Published in 1940 between Brave New World and 1984, Swedish novelist and poet Karin Boye’s steely, unshowy dystopian novel has now at last been PenguiPublished in 1940 between Brave New World and 1984, Swedish novelist and poet Karin Boye’s steely, unshowy dystopian novel has now at last been Penguinized and takes its place alongside those two monsters of terrifying presage. In this hellscape, Boye subverts H.G. Wells’s utopian vision of a World State into a totalitarian nightmare, where scientist Kall invents a truth serum—an anti-soma administered by injection—that forces the recipient into a confessional state for several minutes, exhuming all their negative thoughts on the regime. The novel imagines concepts such as the thought police and various menacing ministries before Orwell made them popular, and opts for a flatter, more icy prose style, with Kall as a less odious Mengele figure. While not as stylistically interesting as Huxley or Orwell, and with more mysticism and reliance on characters making long speeches to expand the scope of the imagined world, Kallocain is still a formidable vision of hell and worth discovering....more
One of America’s most remarkable writers concluded her career with her second-best work, having never quite reached the towering tippermost of The HeaOne of America’s most remarkable writers concluded her career with her second-best work, having never quite reached the towering tippermost of The Heart is a Lonely Hunter again across her painfully short period of livingness. Set in Georgia in the 1950s, in the last gasp of segregation, Clock Without Hands humanises an ex-KKK judge, an egocentric yet amiable octogenarian besotted with his definitely gay grandson, completely oblivious to the poisonousness of his own vile racism. Whether you find the characters unlikely (as in the case of Sherman Pew), or somewhat wooden (the dying J.T. Malone), McCullers’s insights into the twiny muck of humanity are as powerful as in her other works, making this an underrated and compelling swansong....more
Having published one of the finest novels of the century, with one of the finest titles in literary history (The Heart is a Lonely Hunter), McCullers Having published one of the finest novels of the century, with one of the finest titles in literary history (The Heart is a Lonely Hunter), McCullers returned in 1941 with one of the worst-titled novels in literary history. A strange, involving tale of four miserable hysterics stationed at an army camp, this short work has the same penetrating psychological insight as her most fêted writing and captures a snapshot of quintessential American bleakness in a very concise, brooding manner. ...more
As with other Beat classics, the novels of Kerouac, Burroughs et al are path-breaking howls from the nascent drugged-up counterculture, visionary textAs with other Beat classics, the novels of Kerouac, Burroughs et al are path-breaking howls from the nascent drugged-up counterculture, visionary textual explorations from ravaged junk-sick minds that exploded on the scene with an astonishing menace and originality. Today, Naked Lunch is more interesting for its impact on the American avant-garde, the prose itself a frequent schlepp of nonsensical be-bop that rambles on with the tedium of a party bore explaining in excruciating detail that totally trippy dream they had while on acid....more
Bennett’s other epic pales in comparison with The Old Wives’ Tale, following the frequently uneventful life and times of a printer’s apprentice, beleaBennett’s other epic pales in comparison with The Old Wives’ Tale, following the frequently uneventful life and times of a printer’s apprentice, beleaguered by a tyrannical father, a nonexistent sex life, and a thwarted career in architecture. Typical unflinching realism from an underread master chronicler of the Midlands....more
