>Why always ask "Aristook War" - which I've
never >heard of outside of quiz bowl, but >never
"Cortina's War," which we almost put on >the exam in the
American history survey I'm >currently TA-ing? Why
Tanizaki Junichiro but >never Endo Shusaku? Why Naguib
Mahfouz but never >Nawal el-Sadaawi or al-Mutannabi?
(admittedly >there's a Nobel Prize there) The list goes
on...
Actually, I've written Endo as part of a bonus part. When
did you see Tanizaki show up? A great author who
should pop up but I've yet to see him do so.
Interestingly, the latest issue of GQ includes a very brief
interview with him. I do think that when you get to
non-western writers, the canon appears to primarily center
around the Nobel prize (and even to some extent within
the western canon). Why Tagore and not Chatterjee?
Why a buffoon like Dario Fo and not the most
influential of Italian poets next to Dante,
Leopardi?
Nathan Freeburg