🔴 "Moral, Macht, Kontrolle – Wokeness als Projektionsfläche"
Mein Essay über die Ambivalenz von Woke und Antiwoke im Licht von Dave Eggers’ The Circle ist eingereicht.

👉 https://www.johann-seidl.de/stories/wokeness-als-projektionsflaeche/6515/

#Essay #Wokeness #Antiwoke #TheCircle #DaveEggers #Literatur #Politik #Gesellschaft

An incredible (!) journey to bring back coffee from Yemen. Someone send me Port of Mokha beans immediately. ☕

Thanks, jury duty, for giving me a day of waiting and reading. Should've brought my backup book. 🤪

#justfinishedreading #themonkofmokha #daveeggers

Folgen-Ankündigung für 14.06.25:

Heute dreht sich alles um "Eure Väter, wo sind sie? Und die Propheten, leben sie ewig?" von Dave Eggers – ein Roman, der ausschließlich in Dialogen erzählt wird und sich mit Entfremdung, politischer Verantwortung und moralischen Fragen auseinandersetzt.

Ich ordne das Ganze ein und teile meine Einschätzung: Lesenswert oder eher nicht?

Link: https://spoo.me/DKF187EureVa

#Podcast #Bücherliebe #Dailyklappentext #DaveEggers #Literatur #Gesellschaftskritik #Lesetipp

https://www.sfchronicle.com/projects/2025/dave-eggers-short-story/
Here is a must read, in case you missed it in the Sunday paper :
Uncle Patrick’s Secessionist Breakfast.
It is so good
#secession #goodreads #DaveEggers

I’m reading A Hologram for the King by #DaveEggers. Yesterday I finished A Thousand Years of Nonlinear History by #ManuelDeLanda, which was excellent.

RE: https://bsky.app/profile/did:plc:5zca2ola2zxpkw37w4f3wxtu/post/3lobiucjzjk2w

@ricky @rdela https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/squirrelly

c: lacking stability or control : moving erratically
A little wind had kicked up, making the faster cars just a bit squirrelly through the chutes.
– #RobertFJones

d: morally dubious or questionable
The squirrelly guy who sold Toph that cheap lock for his bike … just before we left Chicago—I wanted to punish that man—he said it was the best lock they had, "invincible, no sweat" he said—and the bike was stolen within the week.
– #DaveEggers

"So we got us some burritos." - DAVE EGGERS, Family Business, This American Life #TAL #ThisAmericanLife #FamilyBusiness #NationalBurritoDay #DaveEggers

Very enjoyable reading this evening. So far I’m 3-for-3 with my library book picks in 2025. #books #bookstodon #nowreading #daveeggers

McSweeney’s Mammoth Treasury of Thrilling Tales

https://library.hrmtc.com/2024/10/14/mcsweeneys-mammoth-treasury-of-thrilling-tales/

Das TV Program ist ja heute wieder total grottig.
Dann werde ich mal mein Buch weiter lesen.

#TheCircle
#DaveEggers

"Alternative beverages are not available." - DAVE EGGERS, You Gonna Eat That?, This American Life #TAL #ThisAmericanLife #YouGonnaEatThat #NationalBeverageDay #DaveEggers

A short read to savor. #TheHonorofYourPresence leads you gently by the hand into what ifs that lay just around the corner. #DaveEggers leaves nothing wanting!

#books #reading
#bookstodon
#booksofmastodon
https://store.mcsweeney

https://store.mcsweeneys.net/products/dave-eggers-novella-double-pack

The Eyes and the Impossible by Dave Eggers

#TheEyesAndTheImpossible #DaveEggers #SanJose #RecycleBookstore #Bookstodon

On my radar: Dave Eggers’s cultural highlights https://www.theguardian.com/culture/2024/feb/10/on-my-radar-dave-eggerss-cultural-highlights #Artanddesign #LorrieMoore #Environment #DaveEggers #Television #TVcomedy #Walking #Culture #Fitness #Whales #Feist #Books #Music #Art

I was googling interesting reading lists in Comparative Literature when I came across the Warwick University reading list for The Practice of Fiction.

According to the course syllabus, the following novels will serve as a masterclass in the study of the elements of fiction writing.

[Update: This course has been updated since I published this post and now includes different books. You can explore the current reading list for Practise of Fiction.]

For a closer look at entrances, openings, and beginnings:  

A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius by Dave Eggers (2000)

“Dave Eggers is a terrifically talented writer; don’t hold his cleverness against him. What to make of a book called A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius: Based on a True Story? For starters, there’s a good bit of staggering genius before you even get to the true story, including a preface, a list of “Rules and Suggestions for Enjoyment of This Book,” and a 20-page acknowledgements section complete with special mail-in offer, flow chart of the book’s themes, and a lovely pen-and-ink drawing of a stapler (helpfully labeled “Here is a drawing of a stapler”).  But on to the true story. At the age of 22, Eggers became both an orphan and a “single mother” when his parents died within five months of one another of unrelated cancers. In the ensuing sibling division of labor, Dave is appointed unofficial guardian of his 8-year-old brother, Christopher. The two live together in semi-squalor, decaying food and sports equipment scattered about, while Eggers worries obsessively about child-welfare authorities, molesting babysitters, and his own health. His child-rearing strategy swings between making his brother’s upbringing manically fun and performing bizarre developmental experiments on him. (Case in point: his idea of suitable bedtime reading is John Hersey’s Hiroshima.)” (GoodReads)

For a closer look at shapes and structures:

Gilead by Marilynne Robinson (2004)

“Twenty-four years after her first novel, Housekeeping, Marilynne Robinson returns with an intimate tale of three generations from the Civil War to the twentieth century: a story about fathers and sons and the spiritual battles that still rage at America’s heart. Writing in the tradition of Emily Dickinson and Walt Whitman, Marilynne Robinson’s beautiful, spare, and spiritual prose allows “even the faithless reader to feel the possibility of transcendent order” (Slate). In the luminous and unforgettable voice of Congregationalist minister John Ames, Gilead reveals the human condition and the often unbearable beauty of an ordinary life.” (GoodReads)

For a closer look at people and things:

Austerlitz by W G Sebald (2001)

“In 1967, the narrator bumps into a man in the salle de pas perdus of Antwerp’s Central Station. Thus begins a long if intermittent acquaintance, during which he learns the life story of this stranger, retired architectural historian Jacques Austerlitz. Raised as Dafydd Elias by a strict Welsh Calvinist ministry family, it is only at school that Austerlitz learns his true name–and only years later, by a series of chance encounters, that he allows himself to discover the truth of his origins, as a Czech child spirited away from his mother and out of Nazi territory on the Kindertransport. He returns to confront the childhood traumas that have made him feel that “I must have made a mistake, and now I am living the wrong life.” (GoodReads)

For a closer look at places and domains:

I Served the King of England by Bohumil Hrabal (1983)

“Sparkling with comic genius and narrative exuberance, I Served the King of England is a story of how the unbelievable came true. Its remarkable hero, Ditie, is a hotel waiter who rises to become a millionaire and then loses it all again against the backdrop of events in Prague from the German invasion to the victory of Communism. Ditie’s fantastic journey intertwines the political and the personal in a narrative that both enlightens and entertains.” (GoodReads)

For a closer look at voices:

Drown by Junot Diaz (1996)

“This stunning collection of stories offers an unsentimental glimpse of life among the immigrants from the Dominican Republic–and other front-line reports on the ambivalent promise of the American dream–by an eloquent and original writer who describes more than physical dislocation in conveying the price that is paid for leaving culture and homeland behind.” (GoodReads)

And finally, for a closer look at endings, finales, and conclusions:

Short Stories by Anton Chekhov

“The Best Stories of Anton Chekhov is an unforgettable journey through the complexities of the human heart. Celebrated as one of the greatest short story writers of all time, Chekhov’s masterpieces are given the difinitive treatment by editor John Kulka in this edition.  Among the twelve stories included here are some of Chekhov’s most famous and celebrated “The Lady with the Dog,” “The Darling,” and “Peasants” as well as a few less familiar though equally accomplished masterpieces. All of the stories in this round-up reveal Chekhov as a master of storytelling.” (GoodReads)

Save

https://lilolia.wordpress.com/2014/01/20/a-writers-fiction-reading-list/

#AntonChekhov #BohumilHrabal #DaveEggers #Fiction #JunotDiaz #MarilynneRobinson #ReadingList #WGSebald #Writing

The Circle

Problemet med nærfremtidslitteratur er selvfølgelig, at der nogle gange ikke skal så lang tid til, før vi har overhalet det, som forfatteren advarer om. Nogle gange kan man endda tænke “Var det blot gået så godt”.

Der er en smule af den fornemmelse over Dave Eggers’ “The Circle” fra 2013 (på dansk i 2015). På mange måder lidt for positiv – men også en bog, der opvejer det med så mange pletskud. Og fornemmelsen af, at “denne bog er lidt for tæt på sandheden”.

Først skal du bare lige forestille dig, at Google, Apple og Facebook er blevet til et enkelt firma – titlens The Circle. De vil bare gøre verden til et bedre sted – ved hjælp af radikal tilgængelighed. Alt skal være inden for rækkevidde – mennesker opfører sig jo også bedre, når de ved, at der er nogen, der holder øje med dem, ikke sandt?

Mae Holland bliver ansat på The Circle – i kundesupport til at starte med, men omstændighederne lader hende stige i graderne og bliver en stor del af firmaets forsøg på at gøre hele verden gennemsigtig. Der er – selvfølgelig – en stor tyk streg under overvågningstemaet her, men lige det er nok det element, der føles, som om det er blevet overhalet af virkeligheden. Der, hvor Eggers til gengæld rammer plet, er i sin beskrivelse af hele techbro-kulturen og den sygeligt positive tilgang til alle firmaets tiltag. Alt – om så det ville give Orwell mindreværdskomplekser – kan italesættes som et gode for menneskeheden.

Det er crystal meth som virksomhedskultur.

Med Mae og hendes nærmeste som omdrejningspunkt udstiller Eggers techgiganterne, internettet og de mennesker, der gladeligt sælger deres privatliv for skinnende teknologi. Hvilket er det fleste af os. Det er ikke et særligt positivt syn på menneskeheden, der udstilles, men det er også et, der er svært at argumentere imod, især her i bagklogskabens klare lys.

“The Circle” er en sjældent vellykket prædystopi – det der sjældent beskrevne trin før den fortærskede fremtid, hvor alle smiler kunstigt og kun taler overens med forskrifterne. En klar anbefaling herfra, selv om det også på mange måder er en bog, der risikerer at gøre én til boomer i sin måde at betragte nettet på.

#DaveEggers #nærfremtids #scienceFiction

https://superkultur.dk/2023/11/14/the-circle/

Oh - I forgot the first of these: Was a delight to make the cover for @viennateng 's new single #TheRiverSitter - based on a #DaveEggers book "Museum of Rain". Was such fun to do this. Get the single and support #826Valencia here: https://viennateng.bandcamp.com/track/the-riversitter-after-dave-eggers

#music #writers #writingcommunity #multimediaart