The Wanting Seed

Critics

• Petit Guignol

  Though he’s been busy at the fiction trade since 1956, Anthony Burgess first started to loom on American horizons with his Clockwork Orange (1962). I haven’t read any of the six novels that preceded that minor bombshell (only a couple have been publi ... (read full critics)

  nybooks published on Sat, 21 Aug 2010

1 Review

• 

  I have to say the original "dystopia" sounded totally Utopian to me. In the world, homosexuality was encouraged, breeding was discouraged, race was something that was ignored and everyone had enough to eat, there was no war, no military, no religion, there was a liberal government that seemed half w ... (continue)

  I have to say the original "dystopia" sounded totally Utopian to me. In the world, homosexuality was encouraged, breeding was discouraged, race was something that was ignored and everyone had enough to eat, there was no war, no military, no religion, there was a liberal government that seemed half way between communism and anarchy. Of course the homophobic main characters didn't get a lot of sympathy from me, but I loved the setting.

  Of course things didn't stay that way as society was changing, the state became totalitarian, filled with secret police and torture, which led to LOTS of cannibalism, paganism, sex, and the creation of an army. The characters in the book were a little underwhelming. Though I did like the fact that the main character was opposed to all the different governments. But really this book was about the setting, different reactions to a chronically overpopulated planet. It was disturbing and great. I shall definitely read more Burgess.

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  Robot-mel said on Oct 28, 2009 | Add your feedback

Book Details

• Rating:
  (9)
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• English Books
• Paperback 285 Pages
• Edition: Reissue
• ISBN-10: 0393315088
• ISBN-13: 9780393315080
• Publisher: W. W. Norton & Company
• Pub date: Dec 01, 1996
• Dimensions: 1290 mm x 903 mm x 129 mm Just how big is that?
• Also available as: Hardcover and Others

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