toastman27's review against another edition
adventurous
challenging
dark
emotional
mysterious
reflective
tense
fast-paced
4.0
emmonsannae's review
challenging
dark
hopeful
reflective
tense
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.5
This book is certainly something else. I'm glad it's described as a fable—if I'd read it as a straightforward story, I'd have had a tough time. I didn't actually have a clue what it was about until the last few pages, and I didn't get it until the last one. But that ending!! Thoughts on the fable:
The story is that an unlikeable, aimless, ennui-existent young man leaves home to travel, hitchhikes to a country he doesn't know, and winds up a fugitive way over his head in a terror-police state. He wakes up in an empty room apparently having shot and killed a man; he is then thrust on a series of horrifying adventures in order to to escape and go home. He encounters many strangers on his way, some who help him and some who hunt him (one man in particular follows him to make him pay for his crimes). He slowly begins to understand what it means to be human as he sees humanity violated at every turn, while others never stop offering him help at the risk of their own lives. The twist ending is
The title of the book is important. The narrator goes from feeling like society is something that belongs to others (he is outside it, does not understand it, and does not want to join it) to understanding that society is composed of others—that is, people other than yourself. I think the terror police state is the allegorical telos of utter selfishness. The narrator has to come to understand this in a visceral way, and has to put to death his own selfishness in order to rejoin the "society of others." He has to be given utterly unmerited kindness in a wasteland in order to realize he's been given utterly unmerited kindness all along—he's just made himself apathetic to it. He must be interrogated about his life, why he makes his decisions. He has to face what he has done. He has to *repent*. And he has to realize that he must stop waiting around for his life to acquire a meaning; he has to go out and give it one. The thing I think is most intriguing is that the narrator's wild adventure is sparked when he shoots the stranger (himself) unknowingly, as if while asleep or unconscious. By the end he fully understands what he must do and why, but at the beginning each major event is outside the narrator's control, and is not his decision. That's the part I can't stop puzzling over.
I didn't like the book at all up until the end, and now I want to read it again. Fascinating read.
The story is that an unlikeable, aimless, ennui-existent young man leaves home to travel, hitchhikes to a country he doesn't know, and winds up a fugitive way over his head in a terror-police state. He wakes up in an empty room apparently having shot and killed a man; he is then thrust on a series of horrifying adventures in order to to escape and go home. He encounters many strangers on his way, some who help him and some who hunt him (one man in particular follows him to make him pay for his crimes). He slowly begins to understand what it means to be human as he sees humanity violated at every turn, while others never stop offering him help at the risk of their own lives. The twist ending is
Spoiler
that his hunter was the young man himself all along. Once he realizes this the young man finds himself in the same room where he awakened having shot a man. This time, there's a gun on the table, and the unconscious man he knows he will shoot (and does shoot) is himself. The door back home was open all along and he walks through.The title of the book is important. The narrator goes from feeling like society is something that belongs to others (he is outside it, does not understand it, and does not want to join it) to understanding that society is composed of others—that is, people other than yourself. I think the terror police state is the allegorical telos of utter selfishness. The narrator has to come to understand this in a visceral way, and has to put to death his own selfishness in order to rejoin the "society of others." He has to be given utterly unmerited kindness in a wasteland in order to realize he's been given utterly unmerited kindness all along—he's just made himself apathetic to it. He must be interrogated about his life, why he makes his decisions. He has to face what he has done. He has to *repent*. And he has to realize that he must stop waiting around for his life to acquire a meaning; he has to go out and give it one. The thing I think is most intriguing is that the narrator's wild adventure is sparked when he shoots the stranger (himself) unknowingly, as if while asleep or unconscious. By the end he fully understands what he must do and why, but at the beginning each major event is outside the narrator's control, and is not his decision. That's the part I can't stop puzzling over.
I didn't like the book at all up until the end, and now I want to read it again. Fascinating read.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Violence, Police brutality, and Death
Moderate: Physical abuse, Torture, Gore, Gun violence, Murder, War, and Genocide
Minor: Sexual content
larryc's review against another edition
4.0
As a reviewer on the cover, as well as many others have pointed out, The Society of Others can be considered a cross between Salinger and Kafka, with some Orwell thrown in. The tone changes rather abruptly as the unnamed narrator lives in England as a kind of slacker with the kind of witty, world-weary cynicism that does evoke Holden Caulfield.
When he hitchhikes and has a series of unlikely adventures that land him in a poor and totalitarian country that evokes Cold War Eastern Europe, the whole tone changes as the hero is pursued by sinister secret police, gets involved with violent revolutionaries and then moderate, poetry-loving intellectuals. In the middle of his adventures he also manages to engage in some interesting philosophical and political discussions.
I enjoyed most of this book, but found the ending too vague and abstract. This did not come as a total surprise, given the surreal nature of the young man's adventures, but I would have preferred something a bit more concrete. Another objection that could be made is that the development of the story follows in the long tradition of books and films with an underlying Western bias. The people of this unnamed country are ultimately expendable props who exist mainly for the enlightenment of the protagonist.
Despite these quibbles, I mostly found The Society of Others an enjoyable and thoughtful coming of age tale that blends philosophy, metaphysics and politics in an interesting manner. I'd be curious to read more works by William Nicholson.
When he hitchhikes and has a series of unlikely adventures that land him in a poor and totalitarian country that evokes Cold War Eastern Europe, the whole tone changes as the hero is pursued by sinister secret police, gets involved with violent revolutionaries and then moderate, poetry-loving intellectuals. In the middle of his adventures he also manages to engage in some interesting philosophical and political discussions.
I enjoyed most of this book, but found the ending too vague and abstract. This did not come as a total surprise, given the surreal nature of the young man's adventures, but I would have preferred something a bit more concrete. Another objection that could be made is that the development of the story follows in the long tradition of books and films with an underlying Western bias. The people of this unnamed country are ultimately expendable props who exist mainly for the enlightenment of the protagonist.
Despite these quibbles, I mostly found The Society of Others an enjoyable and thoughtful coming of age tale that blends philosophy, metaphysics and politics in an interesting manner. I'd be curious to read more works by William Nicholson.
readsbyanne's review against another edition
3.0
"Life is hard and then you die." -The Society Of Others, William Nicholson
I've never seen this book here on Bookstagram so I guess it's good to start showing it by making a review
I've never seen this book here on Bookstagram so I guess it's good to start showing it by making a review
cleahar's review
adventurous
dark
mysterious
tense
medium-paced
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? N/A
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.0
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