Just read Animal Farm and 1984 for the first time. Wow, what cool novels.

[Amorphus]

I read both those awhile ago. They're good.

 

[nan0bug]

I think 1984 should be required reading for everyone.

 

Yes, classic required reading.

 

[eigen]

Originally posted by: ElFenix
read We

Read all of Rands work.

 

[Looney]

I never got a chance to read them in school, so i read them a couple of years ago. 1984 didn't impress me at all. It's a VERY far journey from our privacy rights violation to 1984 Big Brother, yet people still use the analogy all the time... or the fear of it becoming so. Even if we have complete Big Brother like they did in 1984, it still wouldn't be the same... why? Because we live in a democratic society (where we can fight things we don't like) to the totalitarian system that's in 1984. And the ending in the book was kind of anti-climatic for me... maybe i was just had too much expectations.

Animal Farm was a fun read, and i liked it a lot. Both books, including Animal Farm, are clearly McCarthyism in nature. Which is understandable i suppose considering the times they were written at.

 

[AnitaPeterson]

Hardcore... I don't think you understood the books at all, and you are badly mistaken about the historical conjecture during which they were written. Orwell was a member of the British Communist movement, so he got to know and understand how these people work and think, and what was the USSR's influence at the time. Besides that, the book was written and published in 1948 (even the name is a reversal of the year's last two figures). Where was Joe McC then? I don't think Orwell had McCarthy in mind at ANY time... frankly, I don't think U.S. history influenced him at all.

What Orwell is warning us about is complacency, which is the number 1 enemy of any democratic society. His 1984 world was a world in which people don't even think about contradicting their leaders anymore. Much worse than Germany under Hitler, because it's more devious. It's amazing how some people refuse to think.

Further readings in this vein: Arthur Koestler's "Darkness at Noon" (I believe that's the English title) and any of Solzhenitsyn's books, but "The Gulag Archipelago" especially.

And of course, "Brave New World" and its companion (still by Huxley), "Brave New World Revisited".

 

[Cawchy87]

I loved these 2 books. If you really want a few to read over the summer that will change the way you think then read:

A brief history of time By: Stephen Hawking

The Basic Writings of Sigmund Fraud (Excuse the butchering of the name)

2 amazing books!

 

[Looney]

Originally posted by: AnitaPeterson
Hardcore... I don't think you understood the books at all, and you are badly mistaken about the historical conjecture during which they were written. Orwell was a member of the British Communist movement, so he got to know and understand how these people work and think, and what was the USSR's influence at the time. Besides that, the book was written and published in 1948 (even the name is a reversal of the year's last two figures). Where was Joe McC then? I don't think Orwell had McCarthy in mind at ANY time... frankly, I don't think U.S. history influenced him at all.

You could be right. I never looked into the historical relevancies of the books.

What Orwell is warning us about is complacency, which is the number 1 enemy of any democratic society. His 1984 world was a world in which people don't even think about contradicting their leaders anymore. Much worse than Germany under Hitler, because it's more devious. It's amazing how some people refuse to think.

Well i don't think so at all. It's been almost 10 years since i read the books, but as far as i remembered, the main character in 1984 wasn't complacent at all. He wanted to do something about it, but wasn't able to due to the totalitarian nature of the system. True, most people had given up for a better world, but that was because of all the brainwashing.