This week we tackle another short story by Ted Chiang: From his 2019 Exhalation collection Truth of Fact, Truth of Feeling.

Ludditism and cognitive tool breakthroughs: we go through the pros and cons. Rich wants to go to the moon. We're not sure how much of a luddite, or dare we say relativist, we should make Chiang out to be.

Fallible memories: just how bad are our memories? Benny and Rich have opposing intuitions,

Special guest episode coming soon!

CHAPTERS

• (00:00:00) Summary
• (00:00:00) Chiang, a luddite?
• (00:00:00) Founding myths
• (00:00:00) Cognitive tools
• (00:00:00) Fallible memories
• (00:00:00) Final thoughts

WRITE US:

We love listener feedback. Send us a note at douevenlit@gmail.com to correct our hot takes, add your own, or ask a question.

NEXT ON THE READING LIST:

• Everything is Illuminated - Jonathan Safran Foer
• One Hundred Days of Solitude - Gabriel Garcia Marquez

This week we wrap up our discussion of Ursula LeGuin's 1974 classic The Dispossessed.

Simultaneity physics: just a mcguffin, or deeper thematic significance? How is it different to a block universe? Does this count as hard sci-fi?

on the [redacted] scene: why would LeGuin include this? how are we supposed to feel about our hero Shevek? why would capitalism make me do this??

Final thoughts on the book: was Shevek's arc satisfying? who would we recommend it to? are we gonna read more LeGuin?

Ted Chiang story coming soon. plus special guest episode!

CHAPTERS

• (00:00:00) shevek’s arc or lack thereof
• (00:11:20) talking about THAT scene
• (00:16:40) Simultaneity theory unpacked
• (00:25:45) Final thoughts on the book
• (00:35:10) special guest announcement

WRITE US:

We love listener feedback. Send us a note at douevenlit@gmail.com to correct our hot takes, add your own, or ask a question.

NEXT ON THE READING LIST:

• Truth of Fact, Truth of Feeling - Ted Chiang
• Everything is Illuminated - Jonathan Safran Foer
• One Hundred Days of Solitude - Gabriel Garcia Marquez

A brilliant physicist grows disenchanted with the stifling anarchist society of his home planet, defecting to a capitalist world in the hopes of finding true freedom...but what he finds only horrifies him.

Cam says Ursula K. Le Guin's 1974 award-winning piece of sociological fiction is a leftist pamphlet. Benny and Rich call bs.

who's right? let us examine the textual evidence.

On incentives: Are social sanctions powerful enough to get everyone to work voluntarily? Can an economy function without price signals and division of labour? How does crime and justice work with no police or courts? Do we have any existence proofs of flourishing anarchist societies?

On family life: Is having your children raised by other people as grotesque as it sounds? How about mere copulation without monogamy? Or living in communal dorms? The boys are much more sympathetic to the idea of ditching compulsory education, but wonder if unschooling etc is a luxury belief.

And the million-dollar question: from behind the veil of ignorance, would we rather be born on Anarres or Urras?

A fun wonky discussion of the central ideological clash. In part 2 we'll try to talk more about the characters and the story.

Also: a humiliating question in the reader mailbag! bold of you to assume we actually read books outside of the podcast.

CHAPTERS

• (00:00:00) an ambiguous anarchist utopia
• (00:09:33) communal parenting, unschooling, and luxury beliefs
• (00:19:10) soft coercion through social norms
• (00:33:18) the free-rider problem and central planning
• (00:42:52) capitalism as the root cause of all antisocial behaviour
• (00:48:02) crime rate is zero if you don't have any laws hehe
• (00:59:42) has real syndicalist anarchism ever been tried?
• (01:04:37) how good is le guin’s worldbuilding
• (01:15:21) reader mailbag: which new releases from living authors do we read immediately?

WRITE US:

We love listener feedback. Send us a note at douevenlit@gmail.com to correct our hot takes, add your own, or ask a question.

NEXT ON THE READING LIST:

• Truth of Fact, Truth of Feeling - Ted Chiang
• Everything is Illuminated - Jonathan Safran Foer
• One Hundred Days of Solitude - Gabriel Garcia Marquez