November 9th, 2009 / 7:02 pm
Random & Snippets

This essay about the book Intermere in The Believer has me thinking about the old, weird Utopian novel. Like this one. Or some of the other books from Health Research Books. Question: do you readers have a favorite oddball Utopian book? Let’s hear about it.

16 Comments

  1. larry l.
  2. larry l.
  3. mimi

      Let’s there about it. Let’s everywear about it.

      I will going to write a oddball utopian book about a werld wear ewe cann yoooooz wurdz NE weigh ewe waaaannnnnnnnaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa.

  4. mimi

      Let’s there about it. Let’s everywear about it.

      I will going to write a oddball utopian book about a werld wear ewe cann yoooooz wurdz NE weigh ewe waaaannnnnnnnaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa.

  5. Matthew Simmons

      Wow. You’ve totally chastened me. I may never write again. A typo. How will I survive? How, mimi? How?

  6. Matthew Simmons

      Wow. You’ve totally chastened me. I may never write again. A typo. How will I survive? How, mimi? How?

  7. joe

      daumal’s “mount analogue” – even unfinished – would be mine. it starts with the search for the lost island, then the landing on it (which ‘the prisoner’ mostly resembled). and eventually what trouble having utopia brings (this is the unwritten part, along with the most of the arrival, but there is enough to like a lot).

  8. joe

      daumal’s “mount analogue” – even unfinished – would be mine. it starts with the search for the lost island, then the landing on it (which ‘the prisoner’ mostly resembled). and eventually what trouble having utopia brings (this is the unwritten part, along with the most of the arrival, but there is enough to like a lot).

  9. Charles Dodd White

      Nathaniel Hawthorne’s THE BLITHEDALE ROMANCE is the best indictment about the inherent folly of Utopian society ever written. By far his greatest novel.

  10. Charles Dodd White

      Nathaniel Hawthorne’s THE BLITHEDALE ROMANCE is the best indictment about the inherent folly of Utopian society ever written. By far his greatest novel.

  11. alan

      By coincidence there’s one I’ve been thinking of recently that I came upon long ago.

      It’s a sci-fi alternate history set in world where John Brown’s raid on Harpers Ferry successfully sparked a widespread slave rebellion as it was meant to, leading to a thriving black-centered republic in the South and West and later to a highly technically advanced socialist federation of North America, if I’m recalling it correctly. I need to find that book again.

  12. alan

      Oh, the title is “Fire on the Mountain,” and it’s by Terry Bisson.

  13. alan

      By coincidence there’s one I’ve been thinking of recently that I came upon long ago.

      It’s a sci-fi alternate history set in world where John Brown’s raid on Harpers Ferry successfully sparked a widespread slave rebellion as it was meant to, leading to a thriving black-centered republic in the South and West and later to a highly technically advanced socialist federation of North America, if I’m recalling it correctly. I need to find that book again.

  14. alan

      Oh, the title is “Fire on the Mountain,” and it’s by Terry Bisson.

  15. Mather Schneider

      Atlas Shrugged. Perfect society where there is no need for laughter because laughter is born from imperfection. Everybody is beautiful and the sex is great, however.

  16. Mather Schneider

      Atlas Shrugged. Perfect society where there is no need for laughter because laughter is born from imperfection. Everybody is beautiful and the sex is great, however.