Subject: Author Showdown?
Author:
Posted on: 2009-09-01 10:25:00 UTC
Err... a load of people are trying to compare J. K. Rowling, J. R. R. Tolkien, Stephanie Meyer and William Shakespeare to each other. It's... an interesting read.
http://graphjam.com/2009/08/28/song-chart-memes-number-readers/#comments
then cry, is the people who bash Shakespeare and Tolkien using terms or phrases from the actual authors.
I will not say that the serise are good or bad, that is and opinion that one has to make for themself. What these books have done though is change the way of thinking in society.
Shakespeare: New words, phrases, terms of general knowlege (who doesn:t know the `To be or not to be` line, even if they don:t know where in Hamlet it is from (I was convinced that it was in Act 5 for the longest time (I blame Bugs Bunney for that)) or that it is even from Hamlet.
While I agree that Shakespeare has been over analized to the point where the results really don:t make sense (I sometimes wonder what the poet himself would say at the conclusions made) it has shaped the way we think, and it will forever will.
Tolkien: What Tolkien wrote was pure escapism. When he was planing and writing The Silmarrion (a book that reads like a history text, by the way) he was fighting in the Second World War on the front lines against an enemy that felt like it could not be beaten. It was only through greater mistakes done by the `evil side` that alowed the `good side` to win.
Tolkien`s books took the `good side/bad side` plot line to a level that was not seen before in fiction. The reason if became a standard of mesurement was because it covers almost all aspects of human (or race of choice) life, from daily chores to death in grusome battle. It also didn:t glorify battle, it gave descriptions of how horrid it can be, what commanders and generals don:t want their soldiers to know. What person would join an army if he knew that he was more likely to die a horible death then to come home with spoils of war?
These writers give readers things to think about, they don:t give you an answer, they let you make up your own mind.
Now I am finished rambling, and will go to bed. Hope someone likes this, and sorry for no specific examples. I am in an area without my books (ie Japan). I tried to explain without a bias, but as a prof once told me, there is always a bias. (The bias I was tring to avoid was one of personal preference, not merit of cultural change)
Leto
However, on the Tolkien point, a) it was WWI, not WWII, I believe and b) I'm a equal fan of fantasies where good and evil are very distinct, but I also like stories where the lines are blurred to the point where you could show the story from the other side and still feel like you're supporting the good guys. I'm attempting to write a fic like that, actually. My hero from the first story (where good and evil was, with a few exceptions (i.e. when he went a bit insane), fairly defined, will make a lot of decisions that seem off. The army of the good guys will be shown to have far more prejudices that I show in the first fic, where they're generally better than humans. I'm considering having a spin-off from the point of the characters affected by my hero's actions.
thanks for the correction in wars, should have looked it up.
I like the fic idea that you have. Origional fic idea I have has a blured like between the good side and the bad side. I am going to try and write something where you don:t actually know which side is which until the very end, using brothers. The brothers, themselves, are peaceful to each other, but thier respective mentors are the one with the problems. I don:t know when I am going to write it out (still in character development stage) and probably wont be written for some time.
L
Your story sounds a lot like one of my others. I've got a Command & Conquer fic where the main character works for the Brotherhood of Nod as one of Kane's best soldiers, but her brother works for GDI, the opposite side. Essentially, Nod are the bad guys but no-one really knows what Kane is up to (even his own forces) and she is devoted in her belief of Kane. Therefore, I protray GDI as the bad guys (what pushed her to joining Nod in the first place).
Some Links:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kane(Command%26Conquer)
<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BrotherhoodofNod">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BrotherhoodofNod
<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GlobalDefenseInitiative">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GlobalDefense_Initiative
GDI is somewhat morally dubious aside from the whole "Saving the human race from getting turned into crystal" thing. Also, Kane spent the entire third game saving the human race from aliens and apparently got a tiberium remote control out of the Tacitus prior to the fourth game.
GDI's always seemed morally excellent. Yes, General Solomon seemed sinister in Tiberian Sun's Nod campaign. Yes, Boyle was a MORON. But GDI itself? Nah. They just don't have all the information like Kane does.
And Kane didn't exactly spend Tiberium Wars saving the world from the Scrin. After all, he LURED them to Earth.
Basically, GDI really doesn't help the people who live in the yellow zones despite being reasonably capable of doing more or at least evacuating a number of them to the blue zones. The reclaiming of yellow zones is nice, but they don't even provide, say, gas masks. That sort of thing is why the militants say "The oppressors must die!"
They also show some recklessness and disregard for human life in terms of the research they conduct in Kane's Wrath. Experiments in liquid tiberium killed numerous researchers and weren't stopped until after nod blew up the facility. Likely the only reason they didn't restart it after that was that the destruction of the facility turned Australia into a red zone. Also, they were risking the Tacitus entirely more than was really acceptable. Experiments that have a 10% chance of causing it to explode each experiment are rather unwise.
As for Kane saving Earth from the Scrin, the key point is that he lured them to Earth early. The Scrin plan was to wait until no effective resistance remained on the planet, which usually occurred when someone detonated a liquid tiberium bomb. The Scrin came to earth and were totally destroyed, instead of waiting a while and arriving to find no resistance. Of course, the inbound invasion fleet might be an issue, but apparently Kane turned the Tacitus into a tiberium remote control or something like that prior to the start of the upcoming fourth game. We'll see how that plays out.
good point. Personally, though, I'm still mildly unconvinced. I think that GDI were right to attempt to leave the Yellow Zones to their own devices while they poured all of their money into anti-Tiberium research. If ZOCOM's efforts worked in a Red Zone, then they would instantly have switched to the Yellows, knowing that their tech works.
Also, gas masks against Tiberium? Epic fail.
Regarding your entire second paragraph... what? Where did that information come from?
And Kane has the Tacitus again (I've never finished either TW or KW)? GDI kept it hidden effectively, didn't they? Good job, well done.
GDI probably had far more than enough to at least airlift people out, though. I got the impression that they had started reclaiming yellow zones, such as Germany, but it was going to take decades to complete. In the mean time, they should probably have evacuated people from the yellow zones, especially the Sahara and Amazon deserts and the areas near enough to red zones to have tiberium in the rainwater. Admittedly, the point is rendered largely moot by the fourth game tralier, going by the brand new england red zone.
Gas masks would prevent inhaling the toxic gas and tiny pieces of tiberium, although a full-body composite hazmat suit would of course be better.
Second paragraph comes from the Scrin campaign and intel database.
GDI did do well with the Tacitus, aside from the part where they nearly blew both it and Chennyne Mountain up by knowingly performing risky experiments. They may possibly have been going to stop doing that, but still. Going by the stuff released about Tiberium Twilight, blowing it up would possibly have doomed humanity.
Independent from GDI as an organization, Boyle goes from an idiot to extremely evil with his actions in the last GDI mission, where he orders the commander to use another liquid tiberium warhead to destroy a Scrin control center in the Tiber Riverbed. The player can either do or not do that. In the ending where it is used, it takes out nearly everything in europe via tiberium chain reaction.
"I got the impression that they had started reclaiming yellow zones, such as Germany, but it was going to take decades to complete."
Likely, but I still think that they should have focused on the Red Zones. After all, they're the bigger threat. If you focus tech on working in a Red Zone, it will definitely work in a Yellow. However, what if they focused tech on Yellow Zones and found that it didn't cut it in a Red Zone? Lose.
"going by the brand new england red zone."
England's a Red Zone now? Cool. *looks outside*
"Gas masks would prevent inhaling the toxic gas and tiny pieces of tiberium, although a full-body composite hazmat suit would of course be better."
Yeah, but you'd have to take both off to eat and drink and everything, so what's the point?
"Second paragraph comes from the Scrin campaign and intel database."
Right, right, PC version came with intel stuff. I have the Xbox for both TW and KW.
"GDI did do well with the Tacitus, aside from the part where they nearly blew both it and Chennyne Mountain up by knowingly performing risky experiments."
Just go through the Stargate, people! Go through the Stargate!
"Going by the stuff released about Tiberium Twilight, blowing it up would possibly have doomed humanity."
Well, duh? If it was created by good Scrin warning Earth about bad Scrin...
"In the ending where it is used, it takes out nearly everything in europe via tiberium chain reaction."
Awesome. I heard about that vaguely, that Michael Ironside resigns because you're a war criminal.
One epic fail on the part of EA is that the mutants vanished. What? There was no explanation and they were a major part of everything. Especially since, you know, they were the only ones to have any success cracking the Tacitus rapidly. But no, they suddenly live in random hovels in cruddy places.
Here's the tiberium twilight trailer: http://pc.gamespy.com/dor/objects/3684/command-conquer-4/videos/comand4trlrevealtrailer_72709.html
Gas masks would protect sometimes, although really the best way to protect people would be to move them away from tiberium fields.
Anyways, I'm pretty sure the tacitus is more than just a giant data storage device. The massive capacity for explosion it apparently possesses would seem to indicate it is a power source or suchlike.
As for the forgotten, i'm pretty sure it's more accurate to say Tratos had success at cracking the tacitus raipidly, and he died. After the Down With Food and Air* riots, they probably left the area they'd been living in to avoid that ever happening again.
*Not the actual name
Awesome! That trailer, I hadn't seen. *huggles Kane* Ooh... glowy...
According to one of the PC's intel things, the Forgotten are all feral now. Which sucks loudly.
J.K. Rowling: Awesome.
J.R.R. Tolkien: Awesome.
Stephenie Meyer: Bollocks.
William Shakespeare: Awesome.
Graphic wasn't very impressive; but then, I'm always wary of graphs that try to predict the future. I think the graph is true, though.
As for the discussion...
Well, I've never read J.R.R. Tolkien, unfortunately, and I haven't read Twilight or any Stephanie Meyer books (does she have others?) but I have read plenty of Shakespeare and Harry Potter. While I think Shakespeare is overrated, I have to agree that his stories are timeless and his insults the best. I love the Harry Potter series, and I do think it could become a timeless classic; perhaps not on the level of Shakespeare, but it will stick around for years to come. I think the whole Twilight craze is overrate, as well, but then i've only read two sentences of the book.
is a bit like Eragon. Looks good at first glance, but... if beauty is skin deep, then both books are one-layered in more than one meaning. I haven't read more than a few snippets, but this is the general view and I agree with them based on what I've read of it.
I've read Tolkien and Rowling and some of Shakespeare (though, like Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, schools forcing me to read them and see "hidden meanings" where the author probably only thought "hey, this'll be cool!" have put me off of them for the rest of time, sadly).
I've read all four, and they all have their merits, some of which are long-lasting, some of which are very brief. I don't really like Shakespeare despite all the praise he gets - it's more that his stories are now culturally ingrained and you can't really avoid them. I don't dislike them, either, but I'm not interested.
Harry Potter, I think, is the same - only in this case I like it ;) That story has been so big over the last ten years that it's ingrained part of itself in daily life; you can mention Harry, or Shakespeare, in random conversation and be reasonably sure the other person will have at least some idea of what you're talking about.
Tolkien, it seems to me, was like that five years ago, but now it's fading along with the movie hype. I like Tolkien, and always will, but not with the obsessive nature that seems to be characteristic of...
Twilight. It's a fashion - a rather big fashion - and hey, I'd rather see teenage girls squeal over books than whinging about whatever miseries are in their angsty lives. I don't dislike Twilight, either, and I read all four books, but it doesn't... it's not the same.
I've rambled a lot, sorry, but that's my point: These stories are so different that they can't be compared. They're written at different times by different people for different audiences and in different ways. The only method of comparison is sheer popularity, and that's ever-changing.
Gives publishers something to talk about, though. *shrug*
I've read a lot of Shakespeare, in school and out, and all the Harry Potter, Lord of the Rings and other Tolkien works, but I couldn't force myself past the first few pages of Twilight. I skimmed ahead a few chapters, but it looked pretty horrible all the way through, and given that pretty much everyone whose literary opinion I in any way trust told me it was horseshit, I didn't care to find out personally.
Shakespeare was a literary genius. Even if you don't like his material, you have to give credit where credit is due; he invented many, many words in the English language, his wordplay was witty, funny, and very beautiful. It's hard to read, because we don't speak that sort of language these days. (NOTE: It is NOT Old English which he wrote in. That is a separate language entirely, with, I believe, an entirely separate alphabet. My favorite English teacher taught us that in Freshman year, telling us that if she caught us referring to Shakespeare as "Old English," she would make us write our essays in -real- Old English, and we would probably cry. Or something like that.) I got lucky in that my parents raised me on the Old King James, which is written in very similar language; I get the dirty jokes, and the metaphors, pretty easily, because the language isn't as much of a barrier. But, no matter whether you -like- his style or not, he was a literary genius. (Did you know that "nothing" referred to a woman's... yeah... back then? When I learned that, it gave a lot of his lines sudden new, hilarious meanings.)
As for the "LotR craze," no, it isn't dying down. The movie craze is. But the books? Were written... circa 1954, 1955. That's about fifty-five to fifty-four years of popularity. When a student teacher saw me reading The Silmarillion in History, he remarked that they seem to come back with a bang every twenty, thirty years or so, since they'd been fairly popular in the fifties (I think), huge in the eighties, died back down a bit, and then became huge a few years back, when the movies were made. Twenty-five years or so from now, people will suddenly rediscover them, I'm sure if the world hasn't ended by then. It's not a passing craze. Tolkien was also a genius, in his own right. (As was Lewis, given that The Chronicles of Narnia also come rushing back fairly often.)
Harry Potter? Who knows? I think it'll be something along the same lines, though personally I prefer Lord of the Rings, Narnia, or, in fact, Shakespeare. HP is good, though, very good, and, as you pointed out, it's now a part of culture. Also not a passing craze.
Twilight? A passing craze. In twenty, thirty years, people who read Twilight and Eragon might remember them, might still enjoy them, but they won't be huge things like LotR and Shakespeare and possibly Harry Potter will.
The comparison thing isn't that ridiculous, as far as who stands the test of time. Honestly, it's not that ridiculous as far as quality is concerned either. Somewhat ridiculous, yes, because Shakespeare was a playwright, not an author, and because he wrote at a point when language was changin drastically (though, I suppose, given the sudden veer we've taken towards babble like "Obvy, FML," and oh my God I can't think of any right now but I meant the craze of abbreviating every single word, even in conversation, you could consider this language in a transition phase as well), but all told, I think he still wins on sheer awesome. His sonnets are awesome. But Stephanie Meyer? Oh good grief no. Her writing is purple prose, and at best, angsty melodrama. (Shakespeare, by the way, also gave us realistic acting. Back then, acting was nearly always incredibly melodramatic, the sort of thing you'd see in a bad soap opera today. Shakespeare was the one who started the whole thing with acting like real people onstage.) JK Rowling wrote well, if not as well as Tolkien, and Tolkien wrote well, and invented NEW LANGUAGES AND AN ENTIRE WORLD COMPLETE WITH FULL GEOGRAPHY HISTORY AND MYTHOS AND BASICALLY INVENTED TODAY'S FANTASY GENRE, but Stephanie Meyer? Wrote a story which ignored all previous vampire lore, a story in which the main character was a whiny brat and the other main character was an abusive jerk. And, because the characters were described in urple prose as the ultimate hot, tween fangirls ate it up. And some other people. But you know how you see those fanfics that are just horrible, horrible stuff, and somehow they have thousands of reviews of "ZOMG I LUVV U THIS ROXORZ" and, more mind-bogglingly, here and there, well-written reviews that actually point out good things? That's like Twilight, in my mind. Yeah, she got published, and she's got a thousand fangirls who fawn over her and are prepared to flame (and call a flamer) anyone who doesn't. But at the end of the day, give me Don't Panic, Okay NOW Panic, any day of the week. And if you don't know what those fics are, and you have ever typed "Where is all the goodfic?" then slap yourself upside the head for me, and then go read them. Please.
(Rambling is a key trait. Nourish it well. :D)
I hear it everywhere and no-one's given me an answer. I'm fairly sure it's not the singular of Tweenies (THANK GOD).
Roughly. As far as I know, it comes from "between child and teenager", since ten-year-olds tend to think they're more mature than nine-year-olds. I also think it may have come from Lord of the Rings, because if I recall right, they used that name or a similar one for Hobbits in their twenties, which were effectively equivalent to teenagers.
Not sure, but that seems to make sense in this context.
I just figured it had a different meaning in real life and forty years on. After all, gay used to mean happy forty years ago.
I'm not going to have a fight with you. I have my opinions and I stand by them; I don't like it when people compare things because I think it creates more problems than solutions. That said, it's still just my opinion.
Sorry if I offended you, but I just don't enjoy Shakespeare's work as much as it's 'all hyped up to be' - I don't know why; I just don't. I've liked some of the film adaptations, and I'm certainly not against giving him the credit he's due, but his stories just aren't ones that I personally can sit down and enjoy.
(And no, it wasn't Old English - it was closer to Middle English. I studied Old English a few years ago and believe me, it is hard. I hated it, to be honest, but it was fascinating to see how English evolved - Shakespeare's influences included.)
Also, it seems I confused you - sorry about that. I was referring to the fanfic part of the LotR "craze", not the stories themselves. Reading back, I can see where I didn't make it clear. too bad these posts can't be edited.
And yes, I've read "Don't Panic" et cetera. I liked them.
I didn't mean to come off as foaming-at-the-mouth enraged. I wasn't. Like hS said, I was more responding to the entire page/forum, the whole debate. It really, really, really irritates me when people take two-second fan-crazes and make them out like paragons of culture and talent. You'd get much the same rant with someone trying to compare Linkin Park with U2, or Fallout Boy with The Beatles, or Eminem with Jimi Hendrix, or, for that matter, Bono with Johann Sebastian Bach, or, as you've seen, Stephanie Meyer with William Shakespeare. And I tend to ramble on about subjects that irritate me-- because internet arguments so often turn into irrational flame wars and demonstrations of Godwin's Law, I prefer to try and make my point as clearly as possible. Repeat after me, now: wordiness does not make things clear. Quite the opposite. You cannot reason with tweeny idiots. High blood pressure is a bad way to die.
(Man, that's incredible. It would be -awesome- to study Old English. I hope someday I can, as well.)
Honestly, I didn't mean to say that you weren't giving Shakespeare enough credit. It's acceptable to not like him, and hypocritical to assume or demand that everyone should. Eating my words? No, no, I never have to do that. That's for the foolishly proud, dontchaknow?
The rant wasn't aimed at starting a fight with you. Believe it or not, I don't like or enjoy flame-wars, or angry arguments. I was just peeved after reading the whole Graphjam page, and kind of found myself with uncontrollabe word-vomit. I stand by what I said, but it wasn't aimed at you, and I'm sorry it... was aimed at you? By position, not intent.
I'm glad you've read, and liked, the Don't Panic series. It's on my top ten favorite fanfics list, and definitely the two of them meld together as my favorite LotR fanfic ever.
... VM wasn't really replying to you so much as to the whole realm of Shakespeare-Tolkien-Rowling-Meyer comparisons. :P
Personally -- as a non-literary-critic -- I don't enjoy reading Shakespeare but like watching/acting his comedies, love Tolkien's worlds but don't tend to read his books much any more, didn't get past the first few chapters of Goblet of Fire but have watched all the films, and read the first three Twilight books (and watched the film) for pretty much the sole purpose of understanding all the mockery.
Shakespeare's works are probably immortal. Lord of the Rings will probably always have a cult/sporadic following. Harry Potter may end up the same, it's too soon to say. And Twilight probably isn't going to last.
But who knows? We may all be dead long.
(When it comes to Old English, I always loved the story of Tolkien's lectures on Anglo-Saxon poetry -- as I recall, he began the course by reciting the opening lines of Beowulf in the original, without telling the class what he was doing. ;))
hS
And that is a crazy awesome story.
...then sorry for being defensive. I just felt like I was being shouted at.
I was shouting. Just not at you. Therefore, th'art justified. Woulda got my hackles up, too.
that I can't stand fashion. I am immune from Twilight disease.
You mean... the LotR craze is ending? The Pit might be safe to tread again (at least until The Hobbit is out)?
And don't worry about rambling. Rambling is fun.