"What Would You Call the Most Misinterpreted Book?" Topic

Not strictly a wargaming question, but I would bet among the nominees, I would expect to see many titles discussing the application of violence to solve political problems (war). In the discussion that led to this, we decided to leave out things that "nobody" understands, i.e., being confused or just put off by a book is fundamentally different than misinterpreting it.

My nominee:

The Prince, Machiavelli – To this day, in English, the word Machiavellian means being a deceitful and uncaring self-serving politician. This is the opposite of what the author advocated. Nobody gets satire.

DOM:

The Jungle, Upton Sinclair – Everyone is disgusted and outraged that a human arm could wind up in their food, and the book was the spark for many food safety movements and government organizations. It took a long time for people to get around to being outraged that some dude lost his arm at work, and that's still not what people focus on.

1984 and Animal Farm were strong contenders (which also made us consider "author" instead of "book").

We also decided to exclude all religious texts from the discussion, as they would easily dominate. Also, pointing out someone's important truth to be a misinterpretation, misquote, or just entirely fabricated material does not lead to pleasant discussions.

Used to be Ringer's Winning through Intimidation, since people who only read titles--more of them than you'd think--believed Ringer was advocating such. Maybe not today. Not that it's better understood, but that it's fallen off the radar.

I could answer this but I'd end up DH'ed….

Perhaps not the _most_ misinterpreted, but currently on a lot of people's Kindles: "Dune". First level misinterpretation: Paul is not a hero. Second level misinterpretation (and Frank Herbert himself was guilty of this): Paul's story is not a warning to the (modern) reader of the danger posed by charismatic messianic leaders. (This is a misinterpretation because unlike charismatic messianic leaders in real life, Paul does in fact have transhuman powers.)

Maybe Dangerous Liaisons. Book was beloved by members of the French aristocracy.

The Bible?
The Koran?

We also decided to exclude all religious texts from the discussion, as they would easily dominate.

Sorry, I missed the fine print.

I'd have put Das Kapital in a different category--books correctly understood, but wrong. Rousseau would be another, and Plato's Republic. If an author predicts one set of results from his prescription and gets another, it does NOT follow that he was misunderstood.

Hmmm. Let me add Ehrlich's The Population Bomb to that pile. Fertility rates had been in decline for two generations when he published.

Or should all these be regarded as religious texts?

Eumelus, you should have seen the letters pages in Analog when was serialized. But they were dissecting the ecological and technical errors, from the folly of hoarding water on a planetary scale to those silly stillsuits, which would boil you like a lobster if you were fool enough to wear one. I believe it was an Australian who pointed out that Arakis was actually cooler and wetter than the Outback.

Of all the SF books to have inspired a cult following…

Starship Troopers. It's not meant to be a suggestion for a better society, or a call for fascism. Quite the opposite.

Any works derided by shallow-minded adults as "only children's literature."

And these days, Dr. Seuss books, which are now routinely criticized by half-baked activists who needed to spend more time reading Dr. Seuss and less time looking for things to be offended by which never offended anyone before.

I'd agree, if "serious Heinlein" stops somewhere around The Moon is a Harsh Mistress--for my money the last keeper. But much of the problem with Starship Trooper is that it's mostly misunderstood by people who haven't read it, which is a different problem, though a common one. Kipling is another regular victim.

Sadly post-WWII, "fascism" simply means something the left dislikes, while "progressive" means something they do. I am reminded of T.H. White's ants, who only have two adjectives. Everything they liked was "ripe" and everything they disliked was "unripe."

Maybe a long shot but "Vom Kriege" by von Clausewitz is, in the geopolitical sense, a book that has been interpreted by many people in ways that suit their particular goals/zeitgeist rather than in the way that von Clausewitz likely intended

Also give a nod to Kipling – his poetry, if you read past the "rah rah the Empire" stuff, contain much wisdom

Does "most misinterpreted" mean misinterpreted by the largest number of people or misinterpreted to the greatest degree by majority of interpreters?

Your call on most misinterpreted. Put in one for each conept, if you want.

I might add The Art of War by Sun Tzu. A lot of people appear to have read it, and a lot of them don't appear to have understood a word of it.

(But that goes for a lot of seminal books.)

"The Autobiography of Malcolm X". It is often misinterpreted as a mean, angry screed against white people and that black pride means black people should declare war and destroy white people, but those readers do not read the book all the way through. He does address black people to be proud, but he also says you can be proud of who you are without being oppressive to others. He also realized that not all people of the Muslim religion were just black or brown skinned.

"On War" by Clausewitz

DBA?

The Bell Curve

Silent Spring by Carson. (Ducks)

A Clockwork Orange, probably because it's more associated with the Kubrick movie than Burgess' book. At the end of the book Alex does not regress back into a criminal mind, as in the movie, but rather matures and begins to appreciate the responsibilities of adulthood.
The Wanting Seed is another great Burgess novel, but way too un-pc to go into here.

If I can call the script for "Romeo and Juliet" a book, then I nominate that one. Dozens of songs hold that romance up as a model. Countless young lovers say they want to be like the heroes of the story.

The heroes of the story committed suicide!

And the whole tragedy could have been easily avoided if they had not devised such a complex escape plan…

But, given how quickly Romeo dumped the previous love of his life on meeting Juliet, I have grave doubts their relationship would have lasted long had they both survived.

If I can call the script for "Romeo and Juliet" a book,

Actors do. Specifically "off book" means everyone has their lines and blocking memorized.

Romeo and Juliet is best read as a morality play communicating "don't be a stupid teenager like this."

@Colonel Bogey, DBM is much more misunderstood than DBA, it has even more pages of Barkerese.
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