And then there were two.
The match-up we’ve seen coming/lamenting/dreading has finally arrived.
Austen vs. Tolkien. Mr. Darcy vs. Gandalf. Elizabeth Bennet vs. Bilbo Baggins.
Many people (including me) have questioned how The Hobbit made it to the final round. Does it really deserve to be in the final round? (The answer is no.) And while I don’t want to influence anyone’s vote, I think you Tolkien fanboys should keep in mind that if Pride and Prejudice loses there is going to be a riot. Just saying.
But no matter what the outcome there is one thing we can count on: No Tolkien next tournament. (Sorry, the final round Brothers Karamzov vs. The Silmarillion match-up that some of you have been hoping for ain’t gonna happen.)
Vote now. Vote responsibly. Vote no hobbit.
March 23rd, 2011 | 1:43 am
The credibility of the whole First Things project may be on the line. Only partially kidding.
March 23rd, 2011 | 1:57 am
John The credibility of the whole First Things project may be on the line.
I was dismayed last year when LOTR took the title. If The Hobbit wins it’s going to raise serious concerns about the intellectual and aesthetic credibility of ROFTERS!
March 23rd, 2011 | 2:42 am
Joe, Thanks for your response. Its reassuring that you think so. Part of the reason that I think its difficult to consider Tolkien as great literature is that its difficult to have empathy for his characters. The construction of an alternate world, while maybe ingenious, intricate and entertaining (to some, and while perhaps conveying an allegorical message along the lines of the Christian worldview, does not move the human heart. Perhaps I’m wrong but I can’t see someone secretly poring over the LOTR in the dim light of evening in a totalitarian gulag. Much easier to see the same with Cervantes, Dostoevsky, Dickens, Conrad, Goethe, Hawthorne, Skvorecky…to name a few.
March 23rd, 2011 | 4:13 am
I am amazed at the elitism and incredulity here. The hobbit is a more sympathetic character to modern Americans than Russian peasants or intellectuals from the 19th century, and probably even more so than the prissy, spoiled aristocratic ladies of Georgian England. The hobbit was the great everyman character of the 20th century, and Tolkein’s stories of them capture the imagination like few others. This fanboy will always shed a tear when Bilbo, Frodo and Gandalf sail off into the western sunset. On the other hand, I could not care less what happens to Austen’s brats.
March 23rd, 2011 | 4:54 am
I’m pretty sure the difficulty some people have relating to Tolkien’s characters has to do with a disappreciation for wonder, even at it’s basest levels. What, you can’t relate to Bilbo’s taste for flowers?
On the other hand… Hawthorn? Seriously? A 200 page insult to Cotton Mather? Just because you believe in the characters doesn’t mean that they are complex and realistic.
Nevertheless, I did vote for Pride and Predjudice. Jane Austen introduced me to my wife.
March 23rd, 2011 | 5:26 am
While I did vote last year for LOTR… them Hobbits beating Heart of Darkness…. Oy! Ref I demand a re-match!
March 23rd, 2011 | 5:40 am
I was a literature major and am now an ordained minister, so I’m not some “Hobbit head” as Mr. Carter so slandered.
That said, I have been supporting Tolkien in this competition because:
a) his books are well-written, vivid, thought-provoking, and his characters memorable (and empathetic);
b) but more importantly, as a pastor, I’ve found that, despite their length and complexity, his works are easily accessible and widely applicable to a vast array of folks in different life situations. And while I haven’t ministered in a totalitarian gulag, I have a hunch that one may find great comfort and strength poring over Bilbo’s courage facing the dragon Smaug or Frodo’s trek through the harsh land of Mordor.
The point is, we shouldn’t dismiss the greatness of books or authors just because they’re popular. Perhaps we should spend some time exploring the possibility that perhaps their popularity is in fact due to their greatness.
Mr. Carter is entitled to his opinion about Tolkien, but so, too, are all the people that consistently vote for him and his books. Perhaps if Mr. Carter could overcome his arrogance, he could appreciate that fact.
March 23rd, 2011 | 6:11 am
John-
Yes, you are wrong. I do happen to agree on The Hobbit not being worthy of the crown. But your general criticism of LotR is wrong. Have you actually read the trilogy as an adult? And are you aware of its popularity behind the Iron Curtain? Of the authors and the implied works their names conjure, I can think of none more than Tolkien whom I would want to read in the dim light of evening in the totalitarian gulag.
As someone said, once, in a place of torture and degradation-
Though here at journey’s end I lie
In darkness buried deep,
Beyond all towers strong and high,
Beyond all mountains steep,
Above all shadows rides the Sun
And Stars for ever dwell:
I will not say the Day is done,
Nor bid the Stars farewell.
That being said, Go Jane!
March 23rd, 2011 | 6:45 am
I can’t see many gulag prisoners seeking spiritual solace in Austen either.
I’m sorry, but the credibility of the entire contest was destroyed when Pride and Prejudice was voted ahead of War and Peace in an earlier round. Tolstoi is a great novelist, perhaps the greatest; Austen is merely a fine novelist, and distinctly of the second rank.
March 23rd, 2011 | 7:43 am
Joe,
First, I agree with John and you generally that it is silly that the Hobbit made it this far and that LOTR won the whole thing last year; in absolute terms, both years, they were probably mid-level books from the original list. And I love John’s test of “would someone in a Gulag be poring over this at night.”
That said, I’d like to say a few words in pseudo-defense of First Things readers’ aesthetic tastes and of the Hobbit’s getting her specifically.
Regarding the first, if I had to guess, almost no First Things reader would call the Hobbit — or even LOTR — their favorite book (though subsequent comments in defense of the Hobbit may prove me optimistic here. Rather, I think Tolkien is a sort of lowest common denominator among the sorts of people who read FT. Everyone has read it, and in the tournament format you’ve set up, books everyone has read have a distinct advantage.
None of us has read all the books and, I at least, tended to vote for books I had read over books that I hadn’t, except in those rare occasions where I absolutely hated the one that I had. Thus, even though particular readers might put the Tolkien books halfway up their own lists, disagreements about what goes on the list above Tolkien, coupled with the fact that many people haven’t read all of the books gives books like Tolkien — which everyone has read and most everyone likes — a distinct advantage in the tournament format.
I’m still mourning the loss of Jayber Crow in the first round, for instance, but it was up against (I think) the Wind in the Willows. I would guess that ~70% of people who have read both would put Jayber first. But only ~10% of your readers had read about the melancholy barber and ~30% had even heard of the book. Even though it might be a better book, it stood no chance.
That said, I also think that the Hobbit had a particularly easy road to the finals this year. I came into this prepared to vote against it if the competition was close because I saw this coming based on last year and the reasoning above. But I found myself voting for it approximately half the time because it just wasn’t in many strong matchups. Some matchups I had a hard time with. And when the Hobbit went up against a great book, I voted the other way. But its road was easier than most books’ this year.
March 23rd, 2011 | 8:12 am
If you ban LOTR next year, you will probably have “Dune” or the C. S. Lewis fantasy series (can’t even think of the name) in the final four. It will be guerilla warfare. These young folks have a twisted view of what constitutes great literature.
March 23rd, 2011 | 8:18 am
Next year, David Copperfield!
March 23rd, 2011 | 8:28 am
I had a thought (too late, now, but still). Perhaps there should be a requirement: to vote in this one you have to swear that you have read BOTH books.
March 23rd, 2011 | 8:45 am
That “Blood Meridian”, “Brothers Karamazov” and / or “Silence” (i.e., books I nominated) are / is not in the final is an outrage. I am tempted to vote for “The Hobbit” (a book I love, by the way) in protest. Or maybe to write-in “The DaVinci Code.” Or “Goodnight Moon.”
March 23rd, 2011 | 8:55 am
Agreed. Pretty sure I voted the competition vs the Hobbit in every round.
(Could be worse though, could be Atlas Shrugged!)
March 23rd, 2011 | 8:58 am
As a 17-year-old guy, I’ve read both. I, of course, enjoyed the Hobbit much more. But at the same time Pride and Prejudice has a better reputation in literary circles. However, I found very little about Pride and Prejudice impressive. Shoot, I enjoyed slogging through War and Peace more than Pride and Prejudice.
As much as it pains me to do it…one vote for the Hobbit!
March 23rd, 2011 | 9:30 am
You know, I don’t think it’s really necessary to trash Tolkien or “The Hobbit” in order to make the argument that it doesn’t belong as #1 or #2 of all time great novels.
It is a very, very good novel. People getting distracted by the fact that it contains non-human characters and fantastic imagery are making a mistake in thinking that those things can not exist with the elements of a good novel.
Some of y’all remind me of the kids I went to second grade with, whose response to the end of the World Series was to declare that the team that lost four games “stinks.” You dn’t have to “stink” in order to not be the best.
And for the record, I voted for P&P because in the realm of all the things that make a novel great, it clearly has the edge. But that doesn’t mean I have to denigrate the manifold literary virtues of “The Hobbit.”
March 23rd, 2011 | 9:50 am
Dear pentamom: I’m not sure that people are actually denigrating “The Hobbit.” Probably most of the people commenting, myself included, have read it and liked it an awful lot. In fact, I just about live by Gandalf’s teachings.
But people are just incredulous. Keep in mind this is a vote for best novel. Ahead of Dostoyevsky and Tolstoy. Ahead of Hawthorne, Melville, Garcia Marquez, Joyce, Bronte. Possibly ahead of Austen?
I do appreciate Tolkien’s literary virtues. BUT.
March 23rd, 2011 | 10:14 am
A few comments:
1. While Jane Austen may be very good, she also had no business winning. Agree there’s not much there for solace in a gulag.
2. Agree that Tolstoy’s early ouster mars the whole competition.
3. “behind the Iron Curtain” was a complex time and place. Glad LOTR is popular in that area. So were cowboy novels and Whitney Houston at different times. Nothing wrong with that, but different from Homer, Goethe, Cervantes, Mozart and Beethoven. By the way, the great should not diminish the good. Tolkien may be good and in some catagories great but he’s not the greatest novelist of all time.
4. I did not argue against Tolkien based on whether he was popular or not, nor did I trash him.
5. Good point regarding the common denominator angle.
6. Kyle, I think I can appreciate wonder, at least at its basest level.
March 23rd, 2011 | 10:17 am
Joe – before making any more comments denigrating Tolkien or the place of his works at the top of lists of great literature, I would highly recommend reading some of the available literary criticism on his books, especially “The Gospel according to Tolkien” by Ralph C. Wood or “Tolkien: Author of the Century” by Tom Shippey.
The strength of Tolkien’s books have a lot to do with the Christian themes that are deeply interwoven into the stories and the characters. His novels are the culmination of a lifetime of research and teaching about northern European languages and mythology, and more importantly, the ways that myth helps us toward a greater understand of the world.
March 23rd, 2011 | 10:19 am
As much as I appreciate Tolkien, I’m still mourning the early elimination of Canticle for Liebowitz. Fifty years on, and Miller’s juxtaposition of “God’s priest and Ceasar’s traffic cop” resonates more every year.
March 23rd, 2011 | 10:22 am
Alex Joe – before making any more comments denigrating Tolkien or the place of his works at the top of lists of great literature, . . .
Oh my. Some people are taking this way, way too seriously.
C’mon folks. I don’t really hate the Hobbit (though I do hate Ulysses). This is all in good fun. It’s silly to rank novels as if you could truly determine the greatest one by popular vote. It’s just a gloriously goofy game to get us talking about books rather than [insert latest current event].
March 23rd, 2011 | 11:09 am
Regardless of The Hobbits (many) virtues, Austen should in no shape or form even be in the final bracket.
March 23rd, 2011 | 11:17 am
Um, what? Vote no Hobbits? Yeah, that isn’t biased. As someone who has a Master’s in Classics and finishing up my doctorate in British Literature, I find the fact that Jane Austen is even listed in the beginning a sign that this whole tournament is a sham. Pride and Prejudice has no aesthetic or literary value. There is no real point. The only reason why it has any output is a bunch of tweens who wish they had a boyfriend that they could intellectually bully and dominate until he says “Oh, I love you”. Give me a break. At least the Hobbit was well written but a guy who knew what he was talking about.
March 23rd, 2011 | 11:40 am
Gandalf’s brow furrowed even more deeply, as if his forehead had been gashed by Daffodiliana, the elfen blade that glowed a bright yellow at the presence of Leopold Bloom.
“Bilbo,” he said slowly, but with a wry chuckle hidden behind his limpid blue eyes, “you must face the leader of the Great Novel-Wraiths, Jayeen of Austenshire.”
Bilbo wet himself, leaving a glowing yellow pool beneath his furry feet. (This bit of glowing yellow, however, did not signify anything except his general wussiness.) “By the name of First Things and all things Carter!” he cried.
“Don’t worry,” said another twee voice. Even Gandalf was startled at the sudden presence of the bespectacled stranger. “I will take him through Modernist Pass.”
“And once there,” the stranger thought to himself, “he shall be taught not to belittle the Dark Lord of Joyceland.”
Gandalf had reservations about entrusting Bilbo to the stranger. But then he thought, “C’mon, it’s only a hobbit.”
March 23rd, 2011 | 11:40 am
I just voted for the Hobbit. A voting competition on literature which commands something deserves no better.
March 23rd, 2011 | 11:43 am
As I commented during an earlier round, the Hobbit is to LOTR as Tom Sawyer is to Huck Finn. Neither of the former books (although written by great and beloved authors) is in a class of the “greatest” novels. Neither is even in the discussion. Instead they are fun and adventurous kids’ books (which adults can enjoy as well).
And Huck Finn and LOTR, while they may look like kids’ books in feel and appearance, engage serious and important themes in very interesting fashion. They are in the discussion.
I do believe that this is “all good fun.” But you can only get so much fun out of debating whether a good hot dog (which I enjoy quite a bit) is on par with a great filet mignon (which is something altogether different).
Go, Jane, go.
March 23rd, 2011 | 12:06 pm
Oh, Joe, I think a sometimes contributer has a scathing for you:
http://www.peterkreeft.com/audio/28_lotr_christianity/peter-kreeft_lotr_christianity.mp3
March 23rd, 2011 | 12:06 pm
Oooo, I was totally already planning on voting for “The Silmarillion” in next year’s tournament.
March 23rd, 2011 | 12:09 pm
“And while I haven’t ministered in a totalitarian gulag, I have a hunch that one may find great comfort and strength poring over Bilbo’s courage facing the dragon Smaug or Frodo’s trek through the harsh land of Mordor.”
Actually, there are few books better suited to the purpose. I realize this might cause even further controversy, but I’ve long held a theory bordering on conviction that “The Lord of the Rings” was given to the world to sustain and embolden Christians during the end-times persecutions that are soon to sweep the earth.
March 23rd, 2011 | 12:16 pm
I agree strongly that The Hobbit shouldn’t win, but I would also argue very strongly that The Lord of the Rings deserved to win last year. The fact that it’s popular blinds us to the fact that it is simply a work of utter genius, an epic that can stand next to any ever written, and in which the whole of life be found, in a way. The only book “modern” book that matches it is War and Peace, which unfortunately not enough people read. In any case, while The Hobbit is no more than a fun adventure (a “there and back again” book, as Tolkien himself put it), The Lord of the Rings is something else entirely, and not to see that, in my view, raises “serious concerns about the intellectual and aesthetic credibility” of whoever is thick enough to miss it.
In this I’m in the company of geniuses like W.H. Auden and C.S. Lewis — or perhaps their aesthetic and intellectual credibility is in question here too? Right.
March 23rd, 2011 | 12:48 pm
I’m nominating Craig Payne for best parody.
My heart was ripped out by Huck Finn’s loss last year and noe heart of Darkness is gone, too.
The one Ring rules them all, alas.
March 23rd, 2011 | 1:16 pm
I think LOTR deserved the win last year – I think it holds its own easily with the great novels of the 19th, 20th & 21st centuries. The Hobbit, not so much — but I think the fact that it got this far is significant.
Fantasy is not a mode that every reader appreciates (as is evident from the comments). But it is an extraordinarily powerful mode of presenting truth. In particular, the literary genre of Fantasy excels in presenting truth beyond the “here and now” — evoking, through the fantasy world, a longing for more, for that which we cannot have fully in this world; helping us see that the physical and material is not all that there is.
Considering that our modern culture tends to focus exclusively on the physical, the material, the here and now — denying the reality of God, of the soul, even of things like love — I can see that the kind of Fantasy that Tolkien writes, steeped in and infused with the Truth of the Gospel, serves as a powerful counterbalance.
I plan on voting for Pride & Prejudice over The Hobbit in this final round, but I can certainly see why The Hobbit defeated its contenders up until now. Among other things, consider that in its faceoff against Heart of Darkness, we had a vision of Hope, Loyalty, and Friendship vs. a vision of Darkness, Despair, and the Fall. The Fall is real, and we are in darkness; but our story does not end there, thank God. So I voted for The Hobbit over Heart of Darkness because Christian Hope is stronger than Death. One can disagree with the literary rankings (of course!) but I would hope that people will respect that some of us see something more through Fantasy than others do.
March 23rd, 2011 | 1:21 pm
I confess that I think Heart of Darkness is one of the finest novels in any language. I have it in my heart and on my e-book reader. I also have to confess that I punched the button for Bilbo yesterday thinking everyone else would push HOD into the final cage-match with Jane Austen.
For today, I’m glad it’s a secret ballot.
March 23rd, 2011 | 1:25 pm
I’m STILL fuming that Robinson Crusoe didn’t even receive enough nominations to make it into the voting.
Hmmm…I think I’ll vote for LOTR because a P&P win would lend too much legitimacy to this tournament ;)
March 23rd, 2011 | 2:12 pm
Okay, on the one side, we have people who think “The Hobbit” can’t be a great novel because it features non-humans, fantasy magic, and is popular.
On the other side, we have people who think “Pride and Prejudice” can’t be great because it’s about pre-marital romance and appeals to women and girls.
In both cases, people appear to be confusing the popular images of the novels, based on their place in pop culture, with the actual content and quality of the novels.
It’s a category mistake to think that just because, beginning the 90′s, Austen novels got repackaged into popular movies and miniseries which gained the (ill-deserved) reputation of “chick flick” that there’s no literary substance to them. Or maybe the mistake is that people are narrow-mindedly assuming that any work that deals with the romantic and social aspects of marriage must be trivial.
I can agree with those who would contend that either shouldn’t be contending for #1. Those who go on to imply that it’s because either is entirely devoid of literary substance are only showing the narrowness of their understanding, or else their confusion of literary elements common to popular but trivial genres, with the novels actually belonging to those genres.
And John’s standard of “solace in the gulag” being the *sole, overarching* value for literary merit strikes me as extremely strange. Not, perhaps, as strange as someone with an advanced degree in literature and classics demonstrating that he knows nothing about either the plot or theme of Pride and Prejudice, but close.
March 23rd, 2011 | 2:14 pm
I’m sorry, Robinson Crusoe is a great story, but it’s mind-numbing to read. Again, all these things are a matter of taste, but it’s the throwing around of opinions as though they are self-evident truths that amuses me.
March 23rd, 2011 | 2:36 pm
Well said, Pentamom; it should be accepted that both works, while not perhaps as great as Dostoevsky or Dickens, possess significant literary merit.
Incidentally, I think John’s “gulag” standard was being held up as one criterion among many, not as the sole, final arbiter of what is good.
March 23rd, 2011 | 3:19 pm
I love both books, but would vote for Austen; it would be a tougher choice between Pride and Prejudice and LOTR.
But I was dismayed early on in the voting. A Tale of Two Cities, for instance, might not make my list of top five novels by Dickens — I think it is not in the same league with Bleak House and David Copperfield, and is excelled by Great Expectations, Dombey and Son, and possibly Our Mutual Friend. There are probably ten novels in the nineteenth century alone that I’d rank above Pride and Prejudice….
If we consider Don Quixote a novel (it isn’t), and the same thing for a few others in here that are not really novels, here is my top ten, for what it’s worth:
1. The Brothers Karamazov
2. Don Quixote
3. Bleak House
4. Moby-Dick
5. Tom Jones
6. The Lord of the Rings
7. The Betrothed
8. War and Peace
9. Middlemarch
10. David Copperfield
March 23rd, 2011 | 3:45 pm
I would put “Crime and Punishment” somewhere in there, too (maybe a “Top Eleven” list).
March 23rd, 2011 | 3:49 pm
I voted for “The Hobbit”. Last year, I voted for “The Lord of the Rings”.
I would completely agree that “The Hobbit” does rise to the level of “The Lord of the Rings” — but then again, I don’t think that it was supposed to do so. Other than the fact that both books fall under the general category of “Fantasy”, the two books really are of different genres.
I’ve read “Pride and Prejudice” as well, and enjoyed it — but “The Lord of the Rings” is one of three books (other than the Scriptures) which has most impacted my life. I would certainly prefer it as a reading choice in the “gulag” than just about any book I can think of.
I’m unsure as to why so many (most, perhaps?) of English professionals seem to enjoy denigrating Tolkien (and Lewis, for that matter.) Tolkien was arguably the top philologists of the 20th century, and if one undertakes a serious study of the literary worth of fairy tales, one cannot ignore his seminal essay “On Fairy Stories”. Likewise, if one wishes to serious engage “Paradise Lost”, one cannot afford to ignore Lewis’s “Preface to Paradise Lost”.
I’m not sure what is meant by a “Tolkien Fanboy”. I’m 43 years old and freely admit to having read “The Hobbit”, “The Lord of the Rings” and “The Silmarillion” more times than I can count. I also incorporate a good deal of both Tolkien and Lewis in serious, collegiate-level theology classes.
The quality of writing and the skills of an author are not necessarily linked to the popularity of either. I’ll freely admit that many popular books are not necessarily well-written. (Dan Brown, anyone?) By the same token, some books which are considered classics aren’t exactly page-turners! (I’ll admit, I found “Robinson Crusoe” to be tiresome — at best!)
If someone dislikes Tolkien on the basis of his literary style or talent, by all means, do so. But appearing to criticize his books because of their widespread popularity is, I submit, a rather dubious form of argument.
March 23rd, 2011 | 6:54 pm
Mark,
My dad, while serving in Vietnam, had The Hobbit with him. Of all the books he ever read and was ever taught, during the darkest days of his life he spent his time reading The Hobbit. It is a work that is full of wonder, magic, mystery, adventure, and has a plot that takes you away yet brings you home. It allowed him to cope while dozens of people who he grew up with, not just served with, died around him.
Can Pride and Prejudice do such a thing? No. Never. It doesn’t even come close. The Hobbit is able to save one’s soul and restore one’s humanity in the darkest days. If anything, Austen strips it away.
March 23rd, 2011 | 7:11 pm
I was out travelling for the first few rounds last week, and haven’t voted since I saw that no Sienkiewicz novels even made the field, but I did go ahead and modify that “religion will soon be dead” algorithm in order to mathematically prove what is, in fact, the greatest novel of all time. This year’s finalists are a sorry lot. The Hobbit ranks #12, and P&P is number 47. It turns out that the Lord of the Rings is actually at number 2 on the list. Number 1 is Delina Delaney. For what it’s worth…
March 23rd, 2011 | 7:41 pm
Fair enough correction, Boze. Though I’d argue that it’s a less valuable criterion than a book that can actually benefit your ability to live life in normal circumstances, since for the overwhelming majority of people, that’s what’s actually going to matter.
In that sense, Austen’s novels (when read with the care they deserve) are much more helpful, since they provide a degree of easily-digested insight into normal human predilections and behaviors. Austen’s characters tend to be somewhat exaggerated versions of types, but they are real types. But I mean that only as an example, not to suggest that Austen is the ultimate example of practically mind-forming literature.
March 23rd, 2011 | 7:58 pm
I personally would like to witness a battle between Mr. Darcy and Gandalf. I would enjoy that far more than I enjoyed either of the books these characters belong to.
March 23rd, 2011 | 8:14 pm
Pentamom – how is a bunch of spoiled rich white people who don’t work deal with the average person’s life again?
March 23rd, 2011 | 11:51 pm
All very interesting. My point regarding “gulag criteria” was not that its an all encompassing criteria. Rather, at difficult times the need for truth, beauty and goodness as conveyors of hope becomes paramount. At death’s door we most probably would all like a copy of the Word of God and someone to share it with. In “the gulag” books that shed light on false ideology might be helpful (Dosoevsky, Cervantes etc etc). These also shed light on our everyday experiences of course, as might Jane Austen. It seems Tolkien (fantasy in general?) requires an added commitment to learn the landscape of his fictional world that is more arduous on the one hand than the other books being discussed, and I would still maintain that one has less empathy with his characters. Without empathy for the character one cannot relate to the personal dimension of truth in the story except abstractly. For the apparently imaginatively challenged like myself the abstract conveyance of truth can be obtained via Thomas, Maritain, Husserl, Patocka etc. The enfleshment of truth and goodness as it relates to man is conveyed in great literature through empathy with human characters. For the life of me I couldn’t care less what happens to the Hobbit. Mea culpa. But for those that enjoy reading it and gain inspiration from it, great! In the absence currently of a gulag culture I also recommend the National Hockey League on local stations and live in person.
March 24th, 2011 | 2:01 am
Just to clarify, since we don’t have to have our heads on a swivel to the extent a gulag culture would, in addition to reading the greats, I would endorse the National Hockey League as wholesome family fun. Not linking ice hockey-Siberia-Gulag here.
Greatest sports book about the greatest sports event of all time? Any takers? “The Boys of Winter” about Lake Placid 1980, where a few guys from Minnesota, Mass., Michigan and Wisconsin took on the Big Red Soviet Machine and won. Say what you want about Reagan, Gorbachev, Thatcher, Wojtyla, this was the beginning of the end of World Communism as a hard totalitarian power – prior to its reincarnation as World Environmentalism, political correctnes and the threat of mandatory screening for risks for the development of disease – all examples of soft totalitarian power. Can Hobbits skate?
March 24th, 2011 | 5:17 am
Didn’t Austen and Tolkien kind of write about the same things? I mean, Austen told stories about the world she was familiar with and Tolkien used fantasy to dramatize the ideas behind everyday life. Where Austen shows rich white brats agonizing over who to marry and what is proper to say in polite society, Tolkien uses the images of quests and dragons and rings. What we need in life, they both show, is courage, faith and help from above. And patience.
They are both useful but Austen is better.
March 24th, 2011 | 6:21 am
First, I agree with John and you generally that it is silly that the Hobbit made it this far and that LOTR won the whole thing last year; in absolute terms, both years, they were probably mid-level books from the original list.
I have no doubt that, in time, Lord Of The Rings will be remembered as the most important book of the 20th century.
I say ‘in time’ because most people don’t even catch most of what is going on. They don’t recognize the allusions and even if they did they don’t really ‘get’ the way medieval techniques like interweaving and allegorical doubling work, so they don’t “get” the best parts.
And those who do, resent it, because here’s this guy who comes along and picks up all the techniques and devices that the far more important modernists are working on, and uses it to make a case for grace? Everyone knows that Real Literature is about existential nothingness, and allusions are supposed to be used to make audience members feel smug about their own superiority – not to make some point about what it means to “carry” your father or inherit a fallen world. Blech, that sounds religious!
Yeah, Lord Of The Rings is a great book – even now, the majority of the Literary Establishment still hasn’t fully figured out what it’s doing or why it matters.
But the Hobbit is not in the same category.
March 24th, 2011 | 7:10 am
Pentamom – how is a bunch of spoiled rich white people who don’t work deal with the average person’s life again?
Oh yes, if it’s got “spoiled” white people in it, it must be “bad”.
Except you seem to have missed the point when it comes to Pride and Prejudice. For one thing, they “spoiled” characters are caricatures.
The main character, Elizabeth, is hardly “spoiled”; she is acutely, painfully aware that her immature father has left the entire family in a position where they will fall into extreme poverty as soon as he is dead and Mr. Collins takes over their house.
She has two opportunities to save the family – when Mr. Darcy and Mr. Collins propose – and she turns them both down, agonizing as she does so about moral and philosophical questions that can’t possibly be there, because “domestic” novels can’t possibly have any depth,can they?
Just another silly Harlequin Romance, as long as you ignore all the biting wit and manage to miss all the insightful stuff about social class and human behavior.
March 24th, 2011 | 10:31 am
Blake – “Except you seem to have missed the point when it comes to Pride and Prejudice. For one thing, they “spoiled” characters are caricatures. ”
Nope. Sorry. Trying to put a sarcasm, ironic, or comedic spin on it wont work. That may work for Emma, which was a parody of Austen’s own style after she realized how atrocious her emphasis on rich people who don’t matter was.
There is no way to connect to Austen’s characters just as there is no way to see them as normal. They are 2 dimension, boring, and have problems that are completely unrealistic. There is no true human emotion, no ability to empathize, and the only reason she is “appreciated” is through years of indoctrination. There are many female writers who were good novelists and were ignored as Austen was forced upon people.
By the way, this comment is absurd: “about moral and philosophical questions that can’t possibly be there, because “domestic” novels can’t possibly have any depth,can they?”
There is no depth when you claim the answer to your problem is to marry when real people now and at the time worked for a living, didn’t live in nice cushy houses, etc. The majority of people in England during her time were contracting nasty illnesses, living in the worst conditions, and had a lot of problems. Instead, they live in a perfect world that is so quaint and wonderful. That is why she is so easy to mock and destroy. There is no plot, the characters are absurd and spoiled, and works like that are why people despise people with money.
As someone pointed out above, Tolkien was a Catholic who included salvation in his works, brought about highly intellectual uses of plot, medieval tropes, etc, and added a dimension of scholarship that no Austen work could even come close to. There is nothing witty, charming, or fun in Austen, yet every sentence has such a thing in The Hobbit. There is no way to challenge that except in deluding yourself about what both say.
March 24th, 2011 | 10:32 am
I, for one, would rather be poked with hot coals than have to survey Jane Austen again. Unless, of course, it is to re-read Pride and Prejudice and Zombies.
Go Hobbit. Not the best two novels in the tournament, but the two finalists nonetheless.
March 24th, 2011 | 3:28 pm
Blake – “Except you seem to have missed the point when it comes to Pride and Prejudice. For one thing, they “spoiled” characters are caricatures. ”
Nope. Sorry. Trying to put a sarcasm, ironic, or comedic spin on it wont work. That may work for Emma, which was a parody of Austen’s own style after she realized how atrocious her emphasis on rich people who don’t matter was.
There is no way to connect to Austen’s characters just as there is no way to see them as normal. They are 2 dimension, boring, and have problems that are completely unrealistic. There is no true human emotion, no ability to empathize, and the only reason she is “appreciated” is through years of indoctrination.
Well, you’re factually wrong – none of Austen’s heroines are “rich”, and most (including the one in Pride & Prejudice) are on the verge of poverty, as already noted.
And as for “empathy”, it’s a comedy of manners.
Of course, it’s perfectly okay to not like Jane Austen, as long as you’re honest about the real reasons, whatever they are. To say that it’s about “rich white people” is just absurd.
To say that the people are “spoiled” is probably just another way of saying their concerns are superficial, which they often are – because it’s a comedy of manners.
It is of course a “woman’s” book, about issues that are quite literally life-and-death concerns to women. Books revolving around the question of how to unite families in marriage in positive, rather than destructive ways continue to be popular today, and continue to be attacked by men who both naturally resent being judged as potential husband material. Not to mention that men tend to prefer even the most poorly done paintings on huge “epic” size canvas over intricate “miniatures”.
Bringing us back to the question that must always come up when judging “the best” literature: best at what?
March 24th, 2011 | 3:31 pm
There is no depth when you claim the answer to your problem is to marry when real people now and at the time worked for a living, didn’t live in nice cushy houses, etc.
BTW this statement just bugs and bugs me.
Are you seriously saying the book is no good because you have a personal moral objection to women who “marry money”, and you think Elizabeth should have just…seriously…gone out and….seriously?….got a job?
Seriously?
…
feminist has turned us all into drooling idiots.
March 24th, 2011 | 5:09 pm
“none of Austen’s heroines are “rich”, and most (including the one in Pride & Prejudice) are on the verge of poverty, as already noted.”
You obviously don’t know what poverty was in England, then. Pick up a Gaskell novel sometime, or just read Wikipedia’s summary – http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/North_and_South_%281855_novel%29
Unless the people are wallowing in their own feces, having to steal for bread, etc., it doesn’t even come close to how the majority of people in Britain lived for a very long time. Hell, the Thames was so filled with human sewage that the House of Commons put bear rugs over the windows during the summer because they believed suffering in the heat was far better than having to endure the stench.
You are severely misinformed about the plight of the common Brit. If anything, the poorest of Austen’s main characters are comfortably mid to upper middle class.
“it’s a comedy of manners.”
No, its not and has never been such. You can’t just make things up because you wish it was so. Emma was her only book that came close to such, and that is because it parodied her other novels.
It is as if you need to make things up because you are unwilling to read the book as it is. Anne Radcliffe, the Brontes, and Gaskill all wrote works that dealt with human emotions in a far better manner, were more realistic or universal, and were far more successful than Austen during the 19th century for a reason. It is a travesty that people wanting to promote Austen had to obliterate all of the good works to promote something that has to be defended with ignorance.
March 24th, 2011 | 5:35 pm
“none of Austen’s heroines are “rich”, and most (including the one in Pride & Prejudice) are on the verge of poverty, as already noted.”
You obviously don’t know what poverty was in England, then.
I am very well aware of what poverty was in England at that time.
You are the one who appears to be having problems grasping the economic realities at stake here. You seem to think that the Austen heroines aren’t in seriously economic trouble, and/or that they could somehow improve their situation by “getting a job”.
Either you did not read the book, or you did not fully comprehend what was going on.
You might also benefit from Anna Karenina.
March 24th, 2011 | 9:22 pm
I have a problem grasping the economic realities? I’ve submitted many papers at the graduate level on the lower class during the 18th and 19th century. I already pointed out other works that realistically portray how real people lived. You seem to be unable to grasp that and you provide no actual retort. That is verification that you are basically just making things up, which does your side no good at all.
It is a simple fact that there is nothing “normal” about any of the characters because Jane Austen never had a normal life. She was removed from poverty, from reality, and is unable to have anything beyond a flat, one dimension character because of it. She never truly lived, and plenty of good female writers that did and write good works are ignored because of the fanaticism over it. And if anything, it is feminism that promotes Austen because of the idea of a woman bullying and abusing a man until he submits to her will that they favor and is lacking in the other female writers.
March 25th, 2011 | 12:50 am
I have a problem grasping the economic realities? I’ve submitted many papers at the graduate level on the lower class during the 18th and 19th century. I already pointed out other works that realistically portray how real people lived.
So let me get this straight.
You are saying that the Brontes are more “realistic” than Austen.
That Austen’s stories are not “realistic” because there are no mysterious men hanging cats from trees, or hiding ex-wives in the attic.
Being a woman writer means you have to write Gothic melodramas, not comedies.
And furthermore Austen has no right to write about financially vulnerable females, because she has not “lived”.
Her “life” wasn’t a real life. It didn’t count.
She didn’t know “reality”. Her reality wasn’t real.
And therefore, the fact that every single one of her books dealt with economically vulnerable females facing uncertainty is an insult to those women who do poverty the right way.
Now please: tell us the right way to be financially vulnerable, since Austen is not qualified to have an opinion.
And since this is obviously not about literature, but a particular type of “identity politics” agenda.
March 25th, 2011 | 1:31 am
“You are saying that the Brontes are more “realistic” than Austen.”
Yes, they are. They deal with the social climate and atmosphere of their day regardless of the allegory surrounding it.
And you keep claiming Austen wrote comedies when she didn’t. You also ignore that Gaskell did not write Gothic works. Why is it that you make such inappropriate claims and ignore reality? That isn’t healthy.
Only someone who denies reality can claim that her depictions have anything to do with reality in a direct or symbolic level. She was out of touch with real life. You seem to act like that is impossible when the average person knows that there are those out there completely out of touch with the dangers and problems of the world.
It is also obvious that someone like Gaskell was actually able to capture the plight of the poor, the struggling, and those who suffered far more than Austen ever could. Why you ignore that is baffling.
March 25th, 2011 | 1:33 am
I also find it odd how you first accused me of promoting feminism, when everyone knows that the Austenites are the ones doing such. Then you say I am talking about identity politics when you were the one doing so. You ignored other literature, actual historical context, and other things that are completely improper when discussing works.
March 25th, 2011 | 10:26 am
Blake, give it up. People who think that a woman who is not starving by definition lives a flat, one-dimensional life and therefore cannot write about life really are not worth arguing with.
I do think you’re overstating the case about Austen’s women and “poverty,” but you are correct insofar as they really were economically at risk — had they not married securely, they would have been forced into a lifestyle for which they were by no means prepared and therefore subject to great hardship, and getting a job was NOT an option, unless you include prostitution among the possibilities. This was not true for all of them, but was definitely true for the Dashwoods, and the Bennets if at least one of them had not married into a family wealthy enough to support a passel of spinsters.
At any rate, the equation of middle class affluence with knowing nothing about reality and living a one-dimensional life is beyond silly.
March 25th, 2011 | 10:30 am
And also, the equation of a somewhat broader view of social conditions with “realism,” in the context of the absurdities of the Brontes’ stories is also ridiculous. The issues of poverty and wealth are not the only “realities” of life. The fact that almost nobody behaves the way almost everybody behaved in Bronte novels, and that there are people all over the place who behave much the way Austen’s characters behaved (allowing for differences in social custom and class expectations) is much more pertinent to what’s realistic. But there’s a word for people whose measure for everything is economic.
And, BTW, I love Jane Eyre, so the lack of realism is not a criticism I’m making.
March 25th, 2011 | 2:38 pm
Pentamom, from the various critical works I’ve read on both Emily and Charlotte’s novels, I have always seen psychoanalysis verifying that the emotions are true or representing actual emotions. The whole “madwoman in the attic” belief was based on showing how the interactions represent true angst and the suppression of various classes. That isn’t true in Austen’s work. If anything, the works are popular because they are a fantasy. They contain what can only be described as soap opera melodrama that the others lack. Young female readers wish that the domineering attributes and fake relationships were reality in the same way they wish that they could marry a vampire from Twilight. In the Bronte novels, you are confronted with actual moral dilemmas, raw passion, and coming to terms with darker aspects of psychology, which is what young teens want to avoid.
March 25th, 2011 | 8:44 pm
And, BTW, I love Jane Eyre, so the lack of realism is not a criticism I’m making.
I love the Brontes too; I hate to have to argue “against” them. (My favorite was Villette).
But the reason I am so insistent on the impending poverty of the Bennetts is because that mother was so unprepared to take on the responsibilities.
So, yeah, I really did see an impending “crash” coming – one that really felt to me like it’d be disastrous for the whole family.
But I admit: my mind no doubt put at lot of that in there. (As a kid I couldn’t stand to watch “I Love Lucy”, because of my outsized sense of dread – even knowing it was just a comedy, I still kept expecting something really really awful to happen to poor Lucy….) ha ha
March 25th, 2011 | 8:59 pm
Jeff, I think there is something supremely ironic about the idea of someone who has been to graduate school snubbing Jane Austen and/or her characters as “spoiled” and “rich”.
It’s almost comical that you – far more “spoiled” and comparatively affluent than either Austen or her characters – have taken it upon yourself to judge what a woman’s “real” experience is, and what sort of woman is “really” qualified to comment on it.
You simply don’t have any right to say Austen’s concerns “don’t count”.
And I do think you are promoting a form of feminism – that strain of feminist vitriol that irrationally attacks and even scapegoats homemakers, often using words similar to those you used (“spoiled” and “should get a job”.
You use the same language that “angry” feminism takes when it wishes to shower its contempt on women who are neither resentful nor rebellious. That is why I think your view of Austen is nothing more than identity politics – the politics of resentment.
March 26th, 2011 | 9:18 am
Um, Blake, not everyone in graduate school is rich or affluent. Actually, very few people are. Your statements above are the same as your claims about feminism, odd deflections from reality to hide from the fact that you lack an argument.
And there is no strain of feminism saying people should work. There is a strain of feminism saying that the girls don’t need to work because of their gynecological superiority. Work, in feminism, is a choice. I never provided it as a choice but an obligation. Furthermore, “work” in the feminism understanding isn’t work in the 19th century – many women worked as farm hands and the rest back then. Ever read Thomas Hardy? The work feminist want for women is high paid corporate “work” where they “manage” people and don’t have to dirty their hands.
You toss around terms without having a clue what they mean, which is rather sad.
March 26th, 2011 | 10:49 am
All I can say, Jeff, is that as a person who lives in the real world, as opposed to one who judge the real world by what one finds in lit crit, I have known far more people like Elizabeth Bennet than like Heathcliff, like Mrs. Dashwood than like Mr. Rochester, and so forth. The Bronte characters may be interesting icons of psychological abnormalities, but their behaviors and relationships are far more “fake” than anything one finds in Austen, and only a feminist/Marxist wallowing in self-referentialism could possibly construe the relationships in Austen as being about “domineering attributes.” If you don’t see “actual moral dilemmas” throughout Austen, you don’t really know how to look. Although, I admit they are there in Bronte, too — just like they’re there in Spider-man.
March 27th, 2011 | 5:57 pm
Pentamom, stop with the straw men. If you know people who are like any Austen character, then you are obviously not living in any real world. There are no people like that. There probably never were people like that. Human nature doesn’t operate that way.
And psychoanalysis differs in your claim about Bronte’s characters being less real than Austen’s. Sorry, but you can’t just throw out such absurd claims. Making things up isn’t an appropriate argument.
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