2016 Stuff Read, #s 7-8
7. It Can't Happen Here, by Sinclair Lewis (audiobook)
I'd like to thank Donald Trump for inspiring me to grab this novel from my reading/listening stack. Though the book is 80 years old, its depiction of the early stages of a corpo-facist takeover of the United States is eerily prescient in showing why a campaign such as Trump's has worked. I also found myself nodding my head in silent agreement with many of the ruminations on human nature and American culture -- many of which are possibly even more true now as they were when Sinclair wrote them. After I finished reading it, I discovered that in 2007 the Libertarian Futurist Society gave It Can't Happen Here a Prometheus Hall of Fame Award. I find this incredibly amusing. While I can see the book appeal to the libertarian crowd, there is no suggestion whatsoever in the book that any kind of libertarianism or proto-libertarianism would be an appropriate response or bulwark to the madness that Lewis depicts America embracing. Then again, a look at the titles of Prometheus Award winners suggests to me that the LFS just loves to give awards to works that show any non-libertarian government running amok -- no matter how plausible the scenario.
8. Analog, December 2015
Part of my push to read as much short fiction as possible before the Hugo nominating deadline, which was a few days ago. It was the first issue of Analog I read in years -- I really prefer the work published in either Asimov's or Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction. In an effort to consider stories from as large a variety of sources as possible, I'll continue to make efforts to read an issue or two of Analog every year for Hugo nominating purposes. Having said that, there wasn't anything in this issue that struck me as Hugo-worthy.
I'd like to thank Donald Trump for inspiring me to grab this novel from my reading/listening stack. Though the book is 80 years old, its depiction of the early stages of a corpo-facist takeover of the United States is eerily prescient in showing why a campaign such as Trump's has worked. I also found myself nodding my head in silent agreement with many of the ruminations on human nature and American culture -- many of which are possibly even more true now as they were when Sinclair wrote them. After I finished reading it, I discovered that in 2007 the Libertarian Futurist Society gave It Can't Happen Here a Prometheus Hall of Fame Award. I find this incredibly amusing. While I can see the book appeal to the libertarian crowd, there is no suggestion whatsoever in the book that any kind of libertarianism or proto-libertarianism would be an appropriate response or bulwark to the madness that Lewis depicts America embracing. Then again, a look at the titles of Prometheus Award winners suggests to me that the LFS just loves to give awards to works that show any non-libertarian government running amok -- no matter how plausible the scenario.
8. Analog, December 2015
Part of my push to read as much short fiction as possible before the Hugo nominating deadline, which was a few days ago. It was the first issue of Analog I read in years -- I really prefer the work published in either Asimov's or Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction. In an effort to consider stories from as large a variety of sources as possible, I'll continue to make efforts to read an issue or two of Analog every year for Hugo nominating purposes. Having said that, there wasn't anything in this issue that struck me as Hugo-worthy.