Everyone is going to put 1984 on the syllabus, but what young people really need right now are novels from the reactionary 1830s and 40s that show how to get ahead through ideological sail-trimming and flattery. Stendhal, Balzac, Thackeray.
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What was going at that time that there are so many French writers being mentioned.
feb 26, 2025, 5:15 pm • 2 0 • view
Napoleon
feb 26, 2025, 5:34 pm • 3 0 • view
Stendhal was a flatterer? In what way? Do you mean by this that he supported Napoleon?
feb 26, 2025, 6:36 pm • 0 0 • view
Napoleon at least represented a revolutionary change, even if he hijacked it for his imperial megalomania. What does Trump represent other than nihilistic grift?
feb 26, 2025, 6:38 pm • 0 0 • view
Or perhaps you meant to say that these authors depicted and criticized how flattery functioned. That makes more sense.
feb 26, 2025, 6:41 pm • 1 0 • view
I was going to say. I haven't read much Stendhal but his scheming protagonist in The Red and The Black ends up guillotined after being exposed for what he is
feb 26, 2025, 7:41 pm • 2 0 • view
The plot details are a bit hazy for me, it’s been decades since I read it, but yeah, sounds about right. 👍🏻
feb 26, 2025, 8:09 pm • 0 0 • view
Steinbeck’s Grapes of Wrath presents an absolutely horrible time in US history. We got through it but it took a world war and ramped up factory production of war weapons to do it. I fear that may be the way we’re headed. I hope not.
feb 27, 2025, 8:01 am • 3 0 • view
And hopefully my memoir soon, once I get it to publishing
feb 26, 2025, 3:44 pm • 0 0 • view
Thanks for the reading list
feb 26, 2025, 4:04 pm • 0 0 • view
I'm listening....
feb 26, 2025, 8:00 pm • 0 0 • view
💙💚💛🧡❤️💜 Please share: ECONOMIC BLACKOUT begins Friday, Feb 28. Eat food from your own kitchen. Don't spend money at Walmart, McDonald's, Target, Amazon, etc. Don't gas up your car. If you must buy something, support your small local businesses. Stop giving your money to billionaires!
feb 26, 2025, 5:25 pm • 11 3 • view
"Flattery" seems a poor substitute for principled action and "getting ahead" a poor substitute for mutual respect. 1984 and Brave New World do also present problems not paths.
feb 26, 2025, 3:47 pm • 2 0 • view
For a more recent flavor of the same topic, novels from the Soviet times are also a great choice: Bulgakov's "Master and Margarita" or some of Ilf and Petrov's.
feb 28, 2025, 1:53 pm • 2 0 • view
Add the Jungle
feb 26, 2025, 7:32 pm • 0 0 • view
TU
feb 27, 2025, 12:53 pm • 0 0 • view
Dune needs to be required reading... Messiah's are Bad.
feb 26, 2025, 7:13 pm • 0 0 • view
I first read 1984 circa 1964 Tried to reread 1984 circa 2024 DNF so fast – tendentious & booooorrrriiinng Animal Farm? ✔ still readable
feb 27, 2025, 4:22 am • 0 0 • view
I would put Fahrenheit 451 on this list. Not because "censorship bad," but because I don't know that anyone has written about what happens when media becomes useless and banal in the way Bradbury did. He wrote about AI slop without even knowing it.
feb 26, 2025, 6:13 pm • 13 0 • view
Bradbury was an absolute master. Something Wicked This Way Comes is an all time favorite. It too feels poignant.
feb 26, 2025, 8:22 pm • 2 0 • view
What about... Emmanuel Joseph Sieyès And Jean-Paul Marat?
feb 26, 2025, 4:36 pm • 0 0 • view
📌
feb 26, 2025, 8:53 pm • 0 0 • view
Chernyshevsky
feb 26, 2025, 4:24 pm • 1 0 • view
Need more young men with big Rakhmetov energy
feb 26, 2025, 5:21 pm • 1 0 • view
Ragged Trousered Philanthropists by Tressel. Any History of the French Revolution.
feb 26, 2025, 4:19 pm • 1 0 • view
Also check out @workingclasshistory.bsky.social
feb 27, 2025, 7:47 pm • 1 0 • view
Here's a little gem. A piece of IWW's Utah Philips giving a talk on the early days of the labor movement and it's music. youtu.be/ymY6y6o6PAo?...
feb 27, 2025, 2:59 am • 0 0 • view
Here is a different recording where he was talking about old time soapboxing first before the song. youtu.be/gTOC4zej_S4?...
feb 27, 2025, 3:10 am • 0 0 • view
Different event songs and stories. youtu.be/dd4yNMo5r14?...
feb 27, 2025, 3:24 am • 0 0 • view
War is a Racket by Gen. Smedley D. Butler. 1935.
feb 26, 2025, 5:21 pm • 0 0 • view
Civil Disobedience by Henry David Thoreau. 1849.
feb 26, 2025, 5:12 pm • 5 0 • view
Any recommendations mate?
feb 26, 2025, 4:02 pm • 6 0 • view
Lord of the Flies and Entropy
feb 26, 2025, 5:10 pm • 0 0 • view
In Texas, it might then be removed from the syllabus.
feb 26, 2025, 6:46 pm • 2 0 • view
Henry Esmond ftw
feb 27, 2025, 3:01 am • 0 0 • view
Always respect the Balzac.. .....sorry. 😅
feb 26, 2025, 10:40 pm • 0 0 • view
V.I. Lenin, Imperialism.
feb 27, 2025, 1:12 am • 0 0 • view
Rereading as we speak. Makes me feel very ill, however.
feb 26, 2025, 5:53 pm • 2 0 • view
Stamped From the Beginning to learn US history not taught in public schools but very much a primer on how we got here. On Tyranny so you have a plan for taking action. 1st mention is by Ibram X. Kendi 2nd is by Tom Snyder
feb 26, 2025, 5:33 pm • 25 3 • view
Timothy Snyder
mar 4, 2025, 12:29 am • 1 0 • view
🤦🏻♀️ Thank you
mar 4, 2025, 12:34 am • 1 0 • view
*Timothy Snyder* Apologies!
mar 4, 2025, 12:36 am • 0 0 • view
This is a great nudge. I appreciate that you didn’t give specific recommendations. I would like to see the world learn how to read a few synopses and see what catches their eye as relevant.
feb 26, 2025, 4:44 pm • 0 0 • view
I was looking for these subjects. Which books?
feb 26, 2025, 4:15 pm • 1 0 • view
Any particular work of these writers you'd recommend for 9th grade?
feb 26, 2025, 5:51 pm • 0 0 • view
Ooof. They're probably all a little too cynical for 9th grade. Ease in gently with "The Lottery."
feb 26, 2025, 6:30 pm • 1 0 • view
I'd heavily recommend "The Coming of the Third Reich" by Richard J. Evans
feb 26, 2025, 4:25 pm • 5 1 • view
Y'all don't get it yet. This next generation of fascists was trained on quotes from Orwell. Orwell's arguments aren't going to work this time. It's been two generations since 1984, the year.
feb 26, 2025, 4:15 pm • 5 1 • view
They should be reading about the 3rd Reich
feb 27, 2025, 1:56 am • 0 0 • view
Better to read Voltair and Thomas Payne. Maybe bring back the age of reason
feb 27, 2025, 10:11 am • 0 0 • view
Proudhon
feb 26, 2025, 4:49 pm • 0 0 • view
People need to put The Jungle on the syllabus - the full novel, not just the food contamination parts. Immigration, worker abuse, limited options for young men, gender discrimination, socialism, AND an author who ran for public office on issues that still resonate
jul 23, 2025, 2:15 pm • 1 0 • view
bsky.app/profile/mvch...
feb 26, 2025, 4:26 pm • 1 0 • view
Any specific book recommendations from those authors you mentioned?
feb 26, 2025, 4:01 pm • 6 0 • view
Stendhal, _The Red and the Black_ Balzac, _Lost Illusions_ Thackeray, _Vanity Fair_ all deliciously cynical
feb 26, 2025, 6:27 pm • 7 0 • view
How about Charterhouse of Parma? I never finished reading it, maybe I should when I get a chance.
feb 26, 2025, 6:42 pm • 2 0 • view
Agree with Animal Farm as it does provide an easy read for younger people and is thematically deep for adults, but I fear we are heading into Slaughterhouse-Five territory. that's my next.
feb 27, 2025, 3:04 am • 0 0 • view
Insightful and a good suggestion. Reposted accordingly. Thanks.
feb 26, 2025, 3:37 pm • 5 0 • view
Oh, we need things like this on the syllbi: ia801309.us.archive.org/14/items/Sim... And: dgrnewsservice.org/resistance-c... And: libcom.org/article/why-...
feb 26, 2025, 4:47 pm • 3 0 • view
Another great idea for school readings: craphound.com/littlebrothe... And it's sequel.
feb 26, 2025, 4:49 pm • 1 0 • view
In the evangelical school I came to be familiar with the evangelical view of education — or, to be more precise, their contempt for education. bsky.app/profile/cons...
feb 26, 2025, 7:55 pm • 1 0 • view
Now fleshed out with practical Stendhalian advice: bsky.app/profile/ecou...
jul 23, 2025, 2:42 pm • 5 2 • view
In the Garden of Beasts by Erik Larson explains Berlin 1933. A must read for 2025.
feb 26, 2025, 6:24 pm • 14 2 • view
We had to watch The Wave in 1981. It was an afterschool special. This, ironically, was in Texas.
feb 26, 2025, 10:34 pm • 0 0 • view
Animal Farm is more instructive in regards to the coup/revolution taking place in the US currently
feb 26, 2025, 5:00 pm • 14 1 • view
Yes, both are important. And the “Brave New World” of Aldous Huxley.
feb 26, 2025, 6:39 pm • 1 0 • view
Animal Farm is the only one where the pigs take over. Metaphorically and literally the state of the US just now
feb 26, 2025, 7:00 pm • 1 0 • view
No, I agree. The Brave New World also highlights the apathy induced by the drug soma, making everyone complacent, which is the infotainment and social media of today. It’s a combo of that plus pigs, dogs, and sheep.
feb 26, 2025, 7:03 pm • 1 0 • view
I bet Pink Floyd members are having a stark sense of Deja vu. Pig man, fat man, haha, charade you are.
feb 26, 2025, 7:05 pm • 2 0 • view
I always get this mixed up with Funny Farm when I see the reference.
feb 26, 2025, 10:38 pm • 0 0 • view
Read On Tyranny by Timothy Snyder.
feb 26, 2025, 4:56 pm • 5 0 • view
Also “The Road to Unfreedom” and “On Freedom”. Both highly relevant.
feb 26, 2025, 6:44 pm • 2 0 • view
Only a matter of time, the way things are going, before 1984, Fahrenheit 451, The Handmaiden's Tale et al become banned books. The messed up way things are currently I am waiting for some republic somewhere to use the 1st act of Logan's Run as both manifesto and blueprint for society
feb 26, 2025, 5:09 pm • 0 0 • view