To Read & To Write

Because of the ingenuity behind China Mieville's "Embassytown" (2011), the book is enormously fun to read. Like many science fiction books I've picked up before, there was a point when I was aware that I was not comprehending all of what I was "reading", but continued happily on anyway, willing to do the work, understanding what I could, while letting the story flow page by page freely. Usually the ability for the reader to do that with a complex story structure and highly intellectual content is a sign of great style. And that - amazing literary style - is something Mieville certainly does have. This is the first Mieville book I've picked up and I was absolutely mind-blown by its concept. With language as the main thematic element, I emerged myself in the wonderful linguistic games, using my own sparse knowledge of Saussurian semiotics to back-up what I thought I was "getting". Beyond that, I loved the symbolism of the book, which Mieville...

For words, we have extensive etymologies, for literature we have comprehensive exegeses, for life we have philosophy, for history we have critical theories, for art we have historical analyses, and the same goes for science. The whole of Stanislaw Lem's  Solaris  (from French and published in 1961) is a beautiful study in  bodies of work such as those, and how, as time passes and consciousness changes, all these criticisms, theories, and conclusions merge and die, sometimes becoming irrelevant or outright wrong, or else become case studies in hysteria or some other psychological manifestation, all the while developing a chronological set of *facts*. The subject in Lem's elegantly written novel is the planet Solaris, a planet that has been under the observation and scrutiny of scientists for thousands of years. The protagonist of this story is Kris Kelvin, a psychiatrist who became fascinated with the planet as a child and consequently dedicated his entire life to it,...

Review edited and updated from yesterday, 12/04/18, today: 12/05/18 "Everything is true,' he said. 'Everything anybody has ever thought." - Do Androids Dream Of Electric Sheep? Ridley Scott's Blade Runner (1982) as well as Denis Villeneuve's Blade Runner 2049 (2017) both prove to be excellent films to be watched in conjunction with reading Philip K. Dick's science fiction novel, Do Androids Dream Of Electric Sheep?, published first in 1968. The films are extremely futuristic, visually, both films taking a cyberpunk-ish/noir aspect of the story which is not easy to grasp in the novel. Dick's novel, in contrast, feels a little dated. The described technology and world is not as digitalized; the book seems more grainy, more blurred, still with remnants of the 1950s (think of the word used for the self-replicating trash/junk: "kipple"). This factors in to why watching the movies would be helpful if one would like to understand the book. Th...