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Thursday, March 01, 2007

Cosmo's New Quiz?

I was talking to someone the other day about Victorian novels and he asked: "So, are you a Charlotte or an Emily?"

It turns out that I am a Charlotte and he is an Emily. Can we still be friends?

It's funny how often one hears some version of this question. The categories are presented as mutually exclusive and the implications are, of course, much broader than which Bronte sister one prefers--the question seems to be interrogating, albeit jokingly, some deep personal truth: what kind of person are you?

Mac or PC? The answer to this seemingly neutral question about an appliance gets mapped on to a whole host of intellectual and personal qualities.

I hear this question a lot with Homer: are you an Iliad or an Odyssey? People can get pretty vocal in their advocacy, and the scope goes beyond aesthetics to politics and ethics.

At any rate, I've been trying to come up with a list of such questions--mine lean toward the literary, because that's my context--I'm curious to hear others. Got any?

Here's my list thus far of seemingly simple matters of taste which seem to be implicated in larger issues of personality or worldview:

Iliad or Odyssey

Spenser or Milton

Beatles or Rolling Stones

Charlotte or Emily

Plato or Aristotle

Pound or Eliot

Marvel or D.C.

Mac or PC

Yankees or Mets

Faulkner or Hemingway


Others?

6 Comments:

  • With cream or black?

    I have heard that alcoholics who take their coffee with cream and sugar are often drug addicts besides, and alcoholics who take it black are just straight alcoholics.

    Me? Cream and sugar.

    I don't know how this measurement works for nonalcoholics, but I'd be interested to know...

    And I am so Charlotte, although my admiration for Emily is deep and abiding, old Jane Eyre and me...we're tight.

    By Anonymous Anonymous, at 6:37 AM  

  • oooohh--good one.

    I'd never heard that before. I'm black no sugar; what does that mean?

    In part, I think it means I'm addicted to coffee.

    By Anonymous Anonymous, at 8:51 AM  

  • I can't drink Coffee unless it has cream, preferably a flavored mocha caramel concoction that itself contains more sugar than an actual soda.

    I've got some, but they tend to run the gambit, and I want to answer yours first, Feems, though it might destroy the little man-crush thing we had going there over your last post...

    Definately an Odyssey guy

    Haven't read Spencer

    I haven't read what Charlotte or Emily are referring to (Cringes as the skies darken, the winds howl, and the heavens prepare to strike...)

    I guess I'm a Beattles guy though I think the question makes a few assumptions that I can't really answer to. I've heard beatles music, and can play 'Blackbird' on the guitar, if that counts.

    I'm against the guy who taught Alexander the Great. Yeah.

    Pound OR Elliot? Hmph. Thats a face or nuts punch question, aint it? I guess Elliot. Cause them bitches still be talking 'bout Michelangelo.

    PC, only because Mac's are too expensive, can't run most games without emulation, and are difficult to upgrade by yourself. But I'd LOVE to have a Mac, just to pretend I'm hip and stuff. Uh...I mean Hipster! (People don't say 'I'm Hip!' anymore do they? I mean aside my older relatives?)

    Yankees or Mets? Double Face/Nut punch there...

    Here are some of mine...

    Fate/Destiny or Free will?

    Vanilla or Chocolate?

    PC Shooter or Console Shooter?

    Bumps or Humps (Probably for Males and non-traditional females)

    D&D Nerd or....not. (all of my friends are defined by this single catagory right now, believe it or not, and my wife Still lets us congregate on sunday, erecting our shrines to Geekasaurus, the God of the Rolling 20, may she be blessed forever...)

    Everything's Fine, L2Play or The world shall end in fire and doom?

    I can think of some others, but those are mine. Think of me what you will... =0)

    Benticore
    Out

    By Blogger Benticore, at 12:49 PM  

  • Here are a few:

    Bud or Guinness

    bottle or draft

    Miles Davis or Benny Goodman
    (and, no, Kenny G is not an option)

    email or letter

    CD or vinyl

    fire or ice
    (to quote Frost)

    driving with the windows up or down

    glasses or contacts

    Jefferson or Hamilton

    I'm sure there are others but that's what I've got for now.

    By Blogger RogueHistorian, at 3:13 PM  

  • Feem: It means that if you were an alcoholic, that's ALL you'd be...no cross addictions for you, pal! p.s. I know your type.

    Bent: Junkie! And I used to be vanilla, but since lately I'm chocolate. It's hormonal. You see how involved this can be?

    Roguey: Windows up or down, that's pretty good. Kind of like: Rain or Shine. There again, USED to be rain, now I'm shine. It's my age.

    And you CAN'T be either Rolling Stones or Beatles, sorry...not with Beggar's Banquet and Magical Mystery Tour both out there. No can be one or the other, Feemus.

    How about this one: Country Western, or not if your life depended on it.

    By Anonymous Anonymous, at 6:28 PM  

  • wow--those are great. This is fun!

    Although, Claudia, I think one could opt out altogether and go with The Clash: "No Elvis, Beatles, or the Rolling Stones!"

    I have another to add that is specific, I suppose, to academia: formalist vs. historicist. This one can get really ugly, with charges of political naivete and dangerously unexamined bourgeois values on one side and charges of smug joyless reductiveness on the other.

    PC Shooter? I have often wanted to shoot my PC, but I have a feeling that's not what that means. L2Play is just entirely beyond my ken.

    Jefferson or Hamilton? It's all about the Benjamin's, Rogue!!

    By Blogger Feemus, at 8:22 AM  

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