[UA] Ballard

[Greg Stolze]

on 2/22/01 4:45 AM, Chris Milne at khris at clara.net wrote:

> Oh, and the JG Ballard book: Running Wild. I haven't read enough
> Ballard, but from what I have (principally this and Cocaine Nights),
> he seems to portray the ways in which modern society can disintegrate
> or become "primitive". Is that a fair statement?

Very fair.  In "High Rise" the apartment complex of the future -- designed
to be totally self-contained, with mall, businesses and residences all
clumped together, just add food -- degenerates into barbarism.  And in
"Concrete Island" a guy gets stranded in a traffic island and can't escape
because no one will (or indeed, can) slow down to help him.

-G.
-- 
Hannibal is a character that my old writing teacher would have called
"loved by it's author." He is so empowered by the person crafting him
that he's granted near god-like abilities, and gets stripped the
qualities we apply to actual human characters. These creations become more
of a device than a personality and generally turn out not nearly as
interesting as the author believes.



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