Internet Sophism

Using the Tagsurfer feature this morning I ran across a post that listed the “101 books to read before you die” from a UK bookstore called Ottakar’s. There are lots of these kind of lists out there, and I always find them fun. A reviewer’s “best of” list says a lot about the reviewer, and I enjoy trying to figure out what kind of things the reviewers value in their lists.

As bookstore employees put this list together, I find it particularly interesting – more fun than serious reviews from academic journals and other “professionals”, typically because the whole advancement of Civilized Culture is not at stake in amateur conversations.

Here are my humble comments (please don’t take them too seriously):

• What, no James Joyce?
• Homer, but no Dante?
• Phillip K. Dick, but no William Gibson?
• Dostoyevsky, but no Tolstoy?
• Richard Dawkins? This is just fiction right? If not, where is Charles Darwin?
• It’s nice to see P.G. Wodehouse and Douglas Adams on the list.
• Life of Pi is a great book
• The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Nighttime is a good book, but not great.

So what made the reviewers choose the books they did? Is it books they had read (collectively)? Books that sold well, or that they imagined would sell well? What is their criterion for good literature?

What are your thoughts?

While we are discussing artistic merit, it may be appropriate to mention the Museum of Bad Art in Massachusetts. Instead of fighting over the nature of really good art, they attempt to decide what is really bad art.

It is much easier and commonplace to create a work of mediocre art, but the creation of really bad art is exceptional.

“All bad poetry springs from genuine feeling. To be natural is to be obvious, and to be obvious is to be inartistic.” –Oscar Wilde