I actually find the the more ornate/embellished English of older early and pre-20th century books has grown on me. I have gotten used to the quirks and can now readily find even aesthetic pleasure of sorts therein.
Anybody familiar with "The Last Men in London"? It vaguely relates to "Last and First Men" but any description of it that I have read so far left me feeling like it's probably going to be too different for me.
"The Flames: A Fantasy" seems like it might turn out to be pretty good though; and I recently found out about "Darkness and the Light". The conceptual basis of the latter appeals to me, being rather like his two big books... but the (to me, rather silly) notion that the salvation of the world depends on what happens to Tibet makes me fear that it'll be a bit politically trollopy.
Not to mention I did not think much of the portion of most of the portion of "Last and First Men" that dealt with the near future with present-day existant countries. In fact there were a few parts that I found nothing short of distastefully ludicrous. Of course, both the better parts of the chapter/part and all the rest of the book more than made up for it. But it vaguely seems like "Darkness and Light" has no other parts.
So how is Stapledon with addressing unabstracted politics though? Is "Darkness and the Light" deep enough to be worth reading, or does it also have its share of ocean nymphs bestowing ultimate victory upon fortuitously unmarried world leaders?
- Ahi
P.s.:
Quote:
Originally Posted by Ralph Sir Edward
He'd spend 10 pages doing nothing but describing a room.
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I remember my annoyance with J. F. Cooper ("The Last of the Mohicans", et al) for seemingly starting every book of his with a 20-30+ page description/enumeration of the landscape.