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Dictator literature : a history of despots through their writing / Daniel Kalder.

By: Material type: TextTextPublisher: London, England : Oneworld Publications, 2018Copyright date: ©2018Description: xiv, 379 pages : illustrations ; 24 cmContent type:
  • text
Media type:
  • unmediated
Carrier type:
  • volume
ISBN:
  • 1786070588
  • 9781786070586
Subject(s): LOC classification:
  • JC495 .K289 2018
Summary: Literacy, long upheld as a standard bearer for progress, is not always a force for good. Had Stalin's mother never sent him to the seminary he never would have learned to read and so never discovered the works of Marx or Lenin. Instead he probably would have ended up like his father a cobbler by trade and a drunk by vocation. Throughout the twentieth century dictators subjected captive audiences to soul-killing prose on a massive scale. They published theoretical works, spiritual manifestos, poetry collections, memoirs and even romance novels. Armed with nothing but a darkly humorous wit, Daniel Kalder journeys long into the literary night to discover what their tomes reveal about the dictatorial soul. From the staggeringly vile and incompetent Mein Kampf, and the 'miracles' wrought by former librarian Mao's Little Red Book, up to the ongoing exploits of North Korea's Kim dynasty, Dictator Literature is an unforgettable look at the power of the pen.
Holdings
Item type Current library Collection Call number Status Date due Barcode Item holds
Non-Fiction Davis (Central) Library Non-Fiction Non-Fiction 321.9 KAL Available T00805929
Total holds: 0

Enhanced descriptions from Syndetics:

A Book of the Year for The Times and the Sunday Times

'The writer is the engineer of the human soul,' claimed Stalin. Although one wonders how many found nourishment in Turkmenbashi's Book of the Soul (once required reading for driving tests in Turkmenistan), not to mention Stalin's own poetry. Certainly, to be considered great, a dictator must write, and write lots. Mao had his Little Red Book, Mussolini and Saddam Hussein their romance novels, Kim Jong-il his treatise on the art of film, Hitler his hate-filled tracts. What do they reveal about their authors, the worst people imaginable? And how did they shape twentieth-century history? To find out, Daniel Kalder read them all - the badly written and the astonishingly badly written - so that you don't have to. This is the untold history of books so terrible they should have been crimes.

Includes bibliographical references (pages 355-364) and index.

Literacy, long upheld as a standard bearer for progress, is not always a force for good. Had Stalin's mother never sent him to the seminary he never would have learned to read and so never discovered the works of Marx or Lenin. Instead he probably would have ended up like his father a cobbler by trade and a drunk by vocation. Throughout the twentieth century dictators subjected captive audiences to soul-killing prose on a massive scale. They published theoretical works, spiritual manifestos, poetry collections, memoirs and even romance novels. Armed with nothing but a darkly humorous wit, Daniel Kalder journeys long into the literary night to discover what their tomes reveal about the dictatorial soul. From the staggeringly vile and incompetent Mein Kampf, and the 'miracles' wrought by former librarian Mao's Little Red Book, up to the ongoing exploits of North Korea's Kim dynasty, Dictator Literature is an unforgettable look at the power of the pen.

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