Although Savage Gods is Paul Kingsnorth’s latest book, it has been around for a while having been published in late 2019 – just before the entire world went “Covid crazy”.
It is one of two books that I eventually decided on, as late Christmas presents for myself, after my wife suggested I spend $50, or there about, on something for myself for Christmas.
In Kingsnorth’s own words – “Savage Gods is a confessional: a short, sharp, unexpected account of a crisis in my own writing, in my sense of purpose and my sense of home. It is an examination, from within the moment, of what it means to lose faith in words. In the process, it asks: what is the meaning of language and what is it for? Does writing illuminate or conceal? And can a human ever really ‘belong’ to a place in a broken world which militates against it?“
I started reading this book just before bedtime and got a third of the way through it before turning in for bed and then being unable to sleep because my mind was still processing and turning over and over what I had been reading. The following day I knew I had to finish it for my own peace of mind – which is what I did.
Some parts of the book, detailing his move from suburban living in a small Cumbrian market town to his new life in rural western Ireland – apparently just inside what is classed as the romantic bit – is fairly straightforward, clear and informative. It details the move and what his and his family’s new life, working the land and being as gentle on the environment as they can, without being completely off grid, is like. This is their attempt to escape from the all consuming “Machine”. This writing is what I bought the book for, to find out all about his transition from urbanite to part time farmer, working the land.
Other parts of the book concerning his writing and his apparent…..his apparent what exactly? His apparent – one could describe it as his falling out with words or his lack of trust in words….those black markings on a white page. And his inner conflict and lack of self belief, or lack of belief in his ability to write any more, or even if he should write at all in the future – which in my opinion is unjustified because I hold the guy in such high regard – I found quite disturbing.
At times, in this book, he writes as though he is coming apart. Having some kind of breakdown due to his mistrust of words. His lack of belief in his craft, his art.
He talks about writing as a sacrifice, or I should say in his quest to write and to be a writer, to be able to fully immerse himself in the world of words and sentences, he sacrifices everything else in his life. Writing comes first even before family. He chastises himself when he puts his “job” above spending more time with his children because he wants to be remembered by his kids as a good father, but it’s what he, as a writer, is driven to do. It’s his cross and he has to bear it.
It is also about belonging or not belonging to a place and whether or not it’s possible to become at home and at ease in that place. This is not something that Kingsnorth is comfortable about doing. It disturbs him when he starts to feel “at home” in a particular place, because it is alien to him. His lifestyle as a writer, has lead him to be a wanderer – not entirely nomadic – not on the move the whole time, but to move from place to place after a few short years without experiencing the feeling of becoming settled, of feeling “at home”.
But now in Ireland, living the rural idyll and reaching his mid 40’s, he is coming to the conclusion that it’s actually OK to feel at home in a place, to finally put down roots and to learn how to belong.
He thinks that perhaps the planting of hundreds of trees on his property by himself and his wife has helped him to begin to accept the act of putting down his own roots as a natural and normal thing to do. Something he has been both searching for, and at the same time avoiding, all his life.
I have, in the few years that I have been aware of Kingsnorth and his work, always been absolutely sure of his ability as a writer, a communicator and a great thinker. The latter is a title that many people give Kingsnorth and one that he seems to be the least comfortable with. (And there’s that word again – comfortable – something else that doesn’t sit well with Kingsnorth). To see his lack of belief in words and in writing and therefore lack of belief in his singular purpose in life – to be a writer. To expose his vulnerability in this way – and in the process, to expose the raw nerves of his relationship with his father – was both refreshing and deeply disturbing – and made me question my own life, my purpose and where, if anywhere, I belong. (please see my previous blog post)
I can’t say that I “enjoyed” reading this book, but I did find it almost impossible to put down. Once started I had to finish it. It is compelling reading, certainly a must read for anyone contemplating writing as a career…..or a calling. Some writers write because they want to. Kingsnorth writes because he has to. It is his very reason for being. He gets little choice in the matter.
I rate the book highly and am now eager to start reading the other book that made up my late Christmas gift…..another Kingsnorth offering. This time it’s his 2009 homage to his homeland called Real England – Part personal journey, part manifesto, Real England offers a snapshot of a country at a precarious moment in its history, while there is still time to save its future.
Once more, many thanks for reading this. I welcome comments, positive or negative, as long as they are constructive.
It was a rainy evening so, with nothing much else that needed my attention I thought I’d spend an hour or so on YouTube. I guess, due to the algorithms that YouTube use, based on my most recent searches and views, they suggested I may be interested in content from a provider called CURRENT IRELAND who were running the first of a string of episodes to be hosted by Jennifer Boyer, head of the Dublin School of Architecture, TU Dublin. These episodes are intended to be broadly related to the theme of consciousness and social responsibility.
Since I have no idea about architecture – except in knowing what I like or dislike about a building simply based on aesthetics – I was tempted to X out of it, but then noticed that their guest was Paul Kingsnorth. Kingsnorth was (actually still is at heart, despite his protestations) an environmental activist. He’s also a writer of fact and fiction, a poet, a recent convert to Christianity, a champion of traditional England and a simpler way of life, and he’s one of a dying breed of men – a great thinker. I don’t always agree with everything that Kingsnorth says, but I do have a great respect for the man and his ideas and ideals.
Kingsnorth delivered a few startling facts and figures about the impact of humans on the planet and other species, particularly since the industrial revolution. But before I get to that, can I just say that here in New Zealand our government have set a target of 65% greenhouse gas emission reduction by 2030. Frankly I can’t see it happening because the current government have been in charge since 2017 and have had no impact on climate change figures over the 5 years that they have been in power. There was a big reduction during March of 2020 during the 4 week Covid lockdown, but that soon rose to pre lockdown levels again.
Another thing is that they are fighting the symptoms of Climate Change rather than the cause. They would rather blame New Zealand farmers for methane emissions from cows belching and farting and so tax them, rather than tackling the real problem which is the continuing push for economic growth. Economic growth as a guide to a nations wellbeing is absurd. We’re burying ourselves under mountains of stuff we don’t need, in order to keep the economy on an upward trend, making a few billionaires even richer, at the expense of nature and other species. WE are the cause of Climate Change…..and if you don’t believe in man made Climate Change, you can hardly deny the polluting effect that man has had on the earth, the seas and the air. Our need to consume is killing the planet and every other species on it.
The big problem is that we like our stuff and we don’t want to give it up. We want the latest iPhone, tablet, smart watch, MacBook, smart TV, in home A.I. – we’ve become addicted to our gadgets. We don’t need all the things we amass around us. Many of us have so much stuff that we have to hire off site storage containers. We have allowed everything on earth, including everything in the natural world to be commodified, given a dollar value, and once that happens it all becomes a resource to be exploited. WE can stop it, but we don’t want to. We love our stuff more than nature, more than other disappearing species, more than our fellow man and more than our children and grandchildren. Why else would we continue to drive the bus, that is humanity, at ever increasing speed toward a high cliff? We have the ability to apply the brakes, to change course and steer away, but we haven’t so far and probably won’t.
The only thing that will possibly save us, if not the planet, is when our civilization, driven by our economy collapses. I say when, not if. The signs are all around us of almost imminent collapse. Spiraling debt, supply chain issues (thanks to our reliance on globalism), rising cost of living, the lowest stock market figures since the financial crisis of 2008, desertion of the church and spiritual beliefs, a lack of what used to be called moral fibre. The constant need for more, more, more. A lack of sense of community – even more so since the Covid pandemic, lockdowns and a huge increase of doing everything on line and becoming physically and emotionally isolated from the world around us. Community has been in a slow state of decline for at least the last 40 years. A rise of The Police State and the Surveillance State, Political tension around the world. Russia and Ukraine – China and Taiwan – the endless Middle East problems. Something has to give, sooner or later.
Anyhow, getting back to Kingsnorth and his facts and figures. He pointed out that everyone wants the modern lifestyle and all the trinkets, baubles and gadgets that go with it. Businesses want increased profits and “a growth economy”. But for us to maintain this lifestyle we need the resources of 3 and a half planet Earths…..and we only have one. If we do go on at this pace -toward the metaphorical cliff – we guarantee our deaths and that of most of the earths other species. He also pointed out that we won’t change things by moaning about it on social media, by endless Tweets, or by petitions or marching in the street. We can only change things by changing what we do in our own lives, and we need everyone to follow suit. We need to walk the walk, not just talk about it.
BUT again we probably won’t, and if we do, we could fall in to a trap and become part of Klaus Schwab’s “Great Reset” – we will own nothing and we will be happy – according to Mr Schwab.
We are currently in the 6th mass extinction event. The last one was about 60 million years ago and that one caused the extinction of the dinosaurs – possibly due to an asteroid impacting the Earth. The 6th mass extinction is not caused by an asteroid, but by humans and our way of life. The World Wildlife Fund states that since the early 1970’s man has been responsible for the demise of 60% of the worlds mammals, birds and reptiles. The most dramatic decline being in central and south America where the wildlife populations have collapsed by 89%. This is over a time period of less than 50 years.
Over the last 10,000 years which basically covers the arrival of human civilization, it’s estimated that we’ve lost 83% of all wild mammals. These are just a few of the depressing figures that show that we as a species are not just part of the problem of the decline of the natural world, but THE problem. Our effect on nature has been devastating and it’s way past time that we started to both accept responsibility and more importantly to act in a responsible manner. This requires a complete change in the way we think and the way that we do things. It means abandoning the growth economy model and living in a more gentle way on the earth, in harmony with nature and with a reverence toward nature. So there is a way that we can be the solution to the problem that we have caused….that’s the good news.
The worse news of course is that we’re too comfortable and too greedy to change our ways, even if it means the total destruction of life on earth, including our own. We’re meant to be the smartest beings on earth….at least that’s what we claim to be. What we’ve done and what we will most likely continue to do is not at all smart.
Modern man relies on advances in technology to solve all our problems, rather than just ceasing our bad habits and being responsible beings. Technology will not save us. In fact, and here’s an interesting figure to ponder over, internet data storage facilities currently emit the same amount of greenhouse gasses as the entire global aviation industry. Get your mind around that little nugget. Just by being on our smart devices – to which we’ve all become accustomed and dare I say addicted – we are doing as much damage as every plane on the entire planet. I don’t have the latest figures but in 2017, at any one time there were on average 9728 commercial flights in the air. That’s a lot of flights and a lot of pollution – but we equal it with our reliance on the world wide web. It’s also estimated that the internet will consume a fifth of the worlds electricity by 2025. Who still thinks that progress is always a good thing?
If everyone in the world deleted their social media accounts today, it wouldn’t only free up a lot of wasted time, it would also make a major contribution to reducing greenhouse gas emissions. Of course we won’t because it’s addictive and the “likes” we get give us a huge dopamine hit. Every time we go on Twitter to tweet about being angry about climate change, we are causing climate change. This is just one example of how we are seriously buggering up the planet.
Since the latest wipeout of species began, almost 50 years ago, there have only been 2 occasions where greenhouse gas emissions have fallen. Global agreements on greenhouse gas reduction, Paris Climate Change agreements etc. have done absolutely zero to reduce the amount of greenhouse gasses. Political solutions are not solutions. The carbon tax that polluting companies have to pay doesn’t reduce greenhouse gasses, it just monetizes the pollution. Planting a tree to offset your pollution is also not helping much in the long term. Stopping your pollution is the best way to solve the problem.
The years that emissions actually fell were 1990 – which was as a result of the fall of the Soviet Union and the corresponding decline of their major industries / closure of factories – and 2008 during the Global Financial Crisis when many businesses went to the wall and the global economy almost collapsed. So you see, there is a direct correlation between the rise of industry, the economic growth model and Climate change/pollution. But we won’t abandon this model until it’s too late. It makes most of us uncomfortable to even think about abandoning our technological lifestyles, giving up our smart toys and (anti)social media.
Our own government here in New Zealand made such a big deal about getting supermarkets to ban individual use plastic bags. Another feather in the cap for Saint Jacinda of the empathetic smile. A step in the right direction maybe, but not a big enough step to make much of a difference…..rather like fighting a forest fire by throwing a thimble full of water on it. We need meaningful actions and we all need to take responsibility, me included.
Kingsnorth doesn’t own a smart phone, but still uses the internet, and owns a petrol powered car. He lives a life that is gentler on nature than most of us, on a smallholding in western Ireland, growing his (and his family’s) own food, homeschooling his children so they have a healthy respect for the natural world, adding value to his community rather than turning his back on it….and trying still, to point out the error of our ways to us before it’s all too late.
Thank you for reading. Comments are always appreciated.
I find it quite ironic that someone over a hundred years ago has a better grasp on what is happening today, to humanity, than many of the people (read “sheeple”) of today.
There have of course been other writers who have predicted our future through their writing – such as George Orwell, Ray Bradbury, Sinclair Lewis, George R Stewart. These writers I knew of and have read their dystopian tales of the demise of the human species, or of the end of the world as we know it. But, I hadn’t realised that E.M. Forster was amongst their ranks,(if only for one story) until I was made aware of his short story The Machine Stops – written in 1909 – which was mentioned in an interview on YouTube with “reformed environmentalist” Paul Kingsnorth.
There are many eerie parallels in Forster’s story with what our society today seems to be adapting as the way forward. I’m referring to people staying in their own little bubbles (in the story these are pods underground), isolated from the outside world, communicating via screens and other devices, relying on The Machine (big government/big pharma/big tech) to meet their needs. All they need to do is follow the rules and do as they are told and they will be housed and fed, given access to medical care and be allowed heavily censored information that has already been through ten retellings so that they can not tell fact from fiction – real news from fake news. Basically the “Facebook Factcheckers” on steroids. Original thought, unless it falls in line with the doctrine of The Machine is not only frowned upon, but could have you cast out and made homeless. This is understood to be akin to a death sentence.
Transport – physical movement – outside of your designated pod, is only achievable if you first apply for permission. Going up and outside onto the earths surface, under the sky and clouds and sunlight is discouraged and is only achievable if you wear a respirator and have permission from The Machine….sound familiar?
The human species in the story have been genetically selected (Eugenics….as promoted these days, by the likes of Bill Gates)- by The Machine – to become little more than unmoving blobs of pasty flesh, devoid of sunlight, who sit in their chairs all day connected to the outside world by their communication devices – much like plugging into virtual reality worlds of today. The only time they get out of their chairs is to go to bed. Athletic types are not allowed to breed as they are deemed unsuitable in this new world where sitting all day is the new normal.
Physical contact with other humans – to touch another person – is considered uncivilized. Everything is done (on line) via The Machine. The Machine tells them what to do, how to behave, what to think.
Not only are there parallels with the world wide covid-19 regulations, but also very ominous similarities with the World Economic Forum’s “Great Reset”. I would hate to think that we would allow ourselves to be manipulated into a dystopian nightmare such as the world described by Forster. However, the last 2 years have proved how compliant we are, on the whole. So, perhaps our fate is sealed?
BUT….that’s just my opinion. What do you think?
I’ll link E. M. Forster’s – “The Machine Stops” below. It is a PDF just 25 pages long and definitely worth a read if you haven’t come across it before.
And for those who claim that the Great Reset is nothing more than conspiracy theory, here is a link to the World Economic Forum website where you can read articles and view videos all about how our future will be, after the Great Reset, according to Klaus Schwab. Our consumer driven lifestyles and our pursuit of “progress”, profits and Capitalism is pushing us closer to Forster’s dystopian future – which is what the WEF is all about, only now they have adopted buzz words such as sustainability……sustaining their wealth perhaps?
My latest visit to the public library netted me the 2 books I have already blogged about recently (both of them in the Zombie genre), plus Lynda La Plante’s Widows – written almost 40 years ago.
I haven’t read any of La Plante’s work before and probably wouldn’t have chosen this book at all (since there isn’t a single Zombie in it – I say only half jokingly), had it not been for bumping into an old work colleague in the library who enthusiastically recommended it. Funnily enough, he had never been much of a reader himself, until the Covid lockdowns started…..and now he’s a book addict. Thank goodness something positive has come out of this whole Covid mess.
Anyhow, back to the book. The cover proclaims La Plante as the “Queen of Crime Drama”. Frankly I had my doubts, but having just finished the book, for a story that is now a little dated, having been written in the early 1980’s, it is rather good.
I won’t be rushing out in search of another of her books straight away, but I will probably read another one or two at some point down the line.
The story has been made into a TV series on British TV back in the 80’s and remade as a feature film in 2018. I remember watching the original series but couldn’t recall the various twists and turns of the story in detail until reading the book this week.
It’s a good story with strong female characters but somewhat stereotypical male crime gang members and the usual hard working but under appreciated London copper (police detective) out to prove his bosses and fellow officers wrong.
The general outline of the story is that 3 women are widowed when a security van robbery goes terribly wrong and their husbands – the would be robbers – are blown up and burned badly in the botched heist. One of the would be robbers is gangland boss Harry Rawlins. After having to identify what’s left of his burned body – his distraught wife Dolly identifies him based on his very expensive gold watch that he never takes off – she then discovers Harry’s bank deposit box containing a gun, money, business (that’s crime business) ledgers which names names and gives details of some very shady crime-land business, and detailed plans for the botched robbery.
Dolly has several options available to her. She could hand Harry’s ledgers to the police, in the form of under appreciated and rather slovenly looking D.I. Resnick and shut down half of the crime gangs in London; she could sell them to the underworld thugs who are eager to take over Harry’s turf; or she could bring in the other widows, of the failed raid, into the fold and form her own gang to finish the job that their husbands had failed to do.
It’s no real surprise and therefore not really a spoiler to tell you that Dolly decides on the last option and pulls together her gang of misfit widows to attempt to pull off a physically demanding robbery that their well built, criminally hardened and street wise husbands had failed to do. What could possibly go wrong?
Part way through their planning to replicate the robbery – less, of course, the explosion and fire carnage – they realise that the original plan that Harry devised would need 4 men, not 3……so who was the 4th man and where is he now? AND who should they draft in as the 4th woman for their team?
La Plante writes a very good story. I’m happy to report that she doesn’t spare the splattering of blood along the way either. Let’s face it gangland crime stories demand their ample share of blood and gore. There are several bone crunching, blood splattering moments strewn liberally throughout the story. We also experience the full spectrum of emotions felt by the widows as they firstly cope with the loss of their husbands and then deal with the stomach churning angst and thrills of plotting the robbery of a security van….involving stolen vehicles, disguises, shotguns, chainsaws and sledge hammers….and a gas mask. We are taken along for the ride and see the women slowly coming together as a team, even if personal differences will mean that it’s unlikely that they will ever be friends….or will they?
La Plante asks many questions of the plot and characters and gives us all the answers, including a couple of rather unexpected ones that I won’t mention here. But what we want to know as avid readers is…….Will they be successful where their menfolk failed? If they do pull off the robbery, will they get away from both the police and the underworld criminal fraternity? Who will they choose as their 4th team member? Will we find out who the 4th man in Harry’s team is? And will he be detrimental to the widows plans? I’ll say no more for fear of slipping up and giving a big spoiler away. Needless to say that not everything is as it seems to be.
All in all it’s a bloody good story – and I mean that both literally and figuratively speaking. Definitely worth a read. So, is Lynda La Plante the Queen of Crime Drama? Actually….she could well be.
As usual, many thanks for reading this blog. Comments, likes and shares are always appreciated.
Although this was meant to be a book review, DNF being of course Did Not Finish, it would be hardly fair to review a book, in any depth, that I only read half way through. I mentioned in one of my very early blog posts how I struggled to get interested in Hemingway’s books and how much I wanted to like his writing. At the time I had been reading A Moveable Feast – his book of essays about life in Paris when he was a struggling writer. I said at the time of reading it that I enjoyed books, documentaries and movies about Hemingway, but couldn’t bring myself to a state of reading bliss when it came to books written by him.
I thought I would give him, and me, another chance and when I saw The Sun Also Rises on the shelves of Minton Booklovers – a most excellent second hand book store in the city of Napier, New Zealand – I felt compelled to buy it.
I had read, somewhere, that The Sun Also Rises was “a Hemingway masterpiece that salutes The Paris Cafe Scene, Spain and the Lost Generation”. Since all three of these subjects interest me I thought it would be a good read. BUT once again I struggled with Hemingway’s style of writing.
So, what is Hemingway’s writing style? It has been described as “economical, minimalist and sparse with few adjectives or adverbs”….OR “simple, direct and unadorned prose”. He writes giving little or no background information and often refers to it, he, or she without being specific about which it, he or she he is talking about. It has been suggested that his style developed from his days of being a journalist – giving just the bare bones about what happened and nothing else. He certainly doesn’t elaborate about anything. It was almost like stepping into the middle of a story rather than having a beginning and introducing us to the characters, setting the scene etc.
Many proclaim him a genius – a masterful writer. I honestly don’t understand why he is lauded by so many. He tends to provide the reader with the very basics necessary and leaves it up to us to add flesh to the bones of what the character means by what they say or deciding how they feel emotionally. I enjoy stories where I care about what happens to the characters, but it’s difficult to care about a character who is presented as all bones and no substance. There are, at times, occasional pages of conversation between two or more characters where it is difficult to follow who exactly is speaking….kind of like you’re listening into a conversation that you’re not part of, or not even meant to be part of. I felt like the book was some sort of “in-joke” that I was being deliberately excluded from.
I didn’t quite reach the half way mark of the 224 page story before I’d decided that enough was enough, for now at least. I’ll leave the bookmark in there and may get around to finishing it at a later date…..perhaps a bottle of whiskey would help?
Speaking of drinking, Hemingway is often associated with being a hard drinker and a tough fighter, but he claimed to rarely drink while writing. He would usually drink afterwards as a way of relaxing, to subconsciously work over the story in his mind, so that the following day he could continue to work with a clear head. Sometimes I wish he had partaken of a tipple or two while actually writing The Sun Also Rises as it may have relaxed his writing style, made his characters more believable, less wooden and far more interesting.
The Sun also Rises, I’m sorry to say, did not make my enthusiasm for Hemingway novels rise at all.
I’d never read any of Roth’s work until recently, when I read “The Plot Against America”. (I reviewed this recently on my blog). I was alerted to Roth’s work when I was reading Woody Allen’s autobiography and in it he mentions several writers who have either influenced him, or who he rates highly. Now I’ve finished “Everyman” I can see similarities between Allen’s characters and writing and Roth’s.
Both writers write stories about relationships, both are of Jewish background, both write about characters who are obsessed with sex and death, particularly the emptiness of death….when you’re dead the lights go out and that’s it.
My copy of Everyman is only a small novel 182 pages or average sized print but it’s well written and looks at one man’s life – his hopes and dreams – and his relationships. Sometimes in life we make decisions that we have a pretty good idea at the time are the wrong decisions for oh so many reasons, but we still choose to make them for short term gains, or instant pleasure, rather than looking at the long term effects of those choices and the problems that those decisions can cause – not just to yourself but to those around you.
We follow the life of one man – a successful commercial artist who worked for an advertising company in New York. The story begins with his death during a heart operation in hospital, followed by his funeral. From here we travel back in time – to when he was a boy and helped his father in the family jewelry shop. It’s a story about relationships. It’s about life and it’s about death and how, sooner or later, it befalls us all. We get to examine his relationship with his parents, with his older brother (who he adored and yet came to hate in his old age), with his three wives – as he was thrice married – with his children from the first two marriages…and his infidelities along the way. He’s one of those guys who is controlled by the urges of the libido rather than by letting logical thought take the lead. And when it comes to describing his character’s sexual liaisons Roth certainly leaves nothing to the imagination – he’s very up front and quite explicit.
All through his life, when it comes to a pretty face, or a stunning body – all traces of common sense, and common decency, take flight. He knows he’s making rash, irrational decisions based on lust. Even when he himself makes a point of letting the reader know how perfect his second wife is in so many ways – he still choses to cheat on her (repeatedly) with a much younger photographic model – and to hell with the consequences.
Of all of his decaying relationships, the one which makes no sense at all is the one that he has with his older brother Howie. As a child he idolized his older brother and as they grew up, they had a strong brotherly bond and a supportive relationship, but as our unnamed advertising exec reaches late middle age, his years of good, robust health come to an end and he develops heart disease, resulting in a number of operations. His older brother however, is still the picture of health and he comes to envy and despise him because of this and gradually, as years pass by, they become estranged.
Without wanting to give away the entire plot….it’s a quite remarkable novel about life, it’s mysteries and it’s strange ways of either working out, or turning bad in turn, and the bleak acceptance that death is waiting for us and that we have little to no control over when we take our final breath. It’s also about wasted opportunities, it’s about regrets and about his ideals not turning out how he hoped they would, even about himself not turning out as he’d hoped he’d turn out – as he becomes the kind of man he never wanted to be – and eventually it’s about acceptance. A human story…a story about the frailties of human life.
According to the blurb on the rear jacket of the book “Everyman takes its title from an anonymous fifteenth-century allegorical play whose theme is the summoning of the living to death.”
Douglas Kennedy in The Times writes – “The genius of this short, bleak, remarkable novel stems from the way that Roth turns his desolate assessment of death into something bracing: an angry acceptance that mortality is the price we pay for the sheer wonder of this thing called life“.
Drawing of Roth which appeared in the New York Times.
I make no secret of the fact that I am an admirer of the work of Woody Allen. I also make no secret about rejecting the ridiculous claims of child molestation against him…..allegations that have been investigated and rejected twice, by the way. It seems to me to be an injustice that has marred the reputation of an otherwise gifted and celebrated artist, who has put out over 50 movies as an actor, writer and/or director over his lifetime. Now in his mid 80’s he sees no reason to slow down and is still hoping to produce “a great film” to cap off his career.
After reading several biographies of Allen’s life, we are finally presented with the autobiography by the man himself.
In the autobiography, Allen takes us through the history of his movies from the conflict of What’s New Pussycat his first produced screen play – which was butchered so much by the director Clive Donner and some of the perceived “stars” of the movie….that Allen wanted nothing to do with the finished product – to the present day Rifkin’s Festival (which I have yet to see), and the autonomy he demanded to have the final say in every movie he signs on to make in order to preserve and protect the integrity of his original scripts. He is not a dictator though who must have his own way. He has always maintained that he will never make an actor say words that they are uncomfortable with and allows them, even encourages them, to say things in their own words – adlib a little as long as the original meaning of the script is conveyed.
The book takes us from Allen’s birth in 1935, through his childhood years and an early career as a writer of gags for established comedians – while still a school boy. His love of magic, his early stand up routines in clubs and of course his career as an actor, writer, director of some wonderful and diverse movies.
My copy, the Arcade Publishing hard cover version of 392 pages, was in my humble opinion informative and a delight to read and is peppered with some very funny one liners in typical Allen manner. Being humble, sometimes perhaps too humble, is I believe a fault of Allen’s. He is one of his own worst critics and is seldom, if ever, satisfied with the work he produces, even when it is hailed by other critics and given awards. Had he not been over ruled by the companies which produced his movies, some of them would have never seen the light of day. I do understand that some people don’t like him or his work, or are influenced by the lies and innuendo in the scandal pages of so called news papers and magazines, but in my opinion the are misguided and are missing out on the work of a modern day genius. I can imagine Allen himself cringing at those words “modern day genius”, but we all have our heroes – those we find worthy of putting on our own particular pedestal to be revered. Allen’s heroes are directors such as Fellini and Bergman (particularly Bergman’s 1957 movie The Seventh Seal), the writers Ernest Hemmingway, Tennessee Williams and Henry Miller, iconic actors Marlon Brando, Cary Grant….and jazz musicians such as Sidney Bechet and Bud Powell among others. He looks at their work and views his own efforts as inferior…but I beg to differ.
He is a creature of habit when it comes to writing and writes every day whether he is inspired by a particular idea or not. However he has been unpredictable over his choice of, and methods of, making movies to the point, he claims, that his financial backers visibly cringe when he tells them he wants to make this or that movie in black and white rather than colour, or to make a drama or documentary style movie, rather than a comedy. He’s certainly not shy about experimenting, as you’ll see when you read his autobiography….something I encourage you to do.
He is often complementary about the actors, co-writers, editors, camera crews and others who work with him to give his scripts life and produce the finished movies and yet puts down his own efforts and fixates about not being as good as Bergman and Fellini. Like most of Allen’s fans – although I hate the word fan as I think it conjures up the image of an airhead who blindly follows their hero regardless of the end product….I’d rather say I have been appreciative of Allen’s work over the years – we tended to like “his early funny movies” such as Sleeper, Bananas and Love and Death and were stunned and initially disappointed by his more dramatic efforts on first viewing. But like a fine wine these mature with time, and a second or third viewing brings out the previously missed depths of the movie which we can now appreciate so much more.
The book of course covers his various marriages and relationships through the years with honesty – sometimes brutal, but mostly endearing, towards his ex’s. He continues to hold Diane Keaton in extremely high regard and is still quite obviously in love with Louise Lasser – to whom he was married for 4 years (1966 – 1970). He is very complimentary about Mia Farrow as an actress but is understandably less enamored with her as an ex lover or as a human being, particular after she put forward false accusations that Allen had molested her 7 year old daughter Dylan. This was after he had begun a relationship with Farrow’s grown up, adopted daughter Soon-Yi Previn. Mia Farrow was understandably “The Woman Scorned” and did all she could to destroy Allen’s reputation by coaching Dylan Farrow to say that Allen had molested her. Something disproved twice over and declared false by two different judges. However this has been recently rehashed by Farrow’s son Ronan, a journalist who has dredged up the false accusations once again. It really is a very sad state of affairs brought about by a clearly mentally disturbed Mia Farrow brainwashing her children and poisoning them toward a man who had only loved and supported them in the past. You have to read the whole story to get the big picture about the scandal.
You also have to take into consideration the hoops that needed to be jumped through, the background checks done, for being declared fit to adopt children that Allen and Soon-Yi had to go through to successfully adopt twice, to realize that Farrow’s accusations were nothing more than fantasy, and yet some spineless actors in the industry are now distancing themselves from Allen although they themselves were never subject to, nor did they witness. anything inappropriate while working with him. Others however have come out publicly, despite potential backlash affecting their own careers, to declare their belief and faith in Allen’s innocence – such as Diane Keaton, Alec Baldwin and Scarlett Johansson, who have worked with him many times. It seems so unjust to me that Allen’s life’s work should be tarnished because of unfounded accusations being perpetuated by the Farrow clan and by the gutter press, simply because scandal sells.
A good read and an interesting insight into the life and work of Woody Allen. I thoroughly enjoyed it and give it 5/5.
Hello all. Firstly a shout out to John Bainbridge (https://walkingtheoldways.wordpress.com) who suggested I read this book. Thanks John, it’s certainly an interesting story. I had read what is arguably Wyndham’s most famous story – The Day of the Triffids – when I was at school many, many years ago, and thoroughly enjoyed it, as I did the movie and TV series that followed. I didn’t quite know what to expect of The Chrysalids though.
The story is one of 6 of Wyndham’s best yarns in an omnibus edition hard cover book that I picked up a few years ago and had been languishing on my bookshelves until the prompt by John to give The Chrysalids a read. The blurb on the cover states – “A thrilling and realistic account of a world beset by genetic mutations and of a community whose rules will not allow for any abnormality, even at the expense of its own children – and the chances of breeding true are less than fifty percent.”
The Chrysalids was first published in 1955. It is regarded by some critics as his best novel. An early manuscript version was entitled Time for a Change.
The story follows a young boy called David, who lives with his puritanical parents and sisters in a “closed community” where the bible is strictly followed. The part of the bible that describes how man is made as a perfect image of god, with 2 arms, 2 legs, five digits on each hand and foot etc. is strictly adhered to. Any plant, animal or human, found to be “deviant” in any way, by the local inspector, is destroyed – or in the case of humans, driven out to live in the Fringes or the Badlands. For humans, the flaw could be something as little as a birthmark, or different coloured eyes, or an extra toe…….”ACCURSED IS THE MUTANT IN THE SIGHT OF GOD”…well, you get the idea.
Early in the story, David has a dream about this fantastic city with things flying in the sky. He tells his older sister Mary about it and she advises him to keep quiet and not to tell anyone else. As David grows, he realises that he is different from the others, but not physically different. His difference, or deviation, or mutation, is in his brain. He discovers that he can communicate with his cousin Rosalind by thought….but it’s not communication by simple words, it’s more a wholeness…a communication that includes feelings, of what they call “Thought Shapes”. He then discovers that there are more children just like him and Rosalind, a group of eight of them scattered across the district, who can transmit and receive thoughts from others over several miles. Naturally, this would be seen as abnormal by the older generation so they have to keep their abilities secret from the “Norms”. They manage this just fine for a number of years.
Meantime, David meets a girl called Sophie in an area beyond the banks of their settlement. Like kids do, and have done for thousands of years, they play and have fun sliding down the bank. One time though Sophie’s descent carries her into some rocks and her foot becomes trapped. David tells her to undo her laces and slip her foot out of her shoe to free herself. Strangely, she refuses and continues to struggle, her foot however is firmly stuck. Eventually, with no other way to escape, she agrees to let David undo her laces and pull out her foot. As he does he sees that she has 6 toes, not the regulation 5. Rather than recoiling and branding her a mutant, he accepts her for what she is and helps her back to her house. Along with Sophie’s parents, David is now part of the inner circle who know about Sophie’s deformity. He agrees to keep it a secret and continues to meet Sophie to play on the bank and in the stream nearby.
One day however another, older boy happens along as the two play in the stream and he sees a wet footmark on a rock, clearly indicating 6 toes not 5 and tries to capture Sophie to take her to the elders – to report a mutant in their midst. David fights with the bigger boy and keeps him occupied long enough for Sophie to escape and run home. But, now that someone else knows about her toes, her parents decide to pack what little possessions they can carry onto their two horses and head for the Fringes. Naturally David is devastated that his friend is gone…forced to flee by the puritanical regime. And for his sin of mixing with the mutants David is flogged mercilessly by his devout father.
He confides in his uncle Axel – who is himself a widely travelled man (for their day and age) – someone who David feels that he can trust with his secret. Axel becomes a close friend and advisor to David and warns him not to reveal to anyone else about his ability to “thought shape”. He also tells David about mysterious lands beyond the badlands.
After a few years, unexpectedly, his parents have another baby, a daughter called Petra. When she achieves the age of about 5, Petra wanders off and falls into a body of water and struggling to make it to the shore – unbeknown to her, she sends out very strong thought shapes of panic and terror which are picked up not only by her brother David, but also by Rosalind who instantly drop what they are doing and sprint off in the direction of the transmission and successfully rescue her. Suspicions are aroused by a few other people who wonder how the two of them knew that Petra was in peril. They claim to have heard her calling for help. They then try to explain to Petra about her unusual ability and swear her to secrecy.
A little later on Petra is again in trouble when she rides her pony into the woods – a place that is off limits – and her pony is attacked by a wild animal and killed. Again she sends out loud and violent “thought shapes” and again David and Rosalind sprint to her rescue….but this time she had sent out such a strong signal that all 8 of the kids who had this “power” came running to her rescue. Unfortunately 2 of the girls were followed by a man, a stranger to them, who demanded to know what this group of kids were doing in the woods and how they had heard Petra’s calls for help, when he hadn’t and was in fact closer to Petra’s location than they. They managed to fob him off saying that they had definitely heard her and eventually he let them go on their way.
However, not long after this event, 2 of the girls were taken in for questioning by the authorities. The questioning soon turned to torture and one of them broke down and confessed to being able to communicate by thought alone. After using hot irons on her, the inquisitors gained the names of some of the children involved. Fortunately the girl managed to send out her thoughts to the others and warn them. David and Rosalind had no choice but to flee to the Fringes and onward toward the Badlands, taking Petra with them.
It becomes clear that Petra’s gift of being able to transmit thought shapes is significantly more powerful than any of the other children as she is able to contact others who share their abilities over a much larger distance. It also soon becomes clear that the authorities are not content with driving them away from the community when they form a posse to hunt them down. A reward is issued to take them prisoner preferably….or to kill them all. The kids are soon running for their lives – threatened not only by the pursuing posse, but also by the mutants and outcasts already dwelling in the Fringes and the Badlands.
I don’t want to spoil the story for anyone who wants to read it by telling you any more of how things progress or the ending. But let me just say that Petra’s range of thought shaping is vast. More powerful than anyone else on earth. For anyone who likes a little SciFi or Dystopia it’s certainly worth reading.
My own thoughts….just the standard sort of thoughts…I don’t have the ability to send out thought shapes, is that the puritans (or Norms) are too set in their ways and are totally inflexible when it comes to anything that deviates from the normal. In their world you can’t have anything to do with evolution. An evolved being would be considered a mutant and destroyed. They are very reluctant to accept change of any kind and so live what we would term a rather backward existence. It seems that perhaps the old world has been destroyed by nuclear war – hence the genetic mutations and the Badlands where nothing grows and the survivors have gone back to a subsistence existence and have embraced the teachings of the bible for guidance. But the rigidity of sticking exactly to the Word is their downfall.
In modern life it’s a timely reminder to us all that “different” doesn’t automatically mean inferior and we need to embrace all types of people. Not turn them away or shun them for being different – whatever that difference may be. The current situation with the Coronavirus outbreak has sparked racism against the Chinese. We need to recognise that it’s not the Chinese people who are the enemy, it’s the virus.
Thank you again for reading my blog posts. If anyone else has read the Chrysalids – what was your take on the story? And again thanks to John Bainbridge for recommending the book to me. For anyone interested in history and walking in the UK, John’s blog is well worth a visit. The link is in the first paragraph at the start of this post.
For some strange reason I don’t read a lot of female writers. It’s not something that I’ve made a conscious decision about, it just happens to be that the majority of books that I have read are by male writers. However, I do read women writers from time to time and the books that I have read, with the odd exception, have been very good.
I forget where I saw it, but somewhere I was looking through a list of dystopian novels and on that list I saw the name Daphne Du Maurier and the book Rule Britannia – so I thought why not give it a try.
Shortly after I’d seen the book listed as dystopian, I was at a book sale of second hand books and found a 1973 copy of Rule Britannia and it’s been sitting on my to be read shelf ever since. Once started though, it’s a difficult book to put down. I don’t want to insult the writer but, based on this one story, I would sort of put her along side Enid Blyton….not because she’s writing for the under 12’s like Blyton, but because of her go to whoa style of writing. There’s no real sub plot, no intricate back stories, just a linear one plot story that introduces the characters to us and then rips along from start to finish. I liked it. A simple read.
It’s about a young lady called Emma who lives with her grandmother – who is an actress of old, now retired and in her 80th year – and six adopted boys of varying ages. They live in a big old house somewhere in Cornwall in the south west of England. Emma’s mother died and she was taken in by her grandmother. Her father is some sort of merchant banker and adviser of the wealthy, but he lives in London….when he’s not in Switzerland or Brazil.
The story is set in the early to mid 1970’s and was written in 1972. It tells a story of a financially bankrupt United Kingdom who have just pulled out of the European Community and appear to have struck some sort of deal with the USA.
The household awaken one morning to find that there is no mail delivery, the radio and TV are dead and there is a warship in the bay, disembarking American Troops, who soon arrive at their door. Theoretically there is meant to be an equal partnership in the newly named USUK, but to Emma and many others it looks more like a takeover bid.
Du Maurier is concerned not only with what would happen to her country – England – under what is virtually occupation, but also with the effect on human relationships. In Emma we are given a view of the occupation through clear young eyes. She can see both sides of the argument, but comes down squarely on the side of Cornwall and England. Lines are drawn between the American occupying forces and those who will benefit financially as a result of them being on British soil on one side and what Du Maurier describes as true Cornishmen on the other.
It’s an interesting concept and Britain’s bankruptcy comes about because the bigger finance becomes, the more complicated, more risky it also becomes. Britain as part of the European Community have to have a certain amount of trade with the member states and eventually depended too much on foreign trade, so after they withdrew from the EU, they were already under pressure. When the occupying forces took control of the shipping lanes and transport links, food, water and fuel are scarce and rationing begins.
It’s quite interesting to read the book and to see how many of the locals and farmers come together as a united front to supply one another with their basic needs. One of the adopted boys, Joe, has learning difficulties and can neither read, nor write. His forte is manual work such as cutting firewood and tending to the vegetable gardens, but even he can see how ridiculous it is for a country such as England, which had been forced to be virtually self sufficient during world war 2, to now be so dependent on foreign trade to supply its basic needs. He says more than 3/4 of the way through the story, after he had just traded a load of logs with a local farmer for milk and pork – “You see, it does work, community living. Our neighbours support us, we support them. We don’t need any money, we can live without it. If everyone did this, throughout the country, there wouldn’t be any need to trade outside. We wouldn’t get rich but we’d be happy, we’d be free….”
And that’s it in a nutshell really. Humans love to make simple things complicated. Tariffs, quotas, trade wars, economic sanctions….all these go away if we’re self sufficient.
There are a number of interesting characters in the book – Emma of course, her rather eccentric ex star of the stage grandmother – known to all as Madame…..but known to Emma as Mad, the six adopted boys who’s ages range from 3 to 19, display assorted strengths and weaknesses – all play off one another quite well, Emma’s father – who is more like a caricature than a real person, in a world of his own, Doctor Bevil Summers – who comes to the family’s rescue more than once, as does their neighbour a farmer called Trembath and the rather mysterious Mr Willis, aka Taffy – who can turn his hand to anything and has rather more tricks up his sleeve than anyone else around. I was sorry that the story had to end and I shall miss a number of the characters.
It’s the only book I have read of Du Maurier’s so I can’t say if it’s one of her best, or worse, or even typical of her work. I guess I need to read more of her novels. It’s not a brilliant book, it’s not something that you’re going to rave about and it’s uncomplicated, it’s not going to tax your brain – but its a good, easy, entertaining read and makes one wonder how life would be under occupation of the forces of another country – whether they were there at the invitation of your government or not.
Once again, thank you for reading and I welcome any comments, likes, shares. Happy reading folks.
Eric Arthur Blair – better known by his pen name George Orwell – was a man very much ahead of his time. The novel 1984 was written in 1948 and published in 1949 – a year before Orwell’s death in 1950 (at the relatively young age of 47), and yet so much of what he wrote about in his novel has been mirrored in todays society. Here we are 70 years after his death and 36 years after the dreaded year – 1984 – and so much that Orwell wrote about is happening today.
One of a multitude of different covers to 1984
For example, in the book, the world has been divided into 3 almost equal super powers. We have Oceania which is comprised of much of the English speaking world – The UK, USA, Australia, New Zealand and South Africa. Naturally the USA are the leaders. We have EastAsia which is lead by China and we have EurAsia – mainly the European mainland countries lead by Russia. Then there is a mishmash of countries around the equator – many of the African countries, middle eastern countries and Indonesia. These don’t fall into any specific “Super Power region” but are in a constant state of being fought over, won or lost by the 3 super powers. Pretty much like the reality of today with three super powers the USA, Russia and China bossing the rest of the world around, particularly the USA who seem hell bent on extracting “their oil” from underneath the foreign sands of various middle eastern nations, gold and diamonds, precious metals and uranium from under African soil.
The super power countries (in the book) are constantly at war with one another, with little or no territory lost or gained except for the aforementioned equatorial nations. We come to learn from the book, that this constant war footing is what helps to keep the existing gap between the rich and the poor members of society. If spending on war was not necessary, the general standard of living could be lifted giving everyone access to running water, electricity, food, modern appliances, a car and more. And indeed is one of the 3 principles of “Big Brother and The Party” – War is Peace. The other 2 being Freedom is Slavery and Ignorance is Strength. Add to this a lot of little rules and the fact that everyone is spying on everyone else and of course Big Brother is watching, listening to and monitoring every move that everyone makes. This is made possible in the book by the Tele-screens in every home and every public building that both serve to broadcast news (propaganda) and are a means to watch – to see into every home and public building.
Back when Orwell wrote 1984, in 1948 or even in 1984 itself, the idea that the government was watching and listening to us all the time would appear to be very far fetched, but of course these days we have personal mobile phones (smart phones), laptops, iPads, smart watches, Fitbits, smart TV’s – even smart appliances – that are capable of transmitting pictures and sound to anyone who knows how to write a computer program. Every word, every deed, every text, every email, every photo or video we take on our smart phones can all be accessed by the government or other powers that be. It may not be Big Brother who is watching us, but it is big government or big business or big military…..the Secret Service, CIA, SIS, Five-Eyes….you name it.
Now the thing is, in the book, all this is controlled by a few people in the inner circle of the Party, with other lesser important party business being conducted by the outer circle of Party members. These two sets of people make up only 15% of the overall population. The general laborious jobs are done by the Proles – people like you and me – who make up the other 85% of the population. The Proles are kept in check by the Party faithful who make sure that the Proles are kept in a cycle of breeding, caring for children, working and being kept busy by trivia – such as arguing with their neighbours, drinking beer, watching football, movies and gambling. Throw into the mix the internet and on-line gaming (something that Orwell didn’t specifically name) and we pretty much have todays society. Kids are indoctrinated at an early age with information/misinformation that they devour and regurgitate as fact – never really thinking for themselves (because ignorance is strength) – the Proles ignorance as to how the world really operates is the Party’s strength. “We pledge allegiance to the flag….” – history is written by the victors and is not allowed to be questioned. Anyone who shows any inkling of being capable of intelligent thought is considered dangerous and is removed – they disappear – are vaporized. A few agents of the Thought Police spread false rumours and mark down and eliminate the few individuals considered by the Party inner circle to be a danger to the status quo. Much like the Patriot Act allows the US Government to disappear anyone who is considered a threat. To take people from their homes, places of work or simply off the street and hold them without charge, indefinitely, in a secret location or to execute them and get rid of the bodies without recourse. You don’t even have to have committed a crime – just appear as a potential threat. It may seem that I am singling out the USA as the main perpetrators of these Orwellian excesses, but most countries have a similar law allowing the government of the day to keep the people downtrodden and obedient. This is the job, in the book, of the Thought Police. Like I said in the opening paragraph, Orwell was a man very much ahead of his time.
The main character in the book is a man called Winston who is part of the outer Party and is employed re-writing newspaper articles, books, records – anything that is contra to the Party line. The problem is that the Party line changes constantly so history is being constantly rewritten. If the Party say that 2 plus 2 equals 5…..then this is fact and anyone who insists that 2 plus 2 equals 4 is a menace to society and has to be dealt with. The problem is that Winston is capable of logical thought and seeks out others who he believes have ideas in opposition to the Party line. One such person, Julia, even suggests that the rocket bombs constantly bombarding the area that the Proles live do not come from outside Oceania and are not fired by the enemy, as stated by the Party officials in the guise of Big Brother, but are in fact a product of the Party’s actions to keep the public feeling under constant threat and to bring out the most very basic patriotic feelings to unite the 85% with the party faithful against the common enemy of EastAsia or EurAsia – who ever the Party says that they are at war with at that particular time. In our society Julia would be called a conspiracy theorist. Again….does this sound familiar? How often, when a distraction is needed for the government to introduce stricter/tighter “security” – meaning removing certain public rights or freedoms – do we suddenly have a Terrorist attack or a threat of war from a Rogue Nation who have broken this or that rule….although exactly what rule is broken and the evidence of such rule breaking is never exposed to the light of day, or the public gaze.
How often have Terrorist plots been thwarted by the CIA and been given major media time? The answer is quite a lot. How many of the Terrorist plots thwarted by the CIA were actually masterminded by, funded by, armed by, or corrupted by the CIA? The answer is every single time. The only plots exposed by the CIA, over the years, have been the plots that the CIA operatives have had a hand in creating. Thus justifying their own jobs.
One also has to wonder how many of the terrorist events that have happened and were not thwarted by the CIA, or other nations equivalent department, were also a product of government or powers behind the government, rather than genuine terrorists. The conspiracy theorists are given that title by the state owned media in order to discredit them. If they were called “truth seekers” rather than “conspiracy theorists” maybe more people would listen to them?
How often have terrorist events happened the very day, or the next day, that the exact event was being trained for by special forces or the armed offender squad? The answer is too often. Take the 7/7 bombings in London – not only was the exact scenario being practiced – the bombing of buses and trains – but the exact same train stations were targeted in the event as in the training scenario. Even by a long stretch of the imagination, this is too coincidental. Similarly the Christchurch mosque shooting – police were two blocks away training for the exact same event. There is no smoke without fire and it seems to be the authorities who are fanning the flames. As a result we have armed police on the streets of Britain with stop and search rights, CCTV cameras on every street corner and in and outside every public building, on trains, on buses, in taxies, cameras on the major roads and motorway bridges monitoring the movement of the public. In New Zealand after the shooting the government moved swiftly to bring in new and very restrictive gun laws. Something that the American people can at least argue against with their constitutions second amendment.
Speaking of the USA – they have been constantly at war either with another country or fighting the war on terrorism or the war on drugs or the war on….whatever, since their independence. The problem in 1984 was how to keep the Proles working, the wheels of industry turning, the profits swelling the accounts of the rich, without increasing the real wealth of the world as a whole. As per the book, War is Peace – meaning – as mentioned earlier – that constant war footing and financing keeps the general population controlled and poor and unable to make the advances needed to improve their lot in life. Life is a struggle and they are kept in a constant cycle of work, eat, sleep, work – breed, to provide the next generation of drones that keep the system operating and the elites at the top of the food chain and getting richer. Orwell knew his stuff alright.
The only way that the Proles see of bettering their lot is by winning the lottery, which the Party rigs so that only small denomination prizes are actually paid out. The top prize rolls over and rolls over and finally jackpots and is “won” by a faceless, nameless person who may not even exist. Thus swelling the coffers of the Party faithful. Again….does this sound familiar?
In the novel 1984 we have a department which deals with “newspeak” – they whittle away at old words and phrases and bring in simpler, more suitable words that are acceptable to the Party – a kind of dumbing down – a reduction of peoples vocabulary. Similar things have happened in reality, but its not only a dumbing down of vocabulary but a general lowering of standards. This is reflected in our education system, where we change the exam system to make it easier to pass – in the media by the dumbing down of TV programs – we have fewer real news programs or documentaries and more “reality tv” or cooking programs or celebrity this or celebrity that. Its entertainment for the lobotomised. It keeps us controllable and suggestible to whatever the powers that be want us to believe – just like Big Brother and the Party control the Proles.
In the book the Proles and the outer party members are all controlled by the inner party and Big Brother (who himself may or may not exist). They are expected to tow the, every more stringent, Party line, and to conform in word, thought and deed. Anyone who does not conform is considered a pariah and suffers the wrath of the Party and also the general population who spy on and report one another to the authorities. Even family members report on one another, with children attending a sort of spy camp and given instructions to spy on and report on their own parents. It’s a constant threat. Does this sound familiar? Do I even dare to mention the PC society and the me too movement? So many things that were acceptable a generation ago are now frowned upon. Even humour is affected. Comedians dare hardly crack a joke for fear of being branded racist, sexist, ageist, anti-sematic, sizeist, homophobic, disrespectful of this or that person or group or religion or region or someone’s gender fluidity…or…or. Jobs can no longer be offered to the most qualified person – we have to get the right balance of gender, sexuality, race, religion….Any business or organization that does not have a 50-50 balance of males Vs females, particular in upper management, is considered sexist. Where does it stop? We’re constantly pointing the finger at non-conformists – just like the children in 1984 are exposing their parents as traitors. With all these divisions and distractions the elites will always be able to pull the wool over the eyes of the Proles. Divide and conquer has always and will always be the rule. Whether it be in 1984 or in real life….the lines are blurring more every day.
As a novel 1984 is an interesting story. Orwell was not just a writer, but a visionary. It’s a book that everyone should read for so many reasons. Just like one of his other books “Animal Farm” was a commentary on the Russian revolution – 1984 is a comment on the direction we are allowing our lives to be manipulated today, as we continue to trade freedom for “security”. It’s a thought provoking book. Definitely worth reading and discussing with family and friends.
I’ll just leave you with a couple of quotes from the book and ask you to think if it applies to how we are being manipulated in reality.
“know that this or that item of war news is untruthful and often the entire war is spurious and either not happening or being waged for purposes other than the declared one…….with Oceania (read USA) the undisputed master of the entire world”.
“The two aims of the Party are to conquer the whole surface of the earth and to extinguish once and for all the possibility of independent thought…..how to discover, against his will, what another human being is thinking, and the other is how to kill several hundred million people in a few seconds without giving warning beforehand”.
Regarding the morale of the masses “whose attitude is unimportant so long as they are kept steadily at work”.
My next book is Daphne Du Maurier’s Rule Britannia – another dystopian novel. Nowhere near as extreme as 1984, it takes place in the 1970’s and concerns the take over of the UK by United States military. I’m already well into the book and will post a review once finished.
Once again, if you’ve stuck with me this far….thank you for reading….and your comments, likes, shares etc are most appreciated. What are you reading? Can anyone recommend any other dystopian novels?
A Literary Bent 