FOFC Literature Draft - Picks Thread
Let the games begin! The rules are discussed in the previous thread, FOFC Literature Draft.
Please make your picks by copying the below list and placing your selection next to the appropriate category. Bold your current selection and keep your selections through each round. I will also try to keep this thread up to date with current selections.
Label your selection like so: Autobiography: 1.1 A Man and His Sandwich, Pumpy Tudors The order, selected randomly by http://www.random.org/lists/ is: A grid of selections can be viewed on Google Spreadsheets. Round 1
Round 2
Round 4
Round 5
Round 6
Round 8
Round 9
Round 10
wademoore and Lathum graciously volunteered to drop out if the number surpassed 10. I was looking forward to seeing both of them participate, but it was easier on me to accept their offers and move on. :) This also allows me to discuss things behind the scenes with wade without an risk of impropriety. :D This is starting on a Friday night, so I'm not going to push people to do much over the weekend. If you can make selections, that's fantastic, but I don't expect us to pick up much speed until Monday. As mentioned in the previous thread, feel free to discuss choices, both observers and participants. Lively debate is expected and encouraged, but please don't give suggestions within the thread. Don't be that guy. |
I'm mos def looking forward to seeing how this rolls.
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You plagarized HA!!!!one111one!!! |
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+1 I'm just not strong enough when it comes to literature to participate, but I'm really looking forward to following this one, great idea for a draft. |
Wow, the pressure is on! I didn't expect to be the one setting precedent.
I have one book in mind. And it could fit in many places. I think I will place it where my knowledge is weakest. The issue is...author. Is it various? Do I, by selecting this work, eliminate all other works by these various authors? The good news is, I don't think much else of what they wrote has survived the millenia. The author could also be God. But he hasn't written too many bestsellers. I'll let lordscarlet determine if he will accept my "God" authorship, or if it should be "various". Chief Rum selects...The Holy Bible by God I will place this work in the History category. My intent is for this work to be as it is commonly accepted by the general Christian faith in today's world, where disagreements of inclusion or exclusion of particular books be settled by relying on that version which is closest to the Roman Catholic faith. |
Chief Rum's list
Here's to follow lordscarlet's rules. |
Should have been non-fiction :)
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I cry foul.
God didn't write the Bible. The bible is a compilation of many different letters and individual writings and stories. |
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Those of faiths that use the Bible claim God inspired those different authors. Putting aside faith, this is, whatever the source, a story told more or less chronologically of the history of the Jewish and then Christian faith. And this story has largely been held within one book since the 4th century. No one carries particular individual books or letters in the Bible. They carry and refer to The Bible itself as a whole. So I would argue it is one work as a whole, which tells a history (which is why I put it where I did). But I will leave it to lordscarlet to judge, and will select another work if he rules it cannot be used. |
As an atheist I find the Bible to be mostly fiction, although there is some personal guidance tips to be found in there.
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See what I mean about several potential categories in which it could fit? :) |
Maybe a spiritual section is needed? Lots of spiritual books
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The Old Testament is largely a historical record, sure, but the New Testament isn't a history in my opinion.
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Wow, you made the very first play I considered and in the very category I would have placed it. I decided that I wouldn't though since I don't feel it has only one author. I certainly won't argue against it being accepted and I applaud the choice as appropriate as 1,1. |
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I disagree. The bible is mostly history with a good bit of personal and practical guidance and a small amount of the supernatural mixed in. Read the book. You'll find tons more war stories, murders, family feuds etc than you'll find water turning into wine though it's obvious which is going to sell more books. SHURG Another thing, the New Testament is actually really old. I think it should be called the Old Testament and the Most Recent Testament. Bonus points to the first to name where that came from. :) |
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On the contrary. While the time span covered is much shorter, the New Testament, in all four of the Gospels, clearly follows from the Christ's birth to his crucifixion and Resurrection. This is followed by the Acts, which detail the years immediately following, and then the Letters, which came later than that (although there is much argument as to the exact timing of the writing of the letters). And Revelations clearly deals with the end of all things, beyond which no story can go. So there is certainly a chronological record being shared (and since most of it dealt with actual events-as related therein, and not the "predictions" of Revelations), it is still very much a historical record. |
Which version are you going with, Chief? There have been several.
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I tried to address that above by stating that rather than going with a particular version, I was using the term of the Holy Bible in general, with any disagreements in form to turn to whichever version Roman Catholicism most closely follows today. If I had to choose a version, I would probably go with King James, but I left it vague for the very reason that I thought naming a specific Bible version could lead to others selecting The International or The New Age or some other version, and that would only serve to muddy the waters. In the end, I guess that is left to lordscarlet's discretion as well. If he allows me to submit the Holy Bible as a pick but requires me to pick a version, I will go with the King James Bible. But if he does all this, I hope he will not allow other versions of the Bible to be selected. BTW, if he does forbid other similar selections, but allows the texts of other religions (like the Koran, which of course is wholely different from the Bible), I wonder how he will handle the Torah (sp?), the Jewish holy book? I am not Jewish, so I would not know, but my understanding is that it is essentially the Old Testament written in Hebrew, is it not? |
That's where one of the problems lies, Chief. The Torah/Old Testament was published as a single work before any version of the Bible containing both it and the New Testament was published. It is still followed separately in the Jewish tradition, and thus doesn't merely form a series of chapters in one single text. Another issue is that the chapters have specific, identifiable authors in many cases (or at least attributed ones). To say that God "inspired" these writers doesn't attribute authorship so much as inspiration. It's a thorny issue.
My sense is that we are and should be required to point to a specific text, rather than lumping all versions of a text into a generalized name embracing all of them. As such, using the King James Bible is a decent bet. Arguments for other versions of the Bible would also be compelling. I'm going to side with the argument for specificity, and so it would probably be a good idea to edit your pick to reflect the King James version. |
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Well, as to your first issue, is the Torah, word for word, the Old Testament? Or are there any key differences? I knew one is written in Hebrew. Given the different languages, the different religious perspectives from which they come from, and the fact that the Bible has wholely new material not present in the Torah, I feel at least that it can be considered a distinct and separate work. As for choosing a version, lordscarlet addresses this, mentioning later versions of a story (he specifically mentions anthologies, but I think this situation is analagous) not being separately available to different drafters. The fact is, there is only one original source material for this work, and it is as a whole known as The Holy Bible. Whichever version one chooses, it is merely an arbitrary version which chooses some parts of the original and rejects others, and which uses different word choices, as a result of both meaning, interpretation and translation issues. It would be like choosing the English verson of Crime & Punishment. Is it not likely that the translation from Russian to English has lost some of the beauty in Dostoyevsky's word choice, which was perfected through his being raised in Russia and using that language his whole life? You could argue that the English and Russian versions are similar, but not exact. Would it then be fair for someone to select the Russian version and then another the English version? IMO, that would be a distinct violation of the intent of lordscarlet's rule prohibiting repeat choices. The King James, the New Age, whatever--it was all parsed from the same original source material. I don't intend to claim a version of the Bible. I intend to claim the entire original work, from which all subsequent versions have been derived. And that was my original intent when I announced my choice (as I stated therein). And there is no limitation on number of authors for a work, so far as I can tell. As long as the work is distinct and disparate, a stand alone, it should be eligible regardless of the number of authors. The Old Testament is largely written as first hand historical accounts. So while authors can't always be specifically named, I think it rises above "anonymity". And, throwing aside historical issues of proving authorship, it is reasonably stated in all New Testament books (the ones widely accepted, that is) who the author is. And there are categories here where whole series are allowed to be selected. If this qualifies as a series, it could certainly be allowed under the precedent that series can be chosen in some cases. And it also qualifies as a single work (just written over a significant amount of time), as it has come to be contained in one bound book for centuries now (really, 1600 years as one book!) |
I told LS he should just eliminate the Bible.
I think for the exercise of this people are way overthinking it. I believe that Chief Rum handled this correctly and the spirit of this and other drafts would show that picking the Bible would eliminate the Bible and all of its incarnations from everyone else - whether it be the on epiece from a collection rule, the author rule, the version rule, etc. What challenge/fun is this if every single person can pick something from the Bible - which they could do if we go by NM's logic. As for what category it goes into, I think the general deal with these drafts has been that there are no "rules" for the category. If you pick a "bad" category it should hurt you in the voting, but nothing prevents you from putting anything in a category (i distinctly remember some nonsensical pick from bucc in the music draft). |
I think the authorship question is the thornier issue. Does this eliminate the Torah and the Koran as choices since they were also written by "God"?
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I think there is a "better" author to use, but I think that "god" is relatively logical. |
Hrm, I would have thought each book in the Bible should be its own selection, subject to authorship. Ie Exodus would eliminate Deuteronomy (both authored by Moses). I would have imagined that to be the fairest way to handle it.
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So then everyone gets to use the bible? Meh - totally kills the point imo. |
Dola:
Let me put it this way. If someone chose [made up names] Joe's Travellin Show from The Stories of Bob by Bob Smith then no other stories from The Stories of Bob can be selected. So, if someone did choose a specific book of the bible, it still eliminates the rest of the Bible. |
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I wasn't planning on using it at all. This is a literature draft. |
Shortest. Path to Clusterfuck. Ever.
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OK. There is a lot of stuff to reply to, so I will quote none of it. I hope I cover everyone's questions, but if I miss something let me know.
Several of the rules were created specifically for The Bible. Some people thought the rules were designed to rule out the Bible as a selection, some people asked me to disallow it. I really didn't want to make a Bible rule, so I tried to write the rules in such a way that I could address it when it came up (almost inevitably as the first pick). In reality this has played out exactly as I expected and planned for. So let me clear things up. If you would like to choose "God" as the author, that is your decision to make. If the "voters" disagree you'll get punished in the winner selection. However, someone did bring up a point that I did not think of. Does this eliminate the Quran, the Book of Mormon, etc? Let me come back to that. To me, a very non-religious person who has never read a page of the Bible, the work "The Bible" refers to all of the books covered by the Christian faith. They are, in a way, a series. I suppose I should have made a rule that says "only one book from a series can be used." I considered it, but could not think of a series that had many different authors. Let's make this an official ruling that any book froma series discounts that series. This should somewhat clear up the whole Bible issue. As for which edition to use,I believe Chief Rum got this right. The wording of the rules is meant to assume there is one true original edition of a work. Translations (such as the King James Bible) are just reprints of the original (maybe a Direcotr's Cut, if you will). Authorship and categorization are up to the person making the selection, so I'm fine with Chief Rum's choices. Having said that, we still have the issue of religious texts that are not followed by the Christian Faith but are meant as continuations of the Word of God. Honestly I'm not sure how to handle those. I'm tempted to cover those under the "one book in a series" rule that I just created. If that seems wholly unfair, please let me know. As Wade mentioned, my intention was that if someone chose "Exodus" the next person could not choose "Levidicus". I thought it possible that someone would choose one "story" from the Bible and that would close out the Bible for everyone. It's possible this argument will cover other books, but I don't want to think about it and mention them, because they may be on someone's list. I suppose in a way I have made a set of "Bible Rules" rather than discounting the bible altogether. However, I don't see how we can have a lively debate about the Bible as literature if I disallow it. :) |
Its my opinion that drafting The Bible is akin to drafting "20th century French poets." I think that pick is very weak.
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The most predictable as well. |
The problem with assuming an original Bible is that there's no consensus agreement on what the original Bible is. Different denominations have different books, even. Plus you throw in the whole argument about lost gospels, etc and that complicates the picture even further.
I also take issue with the idea that the Bible is divinely inspired, indicated by God as the author. That assumes monotheism as the "correct" faith. |
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19th century would be much stronger! |
oh and I'm not saying the pick should be disallowed... that's obviously LS's call to make and he's made it.
I'm just saying I have problems with its selection as such. |
I think st. cronin and Izulde are making arguments for why it may be a "bad" pick rather than a disallowed pick fwiw.
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I think you should just remember that when it comes time to pick a winner. As Wade said, I don't want 15 different selections from the greater works of the Bible selected. I also don't want to rule out religious texts if people would like to choose them. |
OK. I am headed out for a large portion of the day. I hope I settled the Bible argument to most people's satisfaction. I won't be checking the board too much, but I will have email access. Feel free to write me at fofc at idledreams dot net and I can hop onto the board if necessary.
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Pretty much. :) |
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Yes, thank you. :) I think its a poor pick, particularly for that category. |
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Fair enough :) |
cartman's list:
1. Fiction 2. Single Short Story 3. Poem 4. Fantasy/Science Fiction 5. Series (A set of books continuing the same story and intended to be read sequentially) - The Lord of The Rings Trilogy (Fellowship of the Ring, The Two Towers, The Return of the King), J.R.R. Tolkein 6. Sport Related 7. Children's 8. Non-Fiction 9. Biography/Autobiography 10. History |
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Guess you have never read the Book of Acts. |
Cartman with a very strong pick. IMO, there are really only three or four strong series choices, so it was an excellent pick to grab one in the first round.
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Cartman, I was told by lord scarlet that that pick would not count as a series, that its considered one book.
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dola - is it bad form to suggest what the other good series picks might be? I feel like that is a bit close to tampering...
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Rumor is you had a hand in writing that one. ;) |
st.cronin is correct. It was simply the publisher's choice to break it apart. Not knowing all of Tolkien, are his other related books considered part of a Middle Earth collection or series, or were they just individual books around a central theme?
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Yes. :) |
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How can that be? It's not one book. |
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