Social_commentary on George's Blog

Heart of a Dog

Wed, 31 Dec 1969 19:32:05 -0500

Summary

This is one of those books where revealing anything is too much. The book opens from the perspective of a scruffy stray dog who encounters a mysterious Dr. Filipp Filippovich. Things get out of hand.

Thoughts

I enjoyed this book. From the author of The Master and Margarita, which I read almost exactly a year ago, Bulgakov offers another incisive satirical take on the Bolshevik Revolution. The book presents a dual critique: on one hand, it addresses the hubris of the revolutionaries, who are overly confident in their understanding of human nature. On the other hand, it highlights that people are indeed different; some are worth listening to, while others should be ignored. This book provides a literary vision of an unfortunately successful bourgeois (which I don’t feel a part of until I can spell the word without looking it up) social architect and portrays an exaggerated, unwashed proletariat wielding newfound power. Beyond any political interpretations, the book is fairly short and entertaining for the most part. The writing is unsurprisingly quiet good and makes for a perfect Halloween season read from the USSR. Onward comrades!

Dead Souls

Wed, 31 Dec 1969 19:30:42 -0500

Gogol is one more of those Russian authors (actually born in Ukraine) that was an inspiration to many other authors (Dostoyevsky, Tolstoy, Kafka, etic) I thought it was about time to take the old boy out himself. Dead Souls follows a mysterious character that the reader gets to know as the book unfolds who just as mysteriously wants to buy dead serfs from Russian aristocrats. The writing style was easy to digest, and the book is filled with many charming and ridiculous characters. This book was somewhat unique as the author would break the fourth wall from time to time and give his own views about things. Full of insightful social commentary and awkward predicaments the book was called the Russian Pickwick Papers, but I wouldn’t go that far, I would say this book is a lot less ridiculous and more surreal, which I would guess is why it appealed to Kafka. The book surprisingly ends in mid-sentence leaving scholars to argue whether or not it was supposed to be that way. Whether it was or not it definitely felt like the rug was pulled from under you. Gogol was another one of those Russian authors that seemed to live like a character from his books. A complete chad that wanted to teach Cossack history but instead was offered a job teaching Medieval History at the university of St. Petersburg a subject of which he had no qualifications.

The Souls of Black Folk

Wed, 31 Dec 1969 19:31:43 -0500

Written in 1903 the book opens with W.E.B Du Bois central thesis that “The problem of the twentieth century is the problem of the color-line.” This book is a collection of essays that lays out Du Bois’ views on race relations. Poetically written and very moving at times. The essays cover a variety of topics ranging from black farmers in a post-civil war south, the death of his first child and his views on education. What is most surprising to me about reading this book is that although many of the things he fought for (i.e allowing black people in universities, general equal rights) have been accomplished many of his issues with race relation still remain unmoved. This is also interesting because in an early chapter he likened the bill of emancipation to a “promise land” or “second coming” for the black folk who had been waiting on it for so long. But when they got it, it didn’t solve the problem. They instead realized that the power to be free lied in being able to vote. So, then they pushed towards that goal. Achieving that and still finding themselves not free. It seems like you are only as “free” as everyone that is around you thinks. Du Bois describes his experience as living in a veil with whites on one side and blacks on the other. Himself having been able to go to university and having overcome the three temptations of a black life (hate, despair, and doubt) had given him a unique vantage point. He uses this point of view to write the book to in his words “Leaving, then, the world of the white man, I have stepped within the Veil, raising it that you may view faintly its deeper recesses, the meaning of its religion, the passion of its human sorrow, and the struggle of its greater souls.” Overall, a very interesting, well written and balanced take on the current standing of the race problem in 1903 and still seems very relevant today.