Recommendation of the Month: The Pit and the Pendulum by Edgar Allan Poe

“Yet, for a wild moment, did my spirit refuse to comprehend the meaning of what I saw. At length it forced— it wrestled its way into my soul—it burned itself in upon my shuddering reason. —Oh! For a voice to speak!—oh! Horror!—oh! Any horror but this!”

Candide by Voltaire- Part 1 A trip into the best of all possible worlds.

Among the greatest minds of the 18^th century, Voltaire´s witticism and keen intellect enabled him to become a perennial philosophical and literary genius. His work was defined by the sharp-edged social criticism, insightful knowledge and caustic satire that earned him the hatred of the conservative institutions of his time and the appraisal of the literary world. Candide is in no way an exception to the rule.

A Nasty Anecdote by Fyodor Dostoevsky

Another one of Dostoevsky´s amusing short stories, A nasty Anecdote, takes the reader to a particular night in the life of state councilor Ivan Ilyich Pralinsky. This is a man of good reputation, whose self image is that of a highly confident, educated and refined man, capable of showing noble feelings whenever necessary and, most important of all, more than adequate to keep up to the new “thoughts”.

Bobok by Fyodor Dostoevsky

When it comes to discussing truly great writers, the name Fyodor Dostoevsky inevitably comes to my mind. His extraordinary acumen of human nature and his wondrous ability to discern and vividly depict the psychological traits in human behavior are epitomized in his two best novels: Crime and Punishment and The Brothers Karamazov. Nevertheless, many of his other less known works are just as insightful, poignant and more often than not, extremely engrossing.

 

Such is the case of his short story Bobok.

 

Animal Farm´s Symbolism.

 

This is a follow up from the previous post and a summarizing approach to the symbolism lying beneath the characters in this allegorical masterpiece.

 

Animal Farm- An allegorical way to the truth.

"All animals are equal, but some are more equal than others."

In 1945, George Orwell managed to successfully bring to life one of the direst and most shattering indictments of Russian communism. Animal Farm is a powerful and insightful novel, a worthy introduction to his upcoming dystopian masterpiece (1984) that would entail from the message that Orwell was trying to spread at first, with this book; namely: Russia was not the prosperous land of freedom and opportunity as the rest of the world thought it was at the time.

Fahrenheit 451- A closer look into our present dystopian society.

 

To be honest, it came quite short to what I expected, since several friends of mine recommended it to me; although, I think it´s worth reading and analyzing.