The Three Sirens

by Irving Wallace

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What happens when a varied group of men and women, married and unmarried, from our own complex culture is thrown together for six dramatic weeks with the people of a simpler, happier society, free from the inhibitions and tensions of the twentieth century? Irving Wallace's provocative novel is the story of this confrontation, as an American field team of anthropologists and laymen descends upon a remote Polynesian island to study a unique and hitherto undiscovered way of life.The visiting show more Americans are supposed to be dispassionate observers. Yet each brings to the island his own problems, attitudes, and prejudices. The team consists of nine oddly assorted Americans, led by Dr. Maud Hayden, the world-famous woman who is America's leading anthropologist. With her are her son and his young wife Claire; a liberal-minded photographer, anxious to remove his sixteen-year-old daughter from her fast adolescent crowd; a warm, homely nurse whose only attraction is her unique ability to give love; a fussy bachelor attempting to flee from a dominating mother; a female psychoanalyst whose private problems rival those of her patients; and the wealthy wife of the team's sponsor, a one-time dancer oppressed with the knowledge that she is now middle-aged.On The Three Sirens, these visitors are brought face to face with uninhibited behavior and customs that seem to be a shocking assault, a challenge, to their most cherished beliefs about love, sex, marriage, child rearing and justice.In this Polynesian village they find a society where the monotony of marriage is relieved by the freedom to enjoy other mates one week of the year; where the dissatisfactions and repressions of men and women, both married and unmarried, are relieved in a mysterious Social Aid Hut; where women over forty can enjoy life without the destructive feeling that youth is the only happiness; where unattractive girls are desired for those attributes that are ignored in our own cult of beauty; where confused adolescents are given the security of learning firsthand the facts of life; where grown men do not have to prove their virility by means of their Wallace's powerful novel tells the story of the shattering impact that this seemingly Utopian way of life has on the Americans who have come to study the people of The Three Sirens and who suddenly find themselves instead studying the nature of their own desires, fears and passions. Their reactions are the theme of a dramatic and brilliant work of fiction that ruthlessly explores the inmost nature of modern man and his society.Totally engrossing in its outspoken portrayal of an exotic culture, thoughtful in its examination of contemporary American morality, above all swiftly paced and exciting in its storytelling, The Three Sirens is Irving Wallace's most ambitious and satisfying work of fiction to date. show less

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6 reviews
Estantería pasillo, columna tercera, estante 2.
Segunda edición chilena, octubre 1973. N° de Inscripción: 41.536
La isla de las tres sirenas: El paraíso en que todo ser humano quiere vivir.
¿Que sucede cuando personas de nuestra civilización, antropólogos norteamericanos, deciden pasar seis semanas en una isla donde todo es completamente diferente, simple y feliz? Un lugar donde los habitantes viven libre de las tenciones, complejos e inhibiciones que nos aquejan a todos los que vivimos en una sociedad “normal”. Esta novela narra la historia de una vida que podría ser perfecta, pero que choca con nuestras costumbres, nuestra forma de ver a los que nos rodean y con nuestros prejuicios.
Esta interesante novela te hace pensar en la manera como tú te planteas la vida. La sociedad “normal” o "civilizada" con todo sus adelantos, técnicas, show more cultura, con sus comunicaciones y recursos de toda clase, con las maquinas para lavar y secar la ropa, con los telefonos celulares que te puedes comunicar con personas en el mundo entero, con los autos para correr de una parte a otra del país, y las maquinas para ver el interior del cuerpo humano mediante los rayos x. Con todas esas maravillas no hemos podido todavía inventar la maquina mas sencilla: La maquina que nos permita se feliz, que nos permita educar mejor a nuestros hijos, sin tantos prejuicios, complejos e inhibiciones. En la isla de las tres sirenas no hay sola maquina. Para los habitantes de esa isla todo es muy simple. No les importa tener una computadora, un auto, ganar dinero a manos llenas. Para ellos la tecnologia no tienen el menor significado. En la isla de las tres sirenas, los habitantes han creado una sociedad donde se conoce la felicidad sin límites.
Una sociedad que escandalizará a algunos de los antropólogos cuando, en sus investigaciones, descubran que, entre muchas cosas, los matrimonios para vencer la monotonía, los deseos no satisfechos y las represiones se van a la cabaña de “auxilio social” donde mujeres y hombres de todas las edades están dispuestos a aliviar todo tipo de “necesidades”.
Esta historia narra el choque entre dos culturas totalmente diferente. Esta novela nos hace ver a nosotros “La sociedad civilizada” que aun tenemos muchísimas cosas que mejorar, que aun tenemos muchos prejuicios de los cuales desprendernos, sin caer por supuesto en la promiscuidad. Nos hace ver que hay que tratar de ser feliz y no complicarnos tanto la vida con nimiedades.
Esta historia constituye un profundo análisis crítico de la moralidad contemporánea y una de las obras más ambiciosas de Irving Wallace.
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La isla de las tres sirenas es un viaje que no sólo hacen sus protagonistas a una isla desconocida del Pacífico (que no aparece en los mapas y que ha sido descubierta accidentalmente por un etnólogo) sino que también lo es para su lector, aventurero de emociones y de descubrimientos personales intensos. Su protagonista, una etnóloga de edad madura, recibe una carta de un colega que ha descubierto una desconocida isla, habitada por seres autóctonos dotados de una belleza y una cultura revolucionarias para Occidente, porque paradójicamente, ninguna otra cultura había llegado allí a “civilizarlos”. La invita a armar un grupo de investigadores interdisciplinarios dispuestos a ser expectadores de semejante cultura “liberadora”

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103+ Works 9,028 Members
Irving Wallace was born March 19, 1916 in Chicago, Illinois. He began writing for various magazines at age 15 and worked as a screenwriter for a number of Hollywood studios---Columbia, Fox, Warner Brothers, Universal, and MGM from 1950 to 1959, then he turned solely to writing books. His first major bestseller was The Chapman Report in 1960, a show more fictional account of a sexual research team's investigations of a wealthy Los Angeles suburb. Among other fictional works by Wallace are The Prize and The Word. His meticulously researched fiction often has the flavor of spicy journalism. A great deal of research goes into his novels, which cover a wide variety of subjects, from the presentation of the Nobel Prize to political scenarios. With their recurring dramatic confrontations, his novels lend themselves well to screenplay adaptation, and most of them have been filmed, including The Chapman Report and The Prize. Wallace has also compiled several nonfiction works with his family, including The People's Almanac and The Book of Lists, both of which have spawned sequels. Irving Wallace died June 29, 1990 in Los Angeles, California at the age of 74 from pancreatic cancer. (Bowker Author Biography) show less

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Common Knowledge

Canonical title*
La isla de las tres sirenas
Original publication date
1963
*Some information comes from Common Knowledge in other languages. Click "Edit" for more information.

Classifications

Genres
Fiction and Literature, General Fiction
DDC/MDS
813Literature & rhetoricAmerican literature in EnglishAmerican fiction in English
LCC
PS3573 .A426 .TLanguage and LiteratureAmerican literatureAmerican literatureIndividual authors1961-
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Members
159
Popularity
206,399
Reviews
6
Rating
½ (3.55)
Languages
5 — Catalan, Dutch, English, German, Spanish
Media
Paper, Ebook
ISBNs
27
UPCs
1
ASINs
8