Chess, you say? Well, two can play at that game

[steepholm]

When blogging in Another Place recently I mentioned the blurb writers’ habit of characterizing books in terms of other books. It quickly became apparent that this could be turned into a parlour game.

For example, which book might be described as “Charlotte’s Web meets The Lord of the Flies”?

Animal Farm


Or “Death of a Salesman meets Charlie and the Chocolate Factory”?

The Chocolate War


I think we can all agree that this is the funnest thing since Tetris, but it’s not the kind of game one can play on one’s own. So, partly in honour of the return of I’m Sorry I haven’t a Clue, partly for the sheer anarchic hell of it, but mostly as yet another displacement activity, who wants to play Guess the Literary Progeny?

All contributions welcome.

Comments

[beccadelarosa.livejournal.com]

Can I be first to play? I got much, much too excited about this. And you'll just have to guess, because I don't know how to do that fancy cut thing you did. (PS: in honour of you, Charlie, they're all classic kids' lit.)

1. Kafka's The Trial meets Lady Windermere's Fan.

2. Goldilocks and the Three Bears meets Thus Spake Zarathustra. (Well, some of it...)

3. The Histories of Herodotus meets Where the Wild Things Are.

For what it's worth, I got Animal Farm, but completely missed The Chocolate War. Never having read it doesn't help.

[steepholm.livejournal.com]

Hmm. Nothing springs immediately to mind, but I'll put on my thinking cap - these are most intriguing, especially the Herodotus/Sendak (which is the only one where I happen to have read both books). Meanwhile, maybe others will have better luck...

[steepholm.livejournal.com]

Ooh, I wonder if number 1 might be Fire and Hemlock, in some roundabout way?

[beccadelarosa.livejournal.com]

Not the book I had in mind, but it totally could be, couldn't it? I'll tell you if you want!

[steepholm.livejournal.com]

Not yet, not yet - still thinking...

[beccadelarosa.livejournal.com]

I'll give you a hint about number uno. Lady Windermere's Fan may be a bit misleading if you think about it just in terms of the adultry. Helpful? Why, yes.

[steepholm.livejournal.com]

Then might it be sartorias's own Court Duel, perchance?

[beccadelarosa.livejournal.com]

Nope! (This is the best game ever.)

[steepholm.livejournal.com]

Okay, you win, De La Rosa! Give me number one, so that I can see the devious way your mind works, then I may yet have a shot at numbers 2 and 3.

[beccadelarosa.livejournal.com]

Alice's Adventures in Wonderland! Hurrah!

I hope you know that I'm going to have to force my friends to play this a lot, and they'll all blame you.

[steepholm.livejournal.com]

Luckily they'll have to cross the sea to find me.

Wow - The Trial I can totally see, but I haven't read LWF, and the Wikipedia plot summary has me scratching my head...

Am wondering whether Number 3 might be The Hobbit?

[beccadelarosa.livejournal.com]

Yes it is! Excellent!

I was thinking mostly along the lines of the Wilde play being a very Victorian comedy of manners - probably misleading, as I said. Gosh darn it. That's completely my fault and nothing to do with you.

[steepholm.livejournal.com]

Okay, a bow at a venture. How about The Wizard of Oz for number 2?

[beccadelarosa.livejournal.com]

No, but I'm confident you'll get this one.

[steepholm.livejournal.com]

The only other possibility that occurred to me was His Dark Materials, because it does have the death of God, after all. Tell me that's wrong, and I'll dismiss it from my thoughts, to think anew!

[beccadelarosa.livejournal.com]

Think theory of the Übermensch and think anew!

[steepholm.livejournal.com]

Ubermensch, eh? How about A Wrinkle in Time? Not sure about Goldilocks, but worth a shot!

[beccadelarosa.livejournal.com]

Nope!

[steepholm.livejournal.com]

"The übermensch, Nietzsche's bodhisattva, transcends this world by affirming it, escaping the herd mentality and rising above mere existence."

Well, if this doesn't describe Winnie the Pooh I'm giving up. Only one bear, admittedly, but Piglet and Tigger might count at a pinch, and Christopher Robin makes a delightful Goldilocks.

[beccadelarosa.livejournal.com]

YES! I knew you'd get that one. Yay! Wasn't that exciting? Slash enfuriating?

[calimac.livejournal.com]

Are we talking about actual blurbs that appeared on actual books?

My all-time favorite of these is:

"In the tradition of The Lord of the Rings, Siddhartha, and Watership Down."

[steepholm.livejournal.com]

My goodness, what would that be? Surely not The Animals of Farthing Wood!?

But no, real blurbs are very welcome but made-up ones are equally so.

[calimac.livejournal.com]

It's this. Notice blurb replicated in the product description.

I can't make these up. I am unable to warp my brain into the kind of shallowness that would think of Charlotte Web in connection with Animal Farm just because they both take place on farms with sapient animals.

In fact my entire life has been devoted to avoiding the, "Oh, if you like The Lord of the Rings you'll love [insert name of tedious, sloppy trilogy with endless mighty-thewed heroes bopping each other over the head here]" type of thinking. I'm too bitter about this even to make a game of it.

[steepholm.livejournal.com]

I notice the one thing it didn't remind them of was Parsifal... (Sorry, my brain warps into shallowness all too easily.)

[sartorias.livejournal.com]

My brain doesn't work that way, but these are funny!

[rymenhild.livejournal.com]

From a professional review of a relatively recent book:

[I]t's like Jane Austen playing Dungeons & Dragons with Eragon's Christopher Paolini.

[sovay]

[I]t's like Jane Austen playing Dungeons & Dragons with Eragon's Christopher Paolini.

Augh!

[rymenhild.livejournal.com]

I know, isn't that awful?

I wonder who the DM would be.

[steepholm.livejournal.com]

Er, Temeraire, maybe?

[rymenhild.livejournal.com]

That's right! Courtesy of Time Magazine.

[steepholm.livejournal.com]

God forgive me - and, optionally, them.

[ex-writingh.livejournal.com]

So, I thought of the question "What book could be described as 'Watership Down' meets 'Lord of the Rings'?", but I suddenly felt sure I didn't make up that comparison myself. So I googled [mystery title] along with "watership down meets" in quotation marks, and got:

[Mystery title] is Watership Down meets Ivanhoe!
[Mystery title] is Watership Down meets Rambo!
[Mystery title] is Watership Down meets Harry Potter!
[Mystery title] is Watership Down meets Conan the Barbarian!
[Mystery title] is Watership Down meets The Hobbit!
[Mystery title] is Watership Down meets Samwise Gamgee!
[Mystery title] is Watership Down meets Mighty Mouse!
[Mystery title] is Watership Down meets Chronicles of Narnia!
[Mystery title] is Watership Down meets The Voyage of the Dawn Treader!
[Mystery title] is Watership Down meets Tolkien!
[Mystery title] is Watership Down meets Tailchaser's Song!
[Mystery title] is Watership Down meets Godzilla!

I'm quite, quite sure you'll have no trouble guessing the "mystery title" after all that.

[steepholm.livejournal.com]

Redwall - and its many many sequels...?

[ex-writingh.livejournal.com]

Of course. Heh.