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Mockingbird Walter S Tevis 9780385149334 Books

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Mockingbird Walter S Tevis 9780385149334 Books

Amazingly good story with beautiful use of language, published in 1980 and almost every word rings true today. When I read, I fold the corner of the page over when there is a line or scene I especially like. I have a lot of folded over pages on this one. A few examples (no plot spoilers): "You know what work is these days. They have to deactivate robots to find things to pay us for doing."; "'Is there a date now? Does this year have a number?' He looked at me coldly. 'No, there is no date.' I would like to know the date. I would like for my child to have a birth date.'"; "Nothing in my education - my stupid, life-hating education - had prepared me for what I was about to do"; "Since no one had devised a way of making cars safe in the hands of a human driver, it was decided to discontinue them." It's a very moving story that transcends the SF genre and is refreshingly free of political correctness. Really super stuff. BTW, after reading this, I turned to two other books by Tevis, The Man Who Fell To Earth and Queen's Gambit. I enjoyed the latter books, but I think Mockingbird has more good lines and a better set of themes. Mockingbird is a story that makes you appreciate daily life all the more when you put it down.


Tags : Mockingbird [Walter S. Tevis] on Amazon.com. *FREE* shipping on qualifying offers. A futuristic tale set in a world where reading is forbidden, citizens are drugged from childhood on, and machines dominate humans focuses on two people who teach themselves how to read and how to think independently,Walter S. Tevis,Mockingbird,Doubleday,0385149336,Romance - General,Science fiction,Science fiction.,Fiction,Fiction Romance General,Romance: Modern

Mockingbird Walter S Tevis 9780385149334 Books Reviews

I started out thinking I wouldn't like this book, then ended up thinking... this is pretty amazing.

Likes Imagine a full grown human being seeing the world like a newborn; that's essentially what happens when the main character takes the forbidden fruit of emerging from the drug-induced haze of the future, where no one knows what a book is or how to read, or has any sense of anything but the moment... no past, no future. Among human beings, there's no SHARED experiences; no family, no community, no friendships. Even in large groups, everything is experienced in complete isolation. No one converses, no one reads, no one... anything. If there is any accidental contact or conversation in the book, the characters often take extra drugs to avoid thinking or feeling anything about it. Paul, his first baby steps of experiencing things, does not know how to experience emotion because he's never had experiences that provoke emotion before. He has to learn how to have basic human interaction, how to be HUMAN.

He learns to read. He takes a journey. It's awesome and sad and did I say awesome. The woman, Mary Lou, that he experiences experiences with at first, has her own part in the narrative, as well as Bob the robot. THE robot, the perfection of humanity and robotics, who is, unfortunately, humanity's keeper and maintainer and, also unfortunately, very suicidal.

Dislikes There is some swearing including the f-word and some sex... it is about human beings, after all. Not so much a dislike as a disclaimer, since I thought they were important to the story and nothing super graphic. I thought it was interesting that porn was ubiquitous in the future world of human isolation; studies have proven that porn strains relationships and changes how the brain thinks about partners. Paul never thinks very much about it, but my thinking from my perspective is that if you were trying to get human beings to not like or want to interact with each other, flooding them with porn would be a great place to start. Porn sex is purely selfish; for the individual viewer's pleasure only. "Quick sex is best;" as in it's the act that matters, not the people or the relationships, which is exactly what porn says.

The book was awesome and I thought about it a long time after I finished it.
Although I read The Man Who Fell To Earth by Walter Tevis many years ago, I never knew about Mockingbird until I stumbled across it in an advertisement. I'm not sure why this 1980 novel has not taken its place beside Brave New World and 1984 in literary importance. This paean to literacy, including the infinite joys and importance of reading, also starkly warns of the dangers of technology and the absence of critical thought in humanity. The three major characters-a man, woman, and robot-are written with depth and transition, especially Paul, the human male who endures great hardship. This is a book I will return to again.
Our preferences regarding our entertainment preferences over the past few decades has changed drastically. We no longer are attracted to slow-moving, linear stories that take us methodically from square one to the climax of the story’s plot. We now prefer rapid action scenes, flash backs and leaps into the future. We truly are a fickle lot and, being so, can easily brush of this novel by Walter Tevis as being too slow to develop or even being somewhat boring. It was written during a far more peaceful and calm period of our history as reflected in his writing style. But, that being said, there are some very noteworthy projections that he thrusts into our consciousness that we should take heed of. While robots overtaking the world is a time-old theme the uniqueness of this novel reflects the development of the ‘ultimate robot’; One who will live forever while he rules the entire world. While his eternal life, due to simply physical principals, is an impossibility, it allows the reader to question his/her own mortality and fears of death. The human/humanoid population that remains on earth is symbolic of our society which seems to become more and more ‘dumbed down’ from generation to generation. The election of Trump is simply the latest example of our complacency. The only question I have with the author’s ‘fairy tale ending’ is whether the ceasing of sterilization drugs occurred in time to allow other humans to reproduce or are we simply left with a new Adam and new Eve who must restart the repopulation of the world? I guess, as readers, we must draw our won conclusions..............
Amazingly good story with beautiful use of language, published in 1980 and almost every word rings true today. When I read, I fold the corner of the page over when there is a line or scene I especially like. I have a lot of folded over pages on this one. A few examples (no plot spoilers) "You know what work is these days. They have to deactivate robots to find things to pay us for doing."; "'Is there a date now? Does this year have a number?' He looked at me coldly. 'No, there is no date.' I would like to know the date. I would like for my child to have a birth date.'"; "Nothing in my education - my stupid, life-hating education - had prepared me for what I was about to do"; "Since no one had devised a way of making cars safe in the hands of a human driver, it was decided to discontinue them." It's a very moving story that transcends the SF genre and is refreshingly free of political correctness. Really super stuff. BTW, after reading this, I turned to two other books by Tevis, The Man Who Fell To Earth and Queen's Gambit. I enjoyed the latter books, but I think Mockingbird has more good lines and a better set of themes. Mockingbird is a story that makes you appreciate daily life all the more when you put it down.