...elsewhere men talk of public good, but look after their private good...in Utopia, where all possessions are in common, everyone is certain that, provided that care is taken to keep the public barns full, everyone will have whatever he wants for his private use. For there is no unfair distribution of property, there are no paupers or beggars there, and though no one has anything, yet all are rich.
pickA important work, from 1516 no less. Not to be tasted, but "chewed and digested" as Bacon would say. The author not only wishes us to compare actual societies against an ideal one, but if a more "communal" could even come to exist from purposeful human agency. In this American election year, it's all the more important to ask what kind of society we want & why. Not an easy read. But like most difficult tasks, it pays dividends. Recommended.
"Men could no more live without iron than without fire and water, though nature has given no use to gold and silver, which we might not easily go without, if man's folly had not put a price upon scarceness."
Not a blurb, per se. Just a picture of me & my reading buddy this morning.
Last time I read this was my junior year in high school in an Hon. English class, 28 years ago. High time for a revisit, written by the Man For All Seasons, Sir Thomas More. Coffee? Check! Let's begin...
pickThis book is a great read about a dystopian society and ones journey battling being different than everyone else. I liked this book because it describes a world that is vastly different than the one we live in.
À propos of nothing, I always thought Bernard Hill would've been excellent casting for a biopic of William Morris. I wish that'd happened.
Picked this up primarily due to its link to Ever After:A Cinderella Story, but reading up on it and getting stuck into the introduction has me very intrigued!
pickThe character development, the maintenance of the flow despite the time jumps…I am once again in love with LeGuin‘s ability to note the intricacies of that period, and I absolutely loved it. It reminded me of how 1984 was apparently banned in both the US and the USSR for spreading counter ideologies. This is definitely a book to be read over and over again and find new details, nuanced you probably missed the previous read.
