The Outhouse - The Greatest Comic Book Forum

by **Eli Katz** » Sat Apr 28, 2012 7:53 pm

Well, pretentious old Eli, disgusted by all you low-brow, pony-adoring, CGI-loving philistines, has decided to raise a question about high culture and to post a link to another learned article to counter all the bottom-rung discussion here.

The article asks the question: Who is the greater writer, Tolstoy or Dostoevsky? It's a tough, perhaps impossible, question to answer, but a fun one to think about. In trying to answer it, you have to consider not only which author you find more entertaining, but also which one lingers with you longer. It also comes down to what you prefer more in novels: technical excellence or wild passion. Anyway, so whom do you prefer: Tolstoy or Dostoevsky? Before answering, you may want to read the article below. Of course, it is rather long and requires more than 30 seconds of your attention:

http://www.themillions.com/2012/04/tolstoy-or-dostoevsky-8-experts-on-whos-greater.html

- Eli the Edifier

by **Victorian Squid** » Sat Apr 28, 2012 8:28 pm

There are both totally faves of mine but I don't even have to think long before I say Dostoevsky. It's the "sticks with you longer" part that sews it up. I read the works of Dostoevsky I found in a thrift store years ago, shortly after I crash landed in Chicago with $40 to my name and proceeded to hunker down through one of their record blizzards of a particularly nasty Winter. I often considered the benefits of a vinegar-soaked towel with which to wrap my fevered brow. But I feared the repercussions to my social life.

by **Cat-Scratch** » Sat Apr 28, 2012 8:39 pm

Chris Claremont

/Jude'd

Brian Bendis

/Twigg'd

by **Cat-Scratch** » Sat Apr 28, 2012 8:41 pm

J.K Rowling

/Pottertard'd

Stephenie Meyer

/Teenagedgirl'd

by **Victorian Squid** » Sat Apr 28, 2012 8:49 pm

Mawds, please threadkick Smerdyakov.

by **Cat-Scratch** » Sat Apr 28, 2012 8:53 pm

Victorian Squid wrote:Mawds, please threadkick Smerdyakov.

by **bkthomson** » Sat Apr 28, 2012 8:56 pm

Twilight Sparkle!

by **Stephen Day** » Sat Apr 28, 2012 10:00 pm

Tolstoy.

Of the two War and Peace is by far the best work either ever did and that right there decides the question for me.

by **mrorangesoda** » Sat Apr 28, 2012 10:48 pm

Never read any Tolstoy. So Dostoevsky by default.

by **Eli Katz** » Sat Apr 28, 2012 11:06 pm

I say Dostoevsky, primarily because Crime and Punishment is the only novel by either author that I can imagine reading more than once.

That said, if I did read Crime and Punishment again, I would not bother with the crappy, super-Christian, salvation epilogue.

by **Royal Nonesuch** » Sun Apr 29, 2012 12:20 am

Eli Katz wrote:I say Dostoevsky, primarily because Crime and Punishment is the only novel by either author that I can imagine reading more than once.

That said, if I did read Crime and Punishment again, I would not bother with the crappy, super-Christian, salvation epilogue.

The Brothers Karamazov is the perfect antidote to that.

And I'm saying Dostoevsky.

by **Keb** » Sun Apr 29, 2012 2:42 am

I hate them both and think they both needed editors to tell them when to stop with the words.

For some reason my brother has War and Peace and the Brothers Karamazov and I tried reading both and was bored after fifty or so pages.

by **Eli Katz** » Sun Apr 29, 2012 3:20 am

Crime and Punishment is really good, Keb, and not nearly as gigantic as those other two doorstops.

by **S.F. Jude Terror** » Sun Apr 29, 2012 3:22 am

I voted Dostoevski.

by **Keb** » Sun Apr 29, 2012 1:41 pm

Eli Katz wrote:Crime and Punishment is really good, Keb, and not nearly as gigantic as those other two doorstops.

Never read a Russian writer I liked. I also read Notes from Underground and hated it so much I threw the book under my bed and it stayed there for a year.

Same with Joseph Conrad. Guy needs to put the pen down and go make some balloon animals. Fuckin clown.

Don't get me started on Lolita...