Guesses At Nothing

Why then do we continue in this miserable condition? Because nearly the whole of the produce of our labor is stolen from us by human beings. -- George Orwell. Animal Farm

What can I say. Animal Farm. 1984. If there has ever been a social critic as tuned in as George Orwell I don't know who it could be. Big Brother is watching you. This I know to be true. The Ministry of Truth, just the other day staged a press conference to make themselves look good in the eyes of the country. The pigs always get fat. Please feel free to click the contact link at the left hand side of my site to see a picture of the man in question. Also, feel free to drop me a line, but remember.... Big Brother is watching....

Facts do not cease to exist because they are ignored. -- Aldous Huxley

Facts certainly don't cease to exist just because they are ignored, and the fact is, I am now on day 75 of my 30 Authors in Thirty Days project. I offer no apologies. Ye, I plug on. Blogging is my hobby, not my job, and I am thankful for it. It's sports writer syndrome. You may love it, but when you have to do it, you end up hating it. But I digress. On to Aldous Huxley.

Aldous Huxley is best known for his utopian masterpiece, A Brave New World. Huxley's utopia ain't what it's cracked up to be. Genetic and pharmaceutical engineering is the machinery that keeps society moving. People are born in test tubes into several classes which are genetically engineered to fill different roles in society. They are controlled by soma, a mind altering drug that causes them to be happy consumers, while taking part in hapless, recreational sex as a pastime. (All reproduction is done in laboratories.) So in a way, it is a utopia -- life is pleasurable, there is no war, no poverty, no crime, but the utopia is only on the surface. In such a brave new sterile world, they miss the very things that make us human: love, art, family, religion, the self. In short, culture.

Aldous Huxley himself is as interesting as his writing. Late in his life Huxley became interested in mysticism and enlightenment. He experimented with mind altering drugs such as peyote and mescaline, and ultimately began experimenting with LSD. He thought that LSD in particular could lead man towards enlightenment. As Huxley lay dying in the early sixties, he asked for a dosage of 100 micrograms of LSD. He died peacefully several hours after he took the drug. LSD was legal at the time.

"It is not advisable, James, to venture unsolicited opinions. You should spare yourself the embarrassing discovery of their exact value to your listener." -- Ayn Rand, Atlas Shrugged

I could take that the above quote personally, but I won't. In fact, I include Ayn Rand on my list for two reasons the first being that I have read A LOT of Ayn Rand, and when I say a lot it is only three books, ( Atlas Shrugged, The Fountainhead, We the Living) but with 645,000 words in Atlas Shrugged alone you get the picture. Plus, I feel obliged to mention her due to the fact that four of her books made the top ten readers choice of the 100 best novels as compiled by the random house Modern Library. (It also bares noting that none of her books made the list according to board members of the Modern Library.) In reality, her books are elitist, masturbatory, didactic and a little too romantic for my tastes. But for whatever reason her books have mass appeal and in the end you can't discount that. Oh, yeah, and this schmuck even made a career of doing nothing more than jabbering about Rand. In some unfortunate twist of fate I was subjected to a lecture by the guy recorded on cassette tape on some marathon overnight trip to New York. Take my word for it: the drivel that comes out of his mouth has absolutely no value.

How stunning are the changes which age makes in a man while he sleeps! -- Mark Twain

Phew. Number 23 on my list. I'll get through this I swear. I don't know whether it is a fault or a virtue but I tend to dive into things headfirst and then figure it out later. That is certainly the case with this project. Anyway, on to 23....

Mark Twain. I almost crossed this off my list because I wasn't sure what I would say about him. He is definitely the most iconic writer in the history of these United States of America, but I just didn't know what to say. But I included him anyway for the fact that my father used to read me Twain while I was a young pup on his knee, and if this list is about authors who have inspired me, what could be more inspirational than that. So on this day, the day my father was born, I would like to say thank you Dad, for reading me Mark Twain, and for everything else... for making me everything that I am.