses, but it's got to be really good for me to bother getting into that 'mode', ya know?
utopia is one of the worst dystopian novels ever, it is SO BORING
it's like 200 pages of Goldstein's memoirs section in 1984
We by Yvegeny Zamyatin is at least the template for 1984, go read that
also:
i just got the amazing adventures of kavalier and clay, and i read 200 pages in one sitting, then went and wrote until i realized how thin my dog was and how he's probably going to die soon
Suppose this as good a first post as any, but good lord how can you not like paradise lost? I thought it was the best representation of Satan Id ever read.
And maybe it was just the atheist in me reading into it but I found it to be somewhat sympathetic to him as well which I enjoyed.
Suppose this as good a first post as any, but good lord how can you not like paradise lost? I thought it was the best representation of Satan Id ever read.
And maybe it was just the atheist in me reading into it but I found it to be somewhat sympathetic to him as well which I enjoyed.
maybe it was the shitty prose, the godawful development, the terrible, caricatures the author tries to pass off as "characters" and the fucking moronic hypocrisy in the actions of the aforementioned caricatures
maybe it is the fact that it is the douchey epic for the person who does not know what they are talking about or how an epic should legitimately be written because never have I seen a book by which I am so convinced that an author is writing with the sole purpose of parodying an entire language
I admit there were parts where it just dragged on, but I think there were well written sections too. Satans speach to the fallen angels for the classic example.
The god character in that book pissed me off so much though.
Also I took one of the suggestions from this thread and started Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell by Susannah Clarke
I am enjoying it very much so far, so thanks for that!
Suppose this as good a first post as any, but good lord how can you not like paradise lost? I thought it was the best representation of Satan Id ever read.
And maybe it was just the atheist in me reading into it but I found it to be somewhat sympathetic to him as well which I enjoyed.
maybe it was the shitty prose, the godawful development, the terrible, caricatures the author tries to pass off as "characters" and the fucking moronic hypocrisy in the actions of the aforementioned caricatures
maybe it is the fact that it is the douchey epic for the person who does not know what they are talking about or how an epic should legitimately be written because never have I seen a book by which I am so convinced that an author is writing with the sole purpose of parodying an entire language
There was this guy in my High School. He was the only Muslim in the whole class, this being the Midwest and all. He put up with years of people pointing out that his last name was "Hussein" and trying to get him to eat lunch during Ramadan without batting an eye. He was pretty pissed when he got to the bit about Muhammad being in the whatever circle of hell.
The teacher pretty much said that he had every right to be pissed and let him take over the class for a discussion on it, at his request.
He was a pretty cool guy. I haven't seen him for a couple years, though.
I like Brave New World as a counterpoint(?) to 1984, and possibly a more realistic one, but the story itself and the writing leave a lot to be desired.
I actually feel the opposite. I preferred the writing style of Brave New World over 1984.
I aught to read more classic sci-fi stories. Lately I've been trying to read more "legitimate" novels, which basically leads to me reading a crappy book, getting pissed and then reading some Cormac McCarthy.
I aught to read more classic sci-fi stories. Lately I've been trying to read more "legitimate" novels, which basically leads to me reading a crappy book, getting pissed and then reading some Cormac McCarthy.
Like, how classic?
The Time Machine and Journey to the Center of the Earth are good. You should already have a rough idea whether they're your bag or not.
CS Lewis' Space Trilogy is a little more modern. That Hideous Strength (ancient beings and techno-cults) and Out of the Silent Planet (pulpy space travel) each read well on their own, though you'll get more out of That Hideous Strength if you've read the other two. Some people think Perelandra (pulpy space travel) is too allegorical (he later used basically the same premise for The Magician's Nephew if that helps), and you can't really read it without reading Out of the silent Planet first.
Dune is very modern, but still a 'classic' in the sci-fi time scale. I wholeheartedly recommend it to anyone who enjoys science fiction in any form, but skip the sequels unless you're a Herbert fanboy.
Wells and Lewis have the benefit of also being seen as 'legitimate' novels, mostly because they're old. I'd argue that Dune is at least as 'legitimate', what with the political and philosophical themes, complex plots, and believable, interesting characters and whatnot, but I think the literazi might disagree with me.
I was thinking more 1950's onward type of sci-fi. I've never read any Clarke. I've never read any Asimov. I read Starship Troopers over ten years ago. I still haven't read The Man in the High Castle. Maybe I should check out that CS Lewis stuff.
The Chronicles of Amber falls in that weird grey zone between sci-fi and fantasy. The first series is really good, the second has more science fiction elements, but parts don't make much sense, likely because Zelazny was heavily medicated when he wrote parts of it. It was started in 1970, and while it wasn't finished until the nineties, it kept a seventies feel.
Lewis might be a little earlier than you're looking for. It's very pulpy and I think it might pre-date the universal acceptance of the term "science fiction", because in his notes Lewis talks about the "scientifictionists" a lot. It could just be a 'unique' term, though.
Seriously, though Dune. Written in the sixties, but ahead of the standards of the genre in some ways, so it might read as a little more modern than you're looking for. It's still an awesome book.
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Yeah, but I don't expect some random guy at work to get that. I DO expect a reasonable, literate adult to get
humm... sounds a lot like the current Gov't in the US of A.
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Yes that is Soviet Russia for you when Stalin takes power.
1984, however, makes a good political read, a good character drama, a good pulp-ish sci-fi, and so on. It covers pretty much any genre I'm likely to be in the mood for at any given moment, and covers them all well.
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I've almost finished Crooked Little Vein already. Are there any other books like this out there?
I am not disagreeing with you, and I don't want you to quote my post saying "Yeah, but" because I am in complete agreement with you, but I think satires are the only popular form of fiction able to say "if you don't know the context, don't judge the book"
also I think vonnegut is my favorite author. He doesn't really depict dystopian societies much (I mean, Cat's Cradle and your personal opinion about modern-day America aside) but there's still something significantly dystopian about his settings and prose.
Amazon Wishlist: http://www.amazon.com/BusterK/wishlist/3JPEKJGX9G54I/ref=cm_wl_search_bin_1
I just read paradise lost and jesus christ fuck that book
My Junior-year Lit class is a perfect example of that. Most of them didn't get Proposal at all. The handful of us who already knew the background (how bad is it when your a lit geek relative to an honors lit class?) played on their perceptions for a while in the 'open discussion' period. This was during the height of the 'dead baby joke' fad, and we had the 'dead baby joke' king in our class. It was pretty hilarious. Then the teacher explained it, and they probably forgot about it by next week.
I mean I understand that it is either brilliant satire or depressingly retarded views on socioeconomic conduct
but that doesn't forgive tiresome prose and and overall bland way of expressing ideas
I enjoyed comparing the two and explaining why I thought being a succesful tyrant and running "Utopia" were actually the same thing.
Amazon Wishlist: http://www.amazon.com/BusterK/wishlist/3JPEKJGX9G54I/ref=cm_wl_search_bin_1
None of them really make me want to slog through 200 pages of high-styled archaic English. It's fun in small doses, but it's got to be really good for me to bother getting into that 'mode', ya know?
what the fuck is wrong with you
utopia is one of the worst dystopian novels ever, it is SO BORING
it's like 200 pages of Goldstein's memoirs section in 1984
We by Yvegeny Zamyatin is at least the template for 1984, go read that
also:
i just got the amazing adventures of kavalier and clay, and i read 200 pages in one sitting, then went and wrote until i realized how thin my dog was and how he's probably going to die soon
And maybe it was just the atheist in me reading into it but I found it to be somewhat sympathetic to him as well which I enjoyed.
Yeah I am rereading this now after reading it in high school, and I was not so good at picking up on this back then apparently
maybe it was the shitty prose, the godawful development, the terrible, caricatures the author tries to pass off as "characters" and the fucking moronic hypocrisy in the actions of the aforementioned caricatures
maybe it is the fact that it is the douchey epic for the person who does not know what they are talking about or how an epic should legitimately be written because never have I seen a book by which I am so convinced that an author is writing with the sole purpose of parodying an entire language
The god character in that book pissed me off so much though.
Also I took one of the suggestions from this thread and started Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell by Susannah Clarke
I am enjoying it very much so far, so thanks for that!
There was this guy in my High School. He was the only Muslim in the whole class, this being the Midwest and all. He put up with years of people pointing out that his last name was "Hussein" and trying to get him to eat lunch during Ramadan without batting an eye. He was pretty pissed when he got to the bit about Muhammad being in the whatever circle of hell.
The teacher pretty much said that he had every right to be pissed and let him take over the class for a discussion on it, at his request.
He was a pretty cool guy. I haven't seen him for a couple years, though.
I actually feel the opposite. I preferred the writing style of Brave New World over 1984.
Like, how classic?
The Time Machine and Journey to the Center of the Earth are good. You should already have a rough idea whether they're your bag or not.
CS Lewis' Space Trilogy is a little more modern. That Hideous Strength (ancient beings and techno-cults) and Out of the Silent Planet (pulpy space travel) each read well on their own, though you'll get more out of That Hideous Strength if you've read the other two. Some people think Perelandra (pulpy space travel) is too allegorical (he later used basically the same premise for The Magician's Nephew if that helps), and you can't really read it without reading Out of the silent Planet first.
Dune is very modern, but still a 'classic' in the sci-fi time scale. I wholeheartedly recommend it to anyone who enjoys science fiction in any form, but skip the sequels unless you're a Herbert fanboy.
Wells and Lewis have the benefit of also being seen as 'legitimate' novels, mostly because they're old. I'd argue that Dune is at least as 'legitimate', what with the political and philosophical themes, complex plots, and believable, interesting characters and whatnot, but I think the literazi might disagree with me.
Lewis might be a little earlier than you're looking for. It's very pulpy and I think it might pre-date the universal acceptance of the term "science fiction", because in his notes Lewis talks about the "scientifictionists" a lot. It could just be a 'unique' term, though.
Seriously, though Dune. Written in the sixties, but ahead of the standards of the genre in some ways, so it might read as a little more modern than you're looking for. It's still an awesome book.