March 26, 2004

It's Bunk

by Nick Morgan

Let it be declared that the Book Quiz is bunk. Such questions as "Odds or Evens?" landed me in the rather depressing diagnosis below. I know, bunkness is relative, and all Internet quizes are bunk to some degree or another. But I use "bunk" here to describe the special stripe of bunkness that really brings out the wrath of an otherwise tame blogger. Disclosure: this is all little more than my jealousy of PinkDreamPoppies, who gets to be my favorite novel, The Sound and the Fury, while I found Mrs. Dalloway to be just as opaque, but hardly as wonderful as To the Lighthouse, also by Virginia Woolf.


You're Mrs. Dalloway!
by Virginia Woolf
Your life seems utterly bland and normal to the casual observer, but inside you are churning with a million tensions and worries. The company you surround yourself with may be shallow, but their effects upon your reality are tremendously deep. To stay above water, you must try to act like nothing's wrong, but you know that the truth is catching up with you. You're not crazy, you're just a little unwell. But no doctor can help you now.
Take the Book Quiz at the Blue Pyramid.

March 26, 2004 03:47 PM | TrackBack
Comments

I got Catcher in the Rye, which is a book I've never had an affinity for. I'm not sure whether this supports your aversion to the quiz or not - perhaps my distaste for Salinger's piece stems from some unknown similarity.

After all, the quiz would be useless if it only told you what you already knew. Dig deeper, and discover why Mrs. Dalloway really is you. Perhaps you are more popular than you think - Mrs. D is much higher on the Amazon sales list than TTL.

Posted by: Craig at March 26, 2004 03:55 PM

There's always the trouble of the hard-to-choose-between-two-equally-bad-answers question: when I went one way on a question on this quiz, I was Lolita; when I went another way, I was A Theory of Justice. I enjoyed the former more, but I would like to think of myself as the latter.

Posted by: PG at March 26, 2004 04:01 PM

Just tell us you’re not going to wade into a river with a pocket full of rocks…

Posted by: Fool at March 26, 2004 04:57 PM

Bunkness is relative, but I'll have to say that this quiz didn't quite match me with the perfect book. Or rather, not with my favorite book.

I enjoyed The Sound and the Fury a lot but have to admit to having been disappointed by the ending (and somewhat disappointed by the vaunted density of the novel; I was surprised to realize that I'd "gotten it" with my first read). It's first two sections were glorious and engrossing (they are, by far, superior to the third and fourth parts) but the end left me wanting another hundred pages to resolve a few more of the dangling plot threads.

Posted by: PinkDreamPoppies at March 26, 2004 06:42 PM

I just wanted to say that 'To the Lighthouse' was the worst book i ever read, I always wanted to know why people consider it to be a 'wonderful' book as you said. I read it just because I wanted to read something for Virginia Woolf, and it said that To the Lighthouse was supposed to be her best book. Frankly, I wonder how her worst book must be.

Posted by: Iysam @1 at March 27, 2004 06:58 AM

Knowing the author of the Book Quiz (and the equally stupid Country Quiz), I think your assessment is correct: It's bunk. And he's bunk.

Posted by: rex at March 27, 2004 11:08 AM

To the Lighthouse is far better than Mrs. Dalloway, so if you hated it then you probably just hate Woolf. Read more Faulkner, especially Absalom, Absalom!

I got Stranger in a Strange Land, btw.

Posted by: Matto Ichiban at March 27, 2004 09:19 PM
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