GNOAT (Issue Zero, 20)

I mentioned it in passing last week, but I just wanted to reiterate how fascinating Bill Simmons's new book, The Book of Basketball, is. No one pokes fun at/secretly despises lists more than me, yet here we have a 700-page tome that ranks the NBA's greatest players and teams, and for a basketball fan it couldn't be more riveting (even if Simmons gets a tad too stat crazy). To quote the man, good times. And that got me thinking (always a dangerous thing, like pissing off that kid from the Twilight Zone episode "It's a Good Life"): who are the greatest novelists of all time, and what criteria can we use to determine their greatness? Off the top of my head, I chose longevity, quality, impact, style and intangibles*; but unlike the case with sports, where stats can provide a glimpse into determining the greatness of a certain player or team, literature -- art, for that matter -- offers no such insight. In fact, the opposite is often true. The Twilight series or The DaVinci Code are bestsellers, sure, but where do Stephanie Meyer and Dan Brown rank among the greatest authors of the written word? Not very (Kennan) highly, I'm willing to propose**. Extending the analogy, Transformers 2: Revenge of the Fallen was this year's highest-grossing movie, and if you think that carries any weight artistically you probably huffed a ton of glue in your youth and/or are from Ilsan***.

Begrudgingly, I will admit that this list is subjective****. You won't find Hitler's Mein Kampf on it, even though that book's impact is off the charts. But you will find Hemingway, a man whose writing I react to like a person with a peanut allergy. So will you find one-trick ponies such as Harper Lee and Gustave Flaubert (Flaubert spent as much time agonizing over his prose as you spend putting on makeup every morning, and in both cases, the outcome wasn't worth the effort*****). I'm going to adjust the list for inflation, so to speak******, but you'll be entertained nonetheless.

I should note that, while I'm well read and even better bred, I cannot be expected to have read the works of every great writer. That's folly. That's like hoping to walk into Mordor unmolested*******. So no Virginia Woolf, no Salman Rushdie********, no Beverly Cleary. I only know what I've read, and if you've read better, congratulations, here's a star. Just keep in mind that we're ranking writers here, not books, and that my biases will corrupt everything. Because there's no way George Orwell was a better writer than Stephan King. I will prove it. With guitars.

Are you in or are you out? Answer the question, Claire, because it's crucial. I'm going to count down the greatest writers of all time, and if you're in, welcome aboard. Free drinks and Cheetos! If you're out, good luck surviving in post-WWIII Eoinland. These are the best writers ever.

(Spoilers: Shakespeare is No. 1)


* Dostoevsky, for example, spent five years incarcerated in Siberia. My secret wish is to imprison modern-day writers and see how effective they are after being released. My guess is that they wouldn't go on to pen the best novel ever written (The Brothers Karamazov). James Frey just blushed.

** Admission: I've read the works of neither. Nor do I plan to. If someone is willing to state a case in favor of either writer, I'm willing to hear her out. Then I'm going to ignore what I just read. This goes back to Gene Siskel's famous quote about a writer who claimed The Pickwick Papers is a better film than The Godfather. Coming from someone who will fight tooth and nail to have Weekend at Bernie's receive its acknowledgment as a masterful cinematic achievement, you should probably take my expertise on art with a mountain of salt-covered saltballs. I'm not saying I don't play favorites.

*** Ilsan: Human Population: 276, Slow Mutant Population: 349,311. That's right, I'm declaring a Springfield-Shelbyville war on Ilsan again. Get your guns. Oh, I forgot, Ilsan hasn't even realized the utilitarian wheel yet. It's no fun picking on retarded kids or Ilsan denizens, because they put up a fight like Stephen Hawking in an arm wrestle. (I could go on.)

**** Until Kim Jong-il passes away and I'm named his successor (save the Queer Leader jokes), the only man to beat the Pac-Man split screen and conquer the globe. At the same time.

***** Madame Bovary is great and all, but it's a chore. If he were born a century later, Flaubert would likely have invented the Segway PT. Innovative, maybe; but, hell, I look like such a douchebag on this thing! There's a reason why neither are remembered fondly (save for Jeff Bridges riding a Segway in Ironman; that neckbeard melted my heart, the polar ice caps, and Toht's face. At the same time! So I can't disparage the Segway too harshly. Ditto for Flaubert. Plus: his name is so fun to say. FlowbearRR!!!)

****** Whoever wrote Beowulf is not on the list, for obvious reasons. Fear not, though, because James Joyce is. Yes, the man who singlehandedly encouraged generations of poor writers to vomit on paper and call it art is in the top 20! Word to Plump Buck Mulligan.

******* One reason why The Lord of the Rings books are so timeless: Sam and Frodo pulled off the greatest upset in history. It's akin to me having an affair with Lee Hyori after wooing her with a bank account consisting of three dollars and fifty-five cents. In my defense, if Lee Hyori ever saw my dick, I'm pretty sure she'd give it up. Confident, in fact.

******** infidel

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No. 20: Harper Lee

As the possibly apocryphal story goes, Truman Capote ( No. 9 on our list) ghost-wrote To Kill a Mockingbird; but Lee deserves some shine, because this list is ashamedly thin on female authors (Margaret Atwood, a compatriot, can eat one), and because Mockingbird has received a surprising thrashing over the years from critics trying to label it ironically racist. Yes, the benevolent white man defending a persecuted black man has become trite, but labeling Mockingbird racist is as stupid as calling the color green blue. Atticus Finch is, quite likely, the best father, the most altruistic dad, ever. I grew up wanting to be Atticus, and I ended up having a daughter like Scout. How awesome is that? People criticize the Bible, too, and Atticus was biblical; but he remains the greatest father in literature.

Amen.