A Year in Review

As I finish up my senior year of high school, I have had some time to reflect on the year itself and how things have transpired. While it has been an up and down year in some regards, and a very stagnant year in others, this year has been much like the books that we have read this semester! All have common messages and ideas, yet they are so different in lots of ways. So let's go through the books and see where we have been taken on these journeys. Each book will get a first, and last, annual award known as the Fat Mowlers (a play of words on famous blogger Matt Fowler).

1984: By all accounts, probably the most famous dystopian novel of all time under Suzanne Collins read a few dystopian novels and said "hey I can change this slightly and make a lot of money", prompting the Hunger Games. But in all seriousness, this was a classic to start with and showed us the power of Big Brother. Technology and the government is a huge part of this class, and this book hits it right on the nose. Although written in 1949, this books seems to accurately guess where society is heading and it's not good. The important thing with this book is to stay patient because the story heats up fast. The Fatt Mowler for this award for this book is "most likely to be that book you sort of kind of remember in maybe a few years".

Feed: While we may not see cooperations as a huge enemy, in this next novel they play a huge role in literally dominating society. While the book was written in 2002, the author has an incredible conception of where technology is going. In this world, everyone has a little chip in their head and they are being shown only either what the government wants them to know, or their preference. The discussions will be focused around the power of technology and how, should we continue down the road we are on, things will get worse before they get better. One of my personal favorite events in the book is when the feed goes offline and no one is quite sure what to do with themselves. So in honor of that, The Fatt Mowler for Feed is "most likely to happen if you don't pay your electric bill ONCE, though vow never to forget again".

Life As We Knew It: If the first thing you did when you saw the cover is ask "why the heck is the moon so big", congrats! You're probably going to like this book and as the right questions while reading it. I would argue that this is the most suspenseful book of the semester, yet what makes this ironic is the characters actually don't do much. Like seriously. Read it. I know that's "not how it actually goes Matt", but this one defiantly has a different tone to it. If you like reading in the books about how the s*** goes wrong, as oppose to when it already has gone bad (like in 1984), this one will keep you on the edge of your seat. This book briefly talks about the environment (don't worry, it's not a huge theme, it only pops up when something goes wrong), so if you're into that there's something for everyone. The Fatt Mowler for this book is "most likely to be your motivation as to why it's a bad idea to live with your parents for too long". 

The Handmaid's Tale: I hate to set gender relations back a few hundred years, but there's a good chance that if you read this book and you are a women, there will be a small part of you that just hate the male gender. But that's a good thing, because the events in this book are VERY shaking. But now that I've set back gender relations a few years, you get the idea of the book. This book always feels like you've hit the climax, but it keeps going. Make sure you keep up with the reading because the plot changes faster than a speed limit from getting off the highway. If you ignore it, there will be consequences . Margaret Atwood does an incredible job addressing the question of if we really should keep feminism around (yes), and the idea of HOW to change the idea of feminism comes up a lot. The Fatt Mowler for this book is "most likely to actually happen because the book doesn't involve robotic-cyborg-dragon-eating-fire-breathing-moon-monsters and actually makes some great points".

Blindness: Ho. Ly. Crap. You've got to read this book. It's chilling, it's suspenseful, it makes you sit on the edge of your seat, it's just got everything. We travel to a world where people start going blind and must come together to survive. And yet, there is one that can see among them. I really don't want to ruin this book because the ideas explored and the themes discovered are absolutely incredible. The Fatt Mowler for this book is "most likely to pick up and never put down because yes it just is that unbelievably awesome and suspenseful".

Satire YOU should listen to!

Somewhere along the way, we got lost. All of a sudden, people don't seem very interested in the world around them. Maybe you do, as the reader, but not everyone does. So why? Why is this? I have an idea that due to the rise of social media (and everyone having something to say), we wave off what people are trying to say and warn us off. We have so many "scientific studies" that show different things, it's hard to know who to listen to and who to trust. You need to have that balance of a light and dark side (something Anakin Skywalker failed to understand around 2005) in order for people to listen to your point.

Entire satire.

The movie we watched, Idiocracy, offers a unique warning about the world and what happens if we stop caring. But we don't see the movie in a super dark and menacing story line. I would say it would be the "anti-1984", also because how the society is set up in the movie. And yet, here we are. In a world that people are tired of hearing from people about how bad the world is... which is maybe WHY the people are voting for someone like Donald Trump. They want change and this is how the American people are speaking. But back to dystopia.

Satire in these books can help us feel that we belong in the society. I use my reference from before about the movie being on the opposite "side" of 1984. Both forms of media show us some warnings about how society is going, based on the same message, but yet we seemed to listen to the film much more than the book. 

To me, this is why the book that we read, Life As We Knew It, is that sort of happy medium. While the events in the book are a little out of "societies" control, our main characters still offered some humor while describing these events. I believe that they ground the story and make it more believable. We had a hard time jumping into the plot-line and idea of Feed because the idea was so similar to how we are now, yet very different due to rules and ideas in the book. We even found ourselves asking the questions in Life As We Knew It, because the story was being "made up" as we went along!

Look, I'm not saying that every message needs to have a positive message or at least some humor. But I believe that satire can have a strong effect on dystopian novels because it allows us, the readers, to access the book a little bit better.

Ted Cruz and Offred; a match made in heaven

I know what you're thinking.

Please, PLEASE don't do a blog with politics. They never end well.

Please.

Too bad!!!

So if you're still reading at this point, congrats! That means that not only are you curious what my reference is going to be with politics but that we made it to the end of The Handmaid's Tale! Certainly an interesting book, but I want to focus on that ending. As Offred ends her story in the book, her journey is just beginning. We get some strange advice from Nick about who to trust and an uncertain future.

And how fitting is it that as I was finishing up this book, Ted Cruz popped up on the old Tele! Only it wasn't really good news. He was announcing that he was done with the presidential race after an embarrassing loss in Indiana. Which means that Donald Trump has basically the easiest path to the nomination. Think about it. He's basically the last one standing. Him.

As I was sitting there worrying about it though (I am NOT a fan of Donald Trump even if this next part may seem like I am), I thought it was similar to the book in that we TECHNICALLY have an ending to this part of the story, but there is still so much that is unknown and we don't know who to trust. I get that this is going to make me seem like I like Donald Trump (not true), but we don't know what about happen. Let's face it, we haven't been pleased at some of our presidents when they took office, and yet some of them (SOME) were able to turn around their public image.

I don't think people growing up now know it, but in the 1930s a lot of Americans blamed the Depression on Franklin Roosevelt. He was far from the hero then that he seems to be now. And it's true. So maybe, MAYBE (in an attempt to also connect the political sphere to our class) Donald is the one that we need. Society clearly is not where we all want it to be, and people know see and hope for different times. I see Offred and Donald Trump in the same boat, as they both will continue from a journey FAR from normal, and into a unique and unforeseeable future.