cultural fantasy boxing league
01 Jun 2010Books are, let’s face it, better than everything else. If we played cultural Fantasy Boxing League, and made books go fifteen rounds in the ring against the best that any other art form had to offer, then books would win pretty much every time. Go on try it. The Magic Flute versus Middlemarch? Middlemarch in six. The Last Supper versus Crime and Punishment? Fyodor on points. See? I mean, I don’t know how scientific this is, but it feels like the novels are walking it. You might get the occasional exception – Blonde on Blonde might mash up The Old Curiosity Shop, say, and I wouldn’t give much for Pale Fire’s chances against Citizen Kane. And every now and then you’d get a shock, because that happens in sport, so Back to the Future 3 might land a lucky punch on Rabbit, Run; but I’m still backing literature twenty-nine times out of thirty.
- Nick Hornby, The Polysyllabic Spree








