The winner of last week's Great Wednesday Compare (J. R .R. Tolkien Vs Doris Lessing), with a final score of 10-5, was Doris Lessing.Well, I guess I should be ashamed of myself! Not only had I not even heard of Lessing until the
The Times Online article (so I'm not up on Nobel winners, leave me alone!), but I honestly expected a landslide victory for Tolkien. In fact, I figured the 2nd Wednesday Compares would retire with him, I had so overestimated his appeal (I retire a round when a winner has 5 consecutive victories). It's not that I'm a huge Tolkien fan. I've always been pretty ambivalent about the guy. I somewhat enjoyed the Lord of the Rings books (and movies), and I appreciate the influence they've had on the fantasy genre. But I did find them long and the songs got on my nerves. Still, I thought I was in the minority with my negative feelings until I read this post at Sam's blog. Ouch! No wonder Tolkien didn't last long. In fact, unlike the first round of Wednesday Compares, no author has managed to go beyond 2 weeks. Will anyone? There has to be a champion out there somewhere.
Remember, vote simply by adding your comment below, base it on whatever merit you choose, voting does not end until Tuesday at 11:59 p.m. (July 1st, 2008), and please spread the word!
Who's better?
15 comments:
Mailer, hands down more fun.
I haven't read either! But rather than abstain I'll go with who is sexier and that would be Mailer. Besides I do want to read him someday.
So I vote for Mailer
I haven't read Mailer, but I doubt it would matter anyway. Definitely Lessing!
I haven't read either of these authors, so this week I'm going to exercise my right to vote based entirely upon my emotions.
I'm voting for Mailer for two reasons:
1) I'm voting AGAINST the person who beat Tolkien.
2) He totally appeared on an episode of "Gilmore Girls."
Lessing.
Mailer. "The Naked and The Dead" is one of the best war (or anti-war) novels ever written.
Wasn't Mailer "anti" just about everything? Bad attitude. I vote Lessing.
I'm fond of Lessing's short stories, but I just finished The Executioner's Song so I'm still under the spell of Mr. Mailer. Plus, you gotta give the man props for inventing the word "fug" and neatly getting around the censors of the time. It's close enough to the real thing to satisfy me.
OK, so he didn't invent "fug", but he invented another meaning for it.
Definitely Lessing, no contest! I like these easy ones. :)
I've only read Lessing so she's the woman with my vote.
Mailer. He may never have been as successful as he wanted to be but he kept at it, kicking and screaming to the end.
Besides, The Naked and the Dead was a great book.
Oh geez. Lessing, hands down.
I went through a Mailer phase back in my 20's and that was enough, thankyouverymuch. And whatever any of you do, don't pick up Castle in the Forest.
Doris Lessing!!!
I've read five Lessing novels, notably Memoirs of a Survivor and The Golden Notebook, and while I enjoyed her style, rigor and ability to bridge science fiction and the higher literary calling (a tradition British writers like Aldous Huxely, J.G.Ballard and Will Self are able to perform and sustain without the slightest hint of pretention), I did find her dystopic visions rather typical , if evocative. I haven't read much of her since graduating college in the early eighties, and never got around to renewing my acquaintence with her work. Sometimes two or three books will satisfy your curioiusity.
Mailer, though, kept me interested , and had the rare situation where he was both a publicity hog and ungodly gifted artist. Mailer was fascinating because he had his own odd code, a mix of Hemingway , and religious existentialism, and these ideas turned up in all his work, fiction and nonfiction alike, kept fresh by Mailer's willingness to experiment with style, voice and circumstance. His accomplishments as novelist are under rated at this point; yes, Naked and the Dead and Executioner's Song are masterpieces, but there are other brave, exasperating and grand bits of genius in his other fictions, notably Harlot's Ghost, Ancient Evenings, An American Dream and his last novel, The Castle in the Forest.
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