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A review by chronikle
The Circle by Dave Eggers
3.0
I can appreciate what Dave Eggers was trying to achieve with The Circle, I really can. It offers a terrifying insight into what one of our futures might be like, one day, if we give up in the valiant battle for our right to privacy and anonymity. There’s also a fairly accurate depiction of social media addiction and the emptiness, unfulfillment, and envy those addicts can feel when they don’t receive the attention they need. The Circle is trying to warn us about the evils of technology and the harm it can do when we immerse ourselves in it for too long.
Unfortunately, it misses the mark.
The Circle directly links Internet usage and, more prominently, social media usage with cult-like behaviour. It’s not hard to see why, given the prevalence of it in our lives; I would argue there are times when it is a cult-like activity. But The Circle is let down by this heavy-handed viewpoint. Devoid of nuance, Eggers starts his work by clarifying that Internet anonymity (used almost synonymously with trolls) is gone forever, thanks to a program called TruYou that links your accounts, payment options, and personal information to one singular account. It’s frustrating, because The Circle is clearly a warning about protecting your privacy, but there’s no thought given to the people who are very careful about protecting their privacy and personal identity online. As far as The Circle is concerned, everyone was willing to sign that right away for ease of access.
While I don’t think Mae is a particularly well-developed character, I did appreciate the journey her character went on. Plagued by guilt and insecurity at the start of the novel, Mae seeks constant validation, and she receives it in the form of the Circle and its social media. As for how quickly she lets it happen and how ignorant she is to the warning signs around her… well, she’s joined a cult, whether she knows it or not. I did think it was interesting how her character had done a complete 180 from the start, and the story reinforced that by mirroring her previous actions with her post-indoctrination actions.
To be fair to Eggers, I actually read the book in one sitting and I was hooked, eager to know how it ended. (I absolutely adored the ending, by the way—I wasn’t expecting it to have the guts to go where it did, but it did!) But I feel like the book could have been improved greatly by allowing for more nuance re: privacy and Internet application. It felt at times like it was trying to prove how wrong young people were for using the Internet as a source of multiculturalism, innovation, learning, and communication, that whatever good applications the Internet could be used for, the negatives far outweighed the positives.
Also, as everyone else has pointed out, there is the most obvious and poor attempt at maintaining a character’s secret identity. I also thought that plotline was horribly handled, up until the very end of it.
That said, I guessed I enjoyed reading this! There are huge problems with it—not least being the problematic treatment of women—but it had just enough to keep me going through the tedious and unbelievable parts. Your mileage may very on that.
Unfortunately, it misses the mark.
The Circle directly links Internet usage and, more prominently, social media usage with cult-like behaviour. It’s not hard to see why, given the prevalence of it in our lives; I would argue there are times when it is a cult-like activity. But The Circle is let down by this heavy-handed viewpoint. Devoid of nuance, Eggers starts his work by clarifying that Internet anonymity (used almost synonymously with trolls) is gone forever, thanks to a program called TruYou that links your accounts, payment options, and personal information to one singular account. It’s frustrating, because The Circle is clearly a warning about protecting your privacy, but there’s no thought given to the people who are very careful about protecting their privacy and personal identity online. As far as The Circle is concerned, everyone was willing to sign that right away for ease of access.
While I don’t think Mae is a particularly well-developed character, I did appreciate the journey her character went on. Plagued by guilt and insecurity at the start of the novel, Mae seeks constant validation, and she receives it in the form of the Circle and its social media. As for how quickly she lets it happen and how ignorant she is to the warning signs around her… well, she’s joined a cult, whether she knows it or not. I did think it was interesting how her character had done a complete 180 from the start, and the story reinforced that by mirroring her previous actions with her post-indoctrination actions.
To be fair to Eggers, I actually read the book in one sitting and I was hooked, eager to know how it ended. (I absolutely adored the ending, by the way—I wasn’t expecting it to have the guts to go where it did, but it did!) But I feel like the book could have been improved greatly by allowing for more nuance re: privacy and Internet application. It felt at times like it was trying to prove how wrong young people were for using the Internet as a source of multiculturalism, innovation, learning, and communication, that whatever good applications the Internet could be used for, the negatives far outweighed the positives.
Also, as everyone else has pointed out, there is the most obvious and poor attempt at maintaining a character’s secret identity. I also thought that plotline was horribly handled, up until the very end of it.
That said, I guessed I enjoyed reading this! There are huge problems with it—not least being the problematic treatment of women—but it had just enough to keep me going through the tedious and unbelievable parts. Your mileage may very on that.