Most Depressing Books and Authors

The Bluestocking

The Bluestocking

Bloody Mary in Blue
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I'll go first:

Thomas Hardy. His characters never stand a chance against the avalanche of horrible and tragic things that happen to them and never even have a sort-of happy ending.
 
Nineteen Eighty Four by George Orwell was pretty darn depressing. Not too many redeemable factors in that "world".
 
I really like Hardy. I'll post a vote for Kafka. Brilliant, but depressing if you think about how K's problems, for instance, are not so far from current reality in some ways.
 
Hardy for me. Jude the Obscure ruined him for me although I rather liked Tess.

I find Tolkien quite depressing, actually. Mordor and what and destroying the nice shire. I know it was allegorical but, for me, it became a bit of an ordeal.

Dean Koontz can often be a bit miserable.
 
George RR Martin. There's no part of his world I'd like to go on holiday to, and almost no one I would like to meet (much as I enjoy the books). An entire population either grubbing in the **** just to survive or stabbing each other in the back to get a little more power for themselves. No one with any real creativity or idealism or vision, so you know that even after "victory" the world will just revert to the same old same old. If that isn't depressing, I don't know what is.
 
I got quite depressed after reading Nick Hornby's High Fidelity. All the men in it are total losers. Is this what we, the male species, are really like?

Because of that I vowed never ever to have any of my records, CD's, DVD or books stored in alphabetical order - or any sort of order whatsoever.

Thankfully I still have a good memory, so I think I know where everything is*. I like to think it's helping me stave off dementia.

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
* I know, I know typical male hubris...:)
 
As far as depressing reading go, the book by Louis Ferdinand Celine 'Journey to the end of night' could be one of the worst.
Basically, it says that humans are just destined to rot and that war is a 'mad international abattoir/slaughterhouse'. In that vein, Jean-Paul Sartre Existentialism is quite a depressing philosophy, not even allowing for an after life.
 
kythe said:
Nineteen Eighty Four by George Orwell was pretty darn depressing. Not too many redeemable factors in that "world".
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Totally agree with you there. In fact I'd like to nominate that as part of a trinity of pretty depressing insights into humanity, that are linked because they were three novels that I studied as part of my Standard grade and Higher English: 1984, Brave New World and Lord of the Flies.

I have to admit enjoying reading them though, despite their bleak messages.
 
Brave New World by Huxley Living in a world filed with such vacuous people. Id find that very depressing.
 
But even Brave New World has some aspects that make the world "livable". The people were genetically engineered and raised to be fit for their positions. Really, only a few of the free-thinking alphas were unhappy and they were sometimes sent to "islands". Although that seemed at first to be punishment because it implies rejection from society, it actually may be a blessing for those wanting to live in different environments.

But 1984 has no built-in escape. It is truly a prison for everyone in the entire world.
 
kythe said:
But even Brave New World has some aspects that make the world "livable". The people were genetically engineered and raised to be fit for their positions. Really, only a few of the free-thinking alphas were unhappy and they were sometimes sent to "islands". Although that seemed at first to be punishment because it implies rejection from society, it actually may be a blessing for those wanting to live in different environments.

But 1984 has no built-in escape. It is truly a prison for everyone in the entire world.
Click to expand...

The society in Brave new world was an absolute travesty. The very idea that your life mapped out in front of you. Where the vast majority of people have no choice or freedom? And they give you access to drugs make you you happy? That's hell.
 
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I wasn't trying to say its a place I'd like to live. I just don't see "Brave New World" as being on the same level as "1984". At least they don't take pleasure in torturing people who think differently.

The examples of problems you gave for the world of "Brave New World" could actually be applied to the real world we live in (which is admittedly dystopic as well). In first world countries, we take for granted that we have career and recreational choices - assuming we have no disabilities or financial problems which hinder us. But *many* people do have their lives laid out for them due to being born into absolute poverty, war zones, or disease-ridden places.

And all over the world, including the "first world", people commonly turn to drugs and alcohol to cope with the stress of not having the life they want. In a sense, soma could be said to be an advanced form of that since at least it lacks side effects.
 
kythe said:
I wasn't trying to say its a place I'd like to live. I just don't see "Brave New World" as being on the same level as "1984". At least they don't take pleasure in torturing people who think differently.

The examples of problems you gave for the world of "Brave New World" could actually be applied to the real world we live in (which is admittedly dystopic as well). In first world countries, we take for granted that we have career and recreational choices - assuming we have no disabilities or financial problems which hinder us. But *many* people do have their lives laid out for them due to being born into absolute poverty, war zones, or disease-ridden places.

And all over the world, including the "first world", people commonly turn to drugs and alcohol to cope with the stress of not having the life they want. In a sense, soma could be said to be an advanced form of that since at least it lacks side effects.
Click to expand...

You are correct Brave New world does in some ways resemble the world we live in.:sick:
 
kythe said:
I wasn't trying to say its a place I'd like to live. I just don't see "Brave New World" as being on the same level as "1984". At least they don't take pleasure in torturing people who think differently.
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They didn't see it that way, but yes, the people of Brave New World did in fact take (a lot) of pleasure in torturing John. If I was being fair - they just did not really understand what they were doing, but that is one way of looking at John's situation.

The only glint of some sort of hope is that there are places on the Earth in Brave New World where you can be non-conformist - from memory one of the oddball alpha's is sent to Iceland where he's allowed to be different.

In 1984 there is no hope at all.



I think if you throw in a bit of Bick's suggestion of Kafka, then add in 1984, Brave New World and Lord of the Flies and we've got a pretty accurate picture of how modern life is going wrong.
 
The Terror by Dan Simmons. Nothing good happens in that book.
 
Hardy, again (*). Probably GRRM if I could make myself read beyond the first bit. Anything without hope. I liked a lot of the books mentioned here because they did have hope, even if it was sometimes misplaced. Metamorphosis was pretty awful, but actually the worst book (in the sense of most horrifying and depressing) that I've read for ages was Never Let Me Go. That still makes me shudder when I think of it. And it had hope for ages, so ignore everything I said above.

(*) Though, to be fair, apparently A Pair of Blue Eyes has a happy-ish ending, and I do quite like some of his poetry.
 
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