Monday, March 25, 2013

First Chapter, First Paragraphs

I've still to write the reviews for three recently finished books, but those should be along shortly... In the meantime I have picked up the next book on my list. There seems to be a theme in my reading lately. Animal farm, the hundred year old man... And now this new book. Unintentional I assure you, but the theme appears to be Russia.

This excerpt is from We by Yevgeny Zamyatin. This isn't just another dystopian novel, this is the first to be written dystopian novel of the major triumvirate consisting of 1984 and Brave New World. I won't say anymore, until the review, except to give you the first chapter, first paragraphs.

Record One

KEYWORDS:
A Declaration. The wisest of lines. An epic.

I am merely copying, word for word, what was printed in the State Gazette today:

IN 120 DAYS, THE CONSTRUCTION OF THE INTEGRAL WILL BE COMPLETE. THE GREAT, HISTORIC HOUR WHEN THE FIRST INTEGRAL WILL SOAR THROUGH OUTER SPACE IS NIGH. SOME THOUSAND YEARS AGO, YOUR HEROIC ANCESTORS SUBJUGATED THE ENTIRE EARTHLY SPHERE TO THE POWER OF THE ONE STATE. TODAY, YOU ARE CONFRONTING AN EVEN GREATER CONQUEST: THE INTEGRATION OF THE OF THE INFINITE EQUATION OF THE UNIVERSE WITH THE ELECTRIFYING AND FIRE-BREATHING GLASS INTEGRAL. YOU ARE CONFRONTING UNKNOWN CREATURES ON ALIEN PLANETS, WHO MAY STILL BE LIVING IN THE SAVAGE STATE OF FREEDOM, AND SUBJUGATING THEM TO THE BENEFICIAL YOKE OF REASON. IF THEY WON'T UNDERSTAND THAT WE BRING THEM MATHEMATICALLY INFALLIBLE HAPPINESS, IT WILL BE OUR DUTY TO FORCE THEM TO BE HAPPY...

There's a little more to the paragraph but this is the best bit, and I'm itching to get on with it.

Monday, March 18, 2013

First Chapter, First Paragraphs

I just finished The 100 year old man, and while I try to compose a suitable review, I thought I'd write the next instalment of First chapter first paragraphs, not least because they're intriguing.

There are 217 pages, the font is large, and the page margins are large too, so I don't think this one will take long to read.  In fact before I knew it 40 pages had slipped by in flash.

The book is The Vanishing Act by Mette Jakobsen.

And the longer and more carefully I examine all these things, the more clearly and distinctly I know that they are true.
Rene Descartes

It was snowing the morning I found the dead boy.  The island with it's two houses and one church was covered in a layer of white.
Papa was pulling in the fishing nets when I saw a hand between two rocks.  It looked like a magic trick; almost as if a bunch of roses was about to appear - boom!  There you are, for you - and then applause.  But everything was quiet and the hand didn't move.

Looking forward to the rest.

Wednesday, March 6, 2013

Animal Farm by George Orwell

Published by:  Penguin Modern Classics
ISBN: 014118270

This is one of those books that makes me feel like I should be writing a terribly impressive academic style review.  That's probably part of the reason why this book only recently made it off my 'should-really-read-one-day' list.  I don't know if I thought it would be over my head, or just that it deserved someone more accustomed to interpreting books in a certain way.

Whatever my reasons for delaying, it got chosen in January for March's book club, and that was that. I bought my copy a couple of weeks ago, and was expecting to suffer through it for the sake of the club.  Ha!

I had some basic recollections of Russian history from courses I studied years ago, so it wasn't a big stretch.  I was expecting something completely different though.  I thought that Orwell would be only making slight references and implying loose correlations between the events on the farm and the events in Russia, but how wrong can you be? 

It was clearly written, easy to read, and there was no mistaking what was happening, the main characters and who they were meant to portray and how key events in Russia's history happened. The purges, and the 5 year plans came to mind immediately.  I love that Orwell refused to pull his punches, and that a publisher was brave enough to publish it.  What a loss this would have been if it had not been published.

The about-face I've taken on this has pretty much given me whiplash. I went from thinking this is a book I should read but don't really want to, to thinking that this is a book that everybody must read.

To refresh my memory I went to Wikipedia and found some articles. I can't speak for the accurateness of them, but they were less of a dry read than the introduction in this book. Here are a few links:

Five Year Plans - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Five-Year_Plans_for_the_National_Economy_of_the_Soviet_Union
The Purges - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Purge