Quote:
Originally Posted by bfisher
This was a fantastic list, fantasyfan.
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Agreed; the only one I might've passed on was the Shippey. I haven't ever read Tolkien so I'd like to read him first before I read analysis of his books. In a way I wouldn't mind being spoiled as I've seen the three LOTR films (and I think the cartoon when I was young), but I feel like this book may go so in-depth that it could lessen my first-time discovery enjoyment of the novels once I get to them.
I'm probably most interested in The Rhetoric of Fiction, but Aspects of the Novel is a close second for me so I'm happy to see it in the lead on the home stretch. After reading some reviews of it, The Great Tradition sounded like a hoot- controversially opinionated somewhat similarly to what bfisher's dip into the Chesterton found. For instance, the top GR review of the Leavis, by Becky, includes, '...I did rather enjoy this book. Leavis osculates between throwing shade on other critics and authors, seriously studying his chosen authors, and something akin to fanboying. It was nothing if not entertaining...' and the next top review, by Richard Epstein, said this, 'The Leavises, esp. F.R., were always fun to read and to rail at, and they were capable of wonderful analyses; but they were idiots nonetheless. These are the people who thought Hard Times was Dickens's one novel in the great tradition and Hardy scarcely worth considering. Still, he recognized that Shelley was a ninny, and for that I honor him.'