I think they are all like Gordon Pratt in Homicide: Big Fakes. Too bad they all don't get busted by Frank Pembleton, who reads Latin and Greek and still enjoys a good taunt-fest.
'Safe'
Literary Buffistas 3: Don't Parse the Blurb, Dear.
There's more to life than watching Buffy the Vampire Slayer! No. Really, there is! Honestly! Here's a place for Buffistas to come and discuss what it is they're reading, their favorite authors and poets. "Geez. Crack a book sometime."
I didn't even know where to start on the "we are all doomed because people are reading The Hunger Games instead of Plato in the original Greek" crowd.
Pish and tosh. I read The Satyricon in Latin and it's basically 50 Shades of Grey from the Roman era. Does this make me a better person? Bullshit.
Ivory tower types who sneer at genre lit are one of the reasons I didn't pursue a Ph.D in Lit. Besides the fact that the market for English profs sucks ass, and I'd probably have to move to Nome to get a uni job.
As much as I snark about Twilight, the bottom line is that ANYTHING that fosters a love of reading in the public is of the good. Far better that they be reading lowbrow literature for entertainment and thereby putting their imaginations to work rather than playing video games or sitting mesmerized by the TV.
Fish is an overpaid dolt, and my English profs at UNC use to delight in mocking his pretentious ass.
Word, Matt...
Calli, I really liked Fish's article. My students have difficulty learning the difference between analysis and summary. What is cool in that piece is how much he touches on without really summarizing the plot at all. A great sample for those who are beginning literary analysis.
I liked what he had to say, too. I hadn't seriously thought about authenticity as a theme, but it really makes sense.
Has anyone read Night Circus by Erin Moregenstern? Loving it. Also the follow up to Wolf Hall was released and I cannot WAIT to start it.
Jilli loved it, I know, and I just started it (again -- I had once and then got distracted by something). I still need to read Wolf Hall -- S. loved it, and I miss The Tudors.