3 ms·
Something from 30 years ago falls in an uncomfortable spot between feeling current and yet not so at the same time. Many of the themes and concerns and even way
by eterm 1y ago
Something from 30 years ago falls in an uncomfortable spot between feeling current and yet not so at the same time. Many of the themes and concerns and even way of living will be similar, yet also just unfamiliar enough.
Contemporary fiction from 60 years ago however feels just as much like a "period piece" as the victorian classics now do. Reading "The Spy Who Came in from the Cold" I was most struck by passages containing things that were so normal back then they needed no explanation or elaboration, yet are so alien to us now I had to read up a lot more about what they were talking about.
- PantaloonFlames 1y agoCan you give me some examples of “normal then, inscrutable now” ?
- komali2 1y agoVery young people occasionally end up in my reading clubs and they of course intellectually understand that we didn't used to all carry cell phones, but I remember one specific time someone had a very hard time wrapping their head around the era when landline phones existed, but not everyone had one at home, and so you had to try to get someone at work or call a neighbor to ask about them. I guess there's going to be more inscrutable things from my childhood the older I get.
- Nopoint2 1y agoI think that the incomprehensible part might be the levels of cooperation and trust to make it possible.