University of Orwell update: 10/26/14

Hey y'all.  So I've been reading some books for consideration of entrance into the University of Orwell.  Why not talk about them, shall we?

Under the Loving Care of the Fatherly Leader by Bradley K. Martin ---

This is a book that was at my work, and I checked it out with the express purpose of considering it for this list.  Just look at that cover.  So dramatic, no?  Besides, it's a two inch thick book on a topic I want to read about.  What could go wrong?

Well, to be a good history writer, one must learn to use a knife.  A metaphorical knife, to be used against one's own bias and the bias of the sources the writer uses.  One must have an austere, straightforward mind, free from subtle attitudes and being so sunk in a situation or culture that you can't see past the attitudes and influences of that situation or culture.  While it's not possible to be completely unbiased, the writer has to be always aware that their nonfiction is about the subject, not them.  And someone's writing will always show their attitude.

Such was clearly the case with Bradley K. Martin.  Now, most of his narrative does not involve the early life of Kim Il Sung, North Korea's first tyrant.  It's not really possible, given how little is available on the topic.  However, Martin's methods for summarizing Il Sung's early years is questionable.  For one thing, he heavily relies on Il Sung's own memoirs.  Given some of the fantastic fish stories that have come out of the North (see: Kim Jong Il's golf record), one should be very careful at referencing this propaganda.  While Martin spoke to some of the people who apparently knew Il Sung during his early years, most of the first three chapters rests on Il Sung's post-tyrant biographies.  And at least one of the witnesses involved was still loyal to Il Sung.  Yeah.

University of Orwell

Hey y'all.  Welcome to my experiment.

I read a lot of books, mostly nonfiction.  Even when I do read fiction, I prefer the books that in some way help me learn about real life, such as Farmer in the Sky by Robert Heinlein, or One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich, by Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn.  Lately I've noticed that most of my books run on anti-tyrannical themes, even when I don't directly choose a book on that basis.  For example, I just read a C.S. Lewis biography, and it turns out that his wife Joy was an ex-communist.

The more I read, the more I've realized that I'm on to something.  I'm not sure what right at this moment, but everything I'm studying makes me feel as though I'm on the verge of some great truth, one that will be revolutionary once I figure out what it is.  Revolutionary to myself, in any case.  This came to a head as I wrote my Brave New World review on the subject of pleasure vs. abstinence, and now I've finally decided to turn an inside joke into something with potential.

That truth I'm searching for in some way relates to the nature of control, both of others and of self.  It relates to individualism, and how people are so easily led astray by strange ideas and philosophies, some that seem like nonsense to anyone not taken in, and some as addictive as drugs.  Basically, I want all to be able to assess reality, without losing childlike humility and curiosity.  It's not about being smarter or better than anyone else, but about turning oneself into someone who can only be ruled by God and oneself, not by manipulators, clever liars, and those who appeal to our own egos to get us to think as they do.

Thus, the University of Orwell is born.  It's my imaginary university about the philosophy and politics of control.  In execution, it's a collection of books I feel will teach people the history and psychology of control, all arranged into departments as though they were textbooks.

University of Orwell: Brave New World

Hey y'all.  So I've just read Brave New World by Aldous Huxley, and it's.....well, interesting.  A lot of the time people will call something a classic and keep it on an elevated platform, but for this book I feel like it's a normal work -- something that can't be blindly praised, nor something so nonsensical that you start wondering what kind of person would call it classic (i.e. Great Gatsby).  It's a bit nonsensical, to be fair.  Of course, that's the whole point of Brave New World.  It's a representation of the human mind when it's subjected to a setting of convenient pleasure at all times, artificially generated by a techno-tyranny -- that is, a tyranny that controls by using technology.

Now, as I talk about this book, I'm going to be comparing it to George Orwell's 1984 and C.S. Lewis' That Hideous Strength.  These three books are all based on techno-tyrannies, and talk about it from three different angles, each valid in its literary purpose.

But wait, you ask, what's with that title?  University of Orwell?  Well, I'll explain that in the next blog post.  For now, it's about Brave New World.

Spoilers are everywhere.