The Literary Society

Has anyone read 'The Day of the Triffids' by Wyndham? I'm going through a Dystopia phase. So far I've fell in love with Orwell's '1984' and H.G. Wells's 'The Time Machine'.

If you like 'The Time Machine', read 'The Machine Stops' by Forster. Just compared the two for my coursework and I love them both still, which is a good sign (prefer 'Time Machine' on a second read though). And for other dystopias, 'Clockwork Orange' is my favourite, before '1984' and 'Brave New World'. From Wells, 'The Invisible Man' is also fantastic - have you read it? Would definitely recommend it if not!

Also, hi everyone, I'm new. Currently reading Northanger Abbey but not really far enough through to comment.

On the list are the new John Green one and something by Edgar Allen Poe. I'm not good with titles!

Thanks for the recommendations I've always wanted to read 'Clockwork Orange', but I've always been intimidated by all the Russian in it.

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Are you interest in authors who write/have written socio-critical novels? there are a lot German ones who I know, even in English translation!

I have never heard of these. I am willing to give some a try if you say they are good.

It's up to you. As you can read above my favorite German author right now is Thomas Mann who wrote 'The Buddenbrooks'. Georg Büchner's 'Woyzeck' is another German novel which is readable in my opinion. It's a literary fragment to be exactly, as it was not finished before he died. But these are very old opuses ('Woyzeck' was pulished in 1837, 'The Buddenbrooks' in 1901) and very specific. If you want to read sophisticated German literature, I recommend you Franz Kafka. But his opuses are very difficult to read! if you want something to know about the era after World War II, I recommend you Heinrich Böll's novel 'the clown'. And then, last but not least, I recommend you the swiss author Friedrich Dürrenmatt and his novel 'the physicists' (published in 1962) in which a physicist by the name of Möbius escape in a madhouse to hide his 'theory of everything' from superpowers USA and Soviet Union.

These opuses were my recommendations to you which are readable in my view in terms of socio-critical novels at those times.

I'll have a look at them - thank you for the suggestions

I wonder if there are opuses in fantasy and crime which are readable. Any names which can be recommended by you?
By the way there is a novel which can be count as crime: 'The judge and his hangman' was written by Friedrich Dürrenmatt, the same author who has written 'the physicists' too. It is like a crime, but the genre counts to drama. That would be another suggestion to you.

I only mainly read the authors I mentioned a little early in this thread.

I have read the author's names above, but I didn't mean them. I would suggestions in terms of novels. So I precise my question: any novels in fantasy and crime which can be recommended by you?

I agree that it'd be nice to see this thread become more active again. Do I actually need to do something in particular to join the society, or do I just start chatting?

I've only just found it myself so I don't actually know but I wouldn't think you need to join anything - just post about what you're reading!