People (that I talk to) seem to respond differently to Orwell's 1984. One friend seemed to think that it was not a masterpiece like Animal Farm. Others find it morbid and depressing. Some focus on the big brother aspect - perhaps having watched big brother but not having read the book... Indeed, future fiction will always be tied to the issue of its prediction accuracy - like how people seem to like saying "Stem-cell research - it'll be just like Gattaca" or "CCTV cameras - it's just like 1984" - that sort of stuff.
I felt like Animal Farm set the blueprint, and then 1984 really fleshed out the ideas, making it far more intense. I don't see it as a "look what might happen if..."-book because most of its central themes are relevant and tangible to current, everyday life. I find myself repeatedly thinking of the lines "underneath the chestnut tree, i sold you and you sold me". I think the love-story here, and the issue of what it means to betray someone, is one of the lasting impressions of the book - this concept exists outside all the futuristic themes of the book. Sometimes things we thought we'd never relinquish just aren't worth holding on to.
The exploration of newspeak also is philosophically brilliant (i'm pretty sure it gets its own entry in the Oxford companion to philosophy), and is psychologically and linguistically thought provoking.
I find it funny that the movie with John Hurt is not more renowned. Despite its age I think it captures the world pretty perfectly - I must watch it again. On a related note, I found V for Vendetta surprisingly good - like a 1984 world with a superhero. John Hurt plays the big brother character in this which i'm sure must have been deliberate - crazy that they got away with speeches about the "significance of blowing up a building", so soon after Sep 11 (well... 5 years... but still). Anyway, that impressed me.
Tuesday, May 6, 2003
Monday, March 3, 2003
Simon Heselev uses Vonnegut
Interestingly, I probably owe much of my reading enjoyment today to Simon Heselev (a melbourne music guy). He released a song called Tock Tick, a nice jazzy, post rock type track, which has Kurt Vonnegut reading a section from Slaughterhouse 5 (I had, of course, heard about Slaughterhouse 5 and its classic-ness from the movie Footloose, "classic in any time!"). Anyway, so I went to read it, and it was the first novel I'd read in about 6 years. Before that, I'd read David Eddings books, and other than skimming year 11 and 12 texts I hadn't really touched literature. So yes, Simon Heselev, and whoever it is that wrote that lovely anti-american-policy book "Rogue State" got me into reading - and Slaughterhouse 5 can hence be considered a sort of "first book".
Vonnegut's style is one of dry humour, with observations throughout that just make you think "wasn't it nice to notice that?!". I see Slaughterhouse 5, really, as a consolation to the human condition. It is proclaimed by Vonnegut himself as his "anti-war" book, centralising around the firebombing of Dresden (although the story goes most places in space and time). The repetitions throughout of the serenity prayer and the resolve "and so it goes" whenever anything dies (including the Champagne), I think portray an almost melancollie acceptance concerning the meaningless disappointments and trials of life. The aliens who visit Billy Pilgrim see time all-at-once (not linearly), so someone dying isn't sad, because it's already happened and they still exist at all those moments where they were alive. Billy looks at his life, and says, all-at-once, it's okay. I do like this philosophy, and I think it's one that has stayed with me since I read this.
I have conflicting feelings of loving Kurt Vonnegut, and simultaneously recognising that he may not be that great an author. After I read Breakfast of Champions, I thought perhaps I didn't need any more Vonnegut - although this particular Vonnegut does have the awesome consciousness given to a character who recognises that he is being controlled by a narrator, who decides to visit him in a cafe during the book... "Stranger than Fiction" may have borrowed from here, or there could be an heirarchical superatom.
I reneged on the idea to discount Vonnegut on my reading list to read his final rant, Man without a country. I wrote a letter after this, to which he replied (although perhaps not individually), but he has nice sentiments... if this isn't good I don't know what is!
Vonnegut's style is one of dry humour, with observations throughout that just make you think "wasn't it nice to notice that?!". I see Slaughterhouse 5, really, as a consolation to the human condition. It is proclaimed by Vonnegut himself as his "anti-war" book, centralising around the firebombing of Dresden (although the story goes most places in space and time). The repetitions throughout of the serenity prayer and the resolve "and so it goes" whenever anything dies (including the Champagne), I think portray an almost melancollie acceptance concerning the meaningless disappointments and trials of life. The aliens who visit Billy Pilgrim see time all-at-once (not linearly), so someone dying isn't sad, because it's already happened and they still exist at all those moments where they were alive. Billy looks at his life, and says, all-at-once, it's okay. I do like this philosophy, and I think it's one that has stayed with me since I read this.
I have conflicting feelings of loving Kurt Vonnegut, and simultaneously recognising that he may not be that great an author. After I read Breakfast of Champions, I thought perhaps I didn't need any more Vonnegut - although this particular Vonnegut does have the awesome consciousness given to a character who recognises that he is being controlled by a narrator, who decides to visit him in a cafe during the book... "Stranger than Fiction" may have borrowed from here, or there could be an heirarchical superatom.
I reneged on the idea to discount Vonnegut on my reading list to read his final rant, Man without a country. I wrote a letter after this, to which he replied (although perhaps not individually), but he has nice sentiments... if this isn't good I don't know what is!
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