"All this he saw, for one moment breathless and intense, vivid on the morning sky; and still, as he looked, he lived; and still, as he lived, he wondered."

Anna Kavan – Ice

Oh. My. God.How come this novel isn’t up there alongside Ph. K. Dick, Asimov, and the rest of the greatest sci-fi works of our time?

Oh, yeah, it might be because it talks about violence over a woman.

This anxious, delicate masterpiece follows an unreliable, possibly schizophrenic narrator through a world ravaged with violence and unravels its gradually falling apart, while ice relentlessly advances and threatens to cover everything. How? Why? It’s not important. What’s important is the Girl, a woman the narrator is obsessed with, and whose fragility he’s morbidly attracted to. Claiming he wants to save her, he speaks of abuse and control with the same tranquility he uses in detailing the end of the world, of physical violence and the denial of autonomy, flawlessly describing her brittle bones and delicate appearance as the cause for this obsession. Obviously it’s going to be the girl’s fault. That, or the ice.I

It’s a must read.

It should be studied at school.

Ice is a novel by British writer Anna Kavan, published in 1967

Pride Month

Pride Month 2025 – Story of the Day

Veiled in Wit: Queer Subtext and Gender Play in The Heptameron Often dubbed “the French Decameron,” The Heptameron is a collection of 72 stories told by a group of noble travellers, written by Marguerite Queen of Navarre, sister to King Francis I, and one of

Read More »
Pride Month

Pride Month 2025 – Words of the Day

Not by Nature, but by Habit: Christine de Pizan and the Complexity of Gender Roles “If it were customary to send little girls to school and teach them the same subjects as boys are taught, they would learn just as well… Not because they are

Read More »
Pride Month

Pride Month 2025 – Story of the Day

The Sword and the Stage: La Maupin, the Scandalous Virtuosa of Baroque France Julie d’Aubigny, better known as La Maupin, was a French opera singer, expert swordswoman, and outlaw who lived as boldly as the heroines she portrayed. Born into a noble family and trained

Read More »
Share on LinkedIn
Throw on Reddit
Roll on Tumblr
Mail it
No Comments

Post A Comment

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.

RELATED POSTS

Pride Month 2025 – Story of the Day

Veiled in Wit: Queer Subtext and Gender Play in The Heptameron Often dubbed “the French Decameron,” The Heptameron is a collection of 72 stories told by a group of noble travellers, written by Marguerite Queen of Navarre, sister to King Francis I, and one of

Read More

Pride Month 2025 – Words of the Day

Not by Nature, but by Habit: Christine de Pizan and the Complexity of Gender Roles “If it were customary to send little girls to school and teach them the same subjects as boys are taught, they would learn just as well… Not because they are

Read More

Pride Month 2025 – Story of the Day

The Sword and the Stage: La Maupin, the Scandalous Virtuosa of Baroque France Julie d’Aubigny, better known as La Maupin, was a French opera singer, expert swordswoman, and outlaw who lived as boldly as the heroines she portrayed. Born into a noble family and trained

Read More