Saturday, December 3, 2011

The Ten Best "Ten Best" Lists...

I didn't realize I was serious until I read to the end of the first screenful of this article:
Are there too many of these lists? Not enough? Do most run-downs succeed in delving deeper than the year’s biggest blockbuster releases? Which rankings are the most interesting, idiosyncratic or trustworthy — in short, the best?
But the writer was serious. Reality trumps satire once again.

P.S. And here too, in case you thought it was just Salon:

Lately, they have been catching the eye of the literary elite, earning praise that sounds as extravagantly brainy as the thesis-like articles that The New Inquiry uploads every few days.

“They’re the precursor of this kind of synthesis of extrainstitutional intellectualism, native to the Internet, native to the city dweller,” said the novelist Jonathan Lethem, an early champion.

“They’re not trapped within an old paradigm,” he added. “They’re just making it their own.”

See also IOZ's parody.