1 Why are you computing (# Elizabethan writers) / (# writers ever), specifically? I mean, why is the numerator that rather than the number of authors whose name begins with S, or the number of writers called William Shakespeare who wrote at least one play about kings and witches, or any of a zillion other sets of writers?
Because of your hypothesis #2, I suppose. But why that hypothesis rather than the hypothesis that there’s something about having a name beginning with S that makes an author specially likely to be favoured, etc.?
2 It seems odd (this is a polite way of saying “downright wrong”) to be comparing an estimate of the number of “serious writers” in Elizabethan times (estimated on the basis of what works have survived from then to the present day) with an estimate of the number of people who have submitted at least one novel to at least one publisher today. Compare serious writers with serious writers, or wannabes with wannabes.
3 I think you’re wrong about what conclusions to draw from the near-unanimous admiration of Shakespeare. Yes, unanimity makes it likely that there are mechanisms at work other than objective evaluation of artistic merit. (Assuming there to be any such thing.) But it doesn’t give much reason (or any) to think that artistic merit isn’t an important part of the assessment.
4 It seems that this sort of issue is a big deal to you. I suggest that you might be happier if you just stopped worrying about how your cultural preferences differ from those you see as mainstream, and got on with enjoying whatever you enjoy.
[EDITED to avoid misformatting caused by LW’s numbered-list magic.]
I suggest that you might be happier if you just stopped worrying about how your cultural preferences differ from those you see as mainstream, and got on with enjoying whatever you enjoy.
Or, alternatively, bite the bullet and actually update on “mainstream” opinion. This entails becoming curious about why mainstream opinion is what it is, rather than skeptical that its judgements are correct (on the basis of your immediate experience).
This entails becoming curious about why mainstream opinion is what it is, rather than skeptical that its judgements are correct (on the basis of your immediate experience).
Well, he’s done that. It’s not clear to me that the OP was written from a place of skepticism rather than a place of curiosity.
I think he should be both. What he shouldn’t be is dismissive.
(He should also consider the possibility that aesthetic judgements simply aren’t matters of objective fact, at least not wholly, but for present purposes I think that’s effectively a linguistic quibble.)
A few not particularly connected thoughts.
1 Why are you computing (# Elizabethan writers) / (# writers ever), specifically? I mean, why is the numerator that rather than the number of authors whose name begins with S, or the number of writers called William Shakespeare who wrote at least one play about kings and witches, or any of a zillion other sets of writers?
Because of your hypothesis #2, I suppose. But why that hypothesis rather than the hypothesis that there’s something about having a name beginning with S that makes an author specially likely to be favoured, etc.?
2 It seems odd (this is a polite way of saying “downright wrong”) to be comparing an estimate of the number of “serious writers” in Elizabethan times (estimated on the basis of what works have survived from then to the present day) with an estimate of the number of people who have submitted at least one novel to at least one publisher today. Compare serious writers with serious writers, or wannabes with wannabes.
3 I think you’re wrong about what conclusions to draw from the near-unanimous admiration of Shakespeare. Yes, unanimity makes it likely that there are mechanisms at work other than objective evaluation of artistic merit. (Assuming there to be any such thing.) But it doesn’t give much reason (or any) to think that artistic merit isn’t an important part of the assessment.
4 It seems that this sort of issue is a big deal to you. I suggest that you might be happier if you just stopped worrying about how your cultural preferences differ from those you see as mainstream, and got on with enjoying whatever you enjoy.
[EDITED to avoid misformatting caused by LW’s numbered-list magic.]
Or, alternatively, bite the bullet and actually update on “mainstream” opinion. This entails becoming curious about why mainstream opinion is what it is, rather than skeptical that its judgements are correct (on the basis of your immediate experience).
Well, he’s done that. It’s not clear to me that the OP was written from a place of skepticism rather than a place of curiosity.
I think he should be both. What he shouldn’t be is dismissive.
(He should also consider the possibility that aesthetic judgements simply aren’t matters of objective fact, at least not wholly, but for present purposes I think that’s effectively a linguistic quibble.)