tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7366909960546184927.post8193257113305058224..comments2023-06-11T02:19:27.429-07:00Comments on Academic Cog: New Classics MemeSisyphushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09880634753539329199noreply@blogger.comBlogger5125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7366909960546184927.post-72562685289050734612008-07-18T05:01:00.000-07:002008-07-18T05:01:00.000-07:00my only thought is...what a weird list. some of t...my only thought is...what a weird list. some of the books on there--the one's I've actually read, really--are just bad books. or nice but hardly classic.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7366909960546184927.post-19487864182103165572008-07-17T21:22:00.000-07:002008-07-17T21:22:00.000-07:00Interesting meme. I just did the other one about ...Interesting meme. I just did the other one about best classic I was forced to read, which classic to be put away, etc. I think this one would stump me because so much of what I read that is current is in children's and YA lit, and people tend to keep those titles separate. Of course, I don't necessarily agree with that approach so perhaps I will have to do this meme, too, and include those books in my list.k8https://www.blogger.com/profile/07547334819703279971noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7366909960546184927.post-77708692305768254482008-07-16T09:30:00.000-07:002008-07-16T09:30:00.000-07:00What I love about the list is how much I haven't r...What I love about the list is how much I haven't read on it. Both the Hagedorn and the Lethem have been on my radar for a bit, but needed a good recommendation for me to go out and actually purchase and read.Horacehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15662740021328265642noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7366909960546184927.post-67412436098515950322008-07-15T06:36:00.000-07:002008-07-15T06:36:00.000-07:00Dude, kudos to you for taking this on. This is th...Dude, kudos to you for taking this on. This is the kind of list keeping that brings out my worst anthopomorphizing (as in, "even if I didn't LOVE The Remains of the Day, it will feel bad if I leave it out!") <BR/><BR/>But I did want to add a big ol' AMEN to your comments about the work that the Joy Luck Club does, vs. The Woman Warrior. It seems to me like we're in a moment where the former is getting picked up more, because it's more "readable," but it's ideological bent makes me cranky. In other news, I taught WW recently, and the students HATED it. I wonder if it could stand to be retired for awhile?kfluffhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09067013188119828400noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7366909960546184927.post-31774571647068890272008-07-15T04:37:00.000-07:002008-07-15T04:37:00.000-07:00Prose narrative... I had this idea while reading ...Prose narrative... I had this idea while reading your list, actually: I am often struck by how much really high-quality poetry and genre fiction (SF, at least; I know less about other genres) gets written and published in the U.S. by small presses and small journals, and that that's been the case for the last 25 (or 35) years at least. But non-SF novels seem to struggle, and perhaps this is because there is no similar alternative outlet of the same artistic stature for publishing novels, and no similar community of readers willing to adopt the development of the form as an ongoing project. The novel is the most mainstream literary genre there is, and at the moment it is the most insulated against <I>successful</I> innovation, primarily because the barriers to publishing anything that does get written are so high. Novels are big, self-contained books, and we don't serialize them anymore. So novel manuscripts have to go through a series of gatekeepers who must determine whether or not these big, expensive books will sell: the gatekeepers aren't philistines, and most of them probably sincerely want to publish Great Important Books. But those books have to sell, at least initially, and they have to compete with all the other novels out there... kind of like literature job candidates, in fact...<BR/><BR/>I know I couldn't come up with a list like yours, or like the original lists... I just found myself wondering why that might be. One of the best recent novels I've read (2005) I read in manuscript; it never found an agent or publisher. So it goes. I have no solutions, obviously; I just want to encourage suspicion!Anonymousnoreply@blogger.com