Quote:
Originally Posted by ekbell
Do we have to put down Chaucer (provider of bawdy humor, fart jokes and plenty of insight into plain ordinary earthy folks) and Jane Austen (who's books I love for their commentary on the society of her day) to pump up Terry Pratchett?
Terry Pratchett himself read broadly and was not shy in making allusions in his own writing (my favorite is the boarding school goat sacrificing scene in Pyramids which nicely refers to and subverts a similar scene in Tom Brown's School Days -both scenes are about pious little mummy's boys named Arthur but the differences in religion leads to some interesting changes).
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Are we putting them down?
I haven't read either of them, but I have read Pratchett. As a result, I can conclude... that Pratchett is an excellent writer.
And I haven't read lots of books. Many of which I am sure I would enjoy immensely, if I had only heard of them. Some of which I have heard of but didn't have time to investigate further, to determine if I would enjoy them. Some of which I intend to read. And some of which I might end up reading.
...
Some people have made the observation that literary greathood is determined by arbitrary statistics that do not actually tell you whether the book is of lasting value, but I do not take that to mean any specific book
isn't worth it.
For instance, there are books that I feel were elevated to the lofty heights of "literature" for entirely frivolous reasons, and are
coincidentally deserving of it!