i get your point, yet i don't agree with you. let's take music, for example. you can listen to a piece of classical music an simply enjoy it for its beauty (or you don't), or you can analyse why this sounds beautiful to us. you can take the piece apart completely, and explain every detail. both is good, both is fine. if you don't want over-analysation, don't do it, or don't read them.

So, kasimax, by "you're probably reading light fiction.", did you mean "you're probably just reading light fiction."? Maybe I'm just over-analyzing, but it did come across that way.

My original point wasn't that things can't be analyzed and picked through and have value gained from it, but that it doesn't need to have deeper meaning to be worthy of reading nor is everything that is written or composed meant to be a cerebral exercise. I'm not disagreeing with most of what Obi is saying, I just have a different take.

The rest is just humourous. Reading too much into it may be hazardous to your funnybone.

Tolkien 7-2

Dumas is my favorite of all time I'm ashamed that Tolkien is doing this well.

Tolkien. 8-(3)?, if that was a Dumas vote from lambda

This whole thread:

http://xkcd.com/1380/

no, theo, i didn't mean to make it sound that way. nothing against light fiction, i love it. my point is: if an ("highbrow", if you will) author writes "the curtains were blue", there is most likely a meaning behind that. why would he write it if there isn't? of course you don't need to analyse this. noboby needs to. but from time to time, it can be really funny, trying to see what a story has to offer.

Ian Fleming went into excruciating detail about Bond's meals and habits. Was there meaning behind his choices (except that they were the same things Fleming enjoyed)?

We've tallied one too many votes for Tolkien.

Flat characterization in LotR, and yet he endures. I love Tolkien, can't vote against him here, even though Children of Hurin maybe be the single most depressing piece of 'epic' fantasy I've ever read.

Oh, since I started with the High Brow discussion, I was referring to Woolf, who looked down on certain predecessors like Dickens for basically writing popular fiction.

Out of curiosity, before I tackle any of that--

When this tournament's finished...would anyone be interested in one with music?

We could bracket it according to genre, and then have the winners of each group meet in the Final 4 based on point totals?

Rock and Classical Music/Opera would be two obvious genre choices if we did this...

Ideas for the other two?

"Tolkien himself said that he wrote LOtR without social commentary. And who said it had meaning? Sometimes a book is just a good read."

Yes, but I doubt he said that it lacked a broader social meaning (by which I mean that it had ideas that pertained to society...I mean, the book clearly has ideas about good and evil and the nature of both, and that's always something that pertains to society, yes?)

As to the second part of that--I disagree...

Not everything is or has to be Hamlet-deep, but even something that's just "fun," like LOTR or Sherlock Holmes, can have meaning.

Again, it doesn't have to be a deep meaning, but it does have some, even if that meaning is just "good is good" or "being logical and analytical is totally awesome...and sometimes not so much."

"I think sometimes we over-analyze authors and artists."

Fair enough, but I also think there's a tendency and danger in going the other way and not giving authors or artists enough credit, or being anti-analytical.

There's a happy medium between "Hamlet's just a dumb emo mopey goth who can't decide to shit or get off the pot" and "Hamlet is a Marxist Deconstructionist commentary on power relations with respect to the hegemony and proletariat as it pertains to the thing in itself so far as it is itself or ever can be."

The former's overly-reductionist and stupid, the latter's intellectual masturbation...and stupid. :p So, a happy medium.

if you're not throwing classical music/opera into one group then i'd be interested.

Obi, I like that idea. I've enjoyed this, and it lets people with different tastes actually focus on choosing between things they like instead of getting stuck having to vote out a bunch of crappy Sci-Fi writers they've never read in the first round (you just know that would happen to a lot of less famous classical musicians). I think at least one of the other groups should be a general group for things that don't fit into the other genres. I'm not sure what the third should be though.

maybe electronic music? but i don't know if wepdip is so into electronic music.

and you could as well split the rock/classical categories in, say pre-1800 and post-1800 for the classical music.

Country and folk could deserve categories, depending on the size of their constituencies here on webdip. ghug is certainly right that at least one must be a catch-all.

A possible problem with this is that things sometimes fall between genres or within multiple genres.

True, but that's just the same problem that libraries have when they shelve things. Editorial decisions must be made.

Maybe we could try by region?

America, Britain, Europe, World?

Anyway, Tolkien obviously wins, so we'll start the Final Four soon.

Yeah. I guess you're right.

We could have people nominate bands, list genres with them, and then organize them into groups afterwards.

The four bookmen of the manuscripts?

Yeah, that sounded better in my mind. Anyone have one better?

Oh, and by the way, 2WL and I are planning to run a "Favorite Movies" tournament in a few weeks. We're still trying to plan it out (big project), but be on the lookout.

You guys ought to wait awhile. Don't run this thing dry.

Make sure Galaxy Quest and Princess Bride make the movie list... :)

I'd prefer a "worst movie" list with favourite quotes (in the spirit of MST2K). That's more entertaining.

And I agree with bo_sox, wait a month or more.

Good idea, I like it, but it might have more participation later rather than sooner.

The Princess Bride will win by a country mile. Hardly worth the effort of running the tournament. Still, it'll be good to see the likes of Das Boot, On The Beech, and Schindler's List fighting for honours. May put in a nomination for Smokey and the Bandit II. Classic.