Blog by Sumana Harihareswara, Changeset founder
Compare and Contrast...The World!
Hi, reader. I wrote this in 2001 and it's now more than five years old. So it may be very out of date; the world, and I, have changed a lot since I wrote it! I'm keeping this up for historical archive purposes, but the me of today may 100% disagree with what I said then. I rarely edit posts after publishing them, but if I do, I usually leave a note in italics to mark the edit and the reason. If this post is particularly offensive or breaches someone's privacy, please contact me.
George Orwell wrote 1984 after reading We and Brave New World. (I'm reading We right now -- or I guess I should call it Mui, since I'm reading it in Russia and it was written in Russian.) Why did he do that? Probably to give high school seniors stuff to compare and contrast for centuries.
Ever get that feeling that the Divine Author is doing the same goldarn thing?
I didn't get to go to the LUG meeting, BTW. I showed at 7:30 at the Anichovsky Bridge, and so did....no one else. I'll have to contact the group to make sure it still exists.
Anyway. I noticed some oddness a while back, when I saw two similarly themed films coming out at similar times. A Bug's Life and AntZ. The Truman Show and EdTV. And now that I am completing the troika of Orwell, Zanyatin, and Huxley, I get this compare-and-contrast urge.
Actually, I also have all these very interesting people in my life, and a number of them are very similar, as geeks and in other ways (I think; this is one of those situations where one questions the definition of geekitude and its inclusiveness and exclusiveness and explanatory power for characteristics and personality). So I'm forever comparing-and-contrasting, say, Steve and Leonard and Seth and John and Anirvan and Dan and I don't know how many people.
More in a little bit, mostly on the very unexpected concert at the Smolnyi Cathedral and on my stream of consciousness from History Lecture.
Originally published by Sumana Harihareswara at http://www.kuro5hin.org/story/2001/6/29/13150/3586
