Details Regarding Books Re: Colonised Planet 5, Shikasta (Canopus in Argos #1)
| Title | : | Re: Colonised Planet 5, Shikasta (Canopus in Argos #1) |
| Author | : | Doris Lessing |
| Book Format | : | Hardcover |
| Book Edition | : | Anniversary Edition |
| Pages | : | Pages: 365 pages |
| Published | : | 1979 by Jonathan Cape |
| Categories | : | Science Fiction. Fiction. Fantasy |
Doris Lessing
Hardcover | Pages: 365 pages Rating: 3.69 | 2105 Users | 239 Reviews
Representaion In Favor Of Books Re: Colonised Planet 5, Shikasta (Canopus in Argos #1)
This is the first volume in the series of novels Doris Lessing calls collectively Canopus in Argos: Archives. Presented as a compilation of documents, reports, letters, speeches and journal entries, this purports to be a general study of the planet Shikasta, clearly the planet Earth, to be used by history students of the higher planet Canopus and to be stored in the Canopian archives. For eons, galactic empires have struggled against one another, and Shikasta is one of the main battlegrounds. Johar, an emissary from Canopus and the primary contributor to the archives, visits Shikasta over the millennia from the time of the giants and the biblical great flood up to the present. With every visit he tries to distract Shikastans from the evil influences of the planet Shammat but notes with dismay the ever-growing chaos and destruction of Shikasta as its people hurl themselves towards World War III and annihilation.
Identify Books Toward Re: Colonised Planet 5, Shikasta (Canopus in Argos #1)
| Original Title: | Re: Colonised Planet 5, Shikasta |
| ISBN: | 0224017675 (ISBN13: 9780224017671) |
| Edition Language: | English URL http://www.dorislessing.org/shikastaby.html |
| Series: | Canopus in Argos #1 |
Rating Regarding Books Re: Colonised Planet 5, Shikasta (Canopus in Argos #1)
Ratings: 3.69 From 2105 Users | 239 ReviewsColumn Regarding Books Re: Colonised Planet 5, Shikasta (Canopus in Argos #1)
This was the latest in my Nobel Laureate readings, and I started this one I think back in May. It took me this long to finish it, and if it weren't for the fact that it was part of my challenge this year... I may not have forced myself through it. I chose this because I thought it was interesting that a Nobel Laureate had written a sci-fi novel, but I've been really careful to NOT read reviews before I read one of these books, since I'm trying to stay open minded. But... I really wish I hadThis is not an easy book to review. I'm not even sure of my own opinion. If I rate the book highly, it's not for the usual reasons one might cite - that it was a particularly emotional read, or one that I found tremendously gripping or thrilling (a "page-turner"). Quite the opposite. The book, both while you're reading it and in retrospect, comes across as rather deliberately dispassionate - the intellectual calisthenics of a highly political literary mind finally let free to experiment with a
I read this book shortly after it was first published. I've since finished re-reading it in its eBook form.It was hard. But then, Lessing's "Briefing for a Descent into Hell" was hard, and worth the trouble. Shikasta was then, and remains, a book of huge scope. It runs across all of human history, adding in pre-history and moving forward beyond today and into the future.As I read it I fancied I discovered echoes of "The Four-Gated City", the final book in Lessing's Children of Violence series. I
I really wanted to like this but it was just too dull. I really wanted to finish this but life is too short. I got nearly two hundred pages in and just found myself dreading reading time because I knew I would have to pick this up.There's no plot for the reader to follow. There are no characters for the reader to engage with. There is no point to this narrative other than to show how stupid and corrupt humanity is. Yeah, well, I already know that and this is not what I call entertainment.This is
THIS IS THE WAY THE WORLD ENDS -NOT WITH A BANG, BUT WITH A WHIMPER.The Hollow MenEliots is indeed such an apt envoi for the Shikastan world, if you know the plot of this novel...Doris Lessing seems to have been BORN to write sci-fi - though most of her critics were relatively aghast at such presumptuous temerity on her part, back in the 1970s.And whenever I consider the brilliance of this marvellous Nobel laureate - in the panoptic Vision of her superb novels like this one - it almost seems as
They say North America is full of troubles but I said I didnt want to listen any longer. I have always admired Doris Lessings vision as a novelist and a humanist; The Golden Notebook was (as was The Diaries of Jane Somers, about which I wrote at length, and very personally, here) such an important book to me, and continues to be to this day, and I think its focus on our deep psychological and interpersonal rifts is still highly visionary, ominously prescient.With that said, and perhaps because
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