SI Andy Staples: Ranked Teams as American Literary Classics
http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/2011/writers/andy_staples/09/27/top-25…
Their Eyes Were Watching God by Zora Neale Hurston: Much of the action in Hurston's novel takes place in The Muck. The area, near Florida's Lake Okeechobee, also produced Wolverines tailback Vincent Smith, who is averaging 8.5 yards per carry this season. The Wolverines also resemble main character Janie Crawford, who returns to Eatonville, Fla., as a mysterious figure and the subject of gossip by her fellow townsfolk. The rest of the Big Ten is wondering about Michigan, which once again has started hot. The Wolverines' dominant win against San Diego State suggests Michigan has improved under Brady Hoke, but Rich Rodriguez's team started off 5-0 last year and lost six of its next eight.
Last game: Beat San Diego State, 28-7
The Muck starring Vincent Smith, Jeremy Gallon, and Brandin Hawthrone
September 27th, 2011 at 3:18 PM ^
Hated that book. Bad omen.
September 27th, 2011 at 3:18 PM ^
September 27th, 2011 at 3:19 PM ^
THat is the closest anyone on the LSU football team as come to reading Slaughterhouse-Five
September 27th, 2011 at 7:59 PM ^
and it would still be correct.
September 27th, 2011 at 3:19 PM ^
If there anything I'm learning from Staples' column, it is that he is trying to prove that he is the most well-read sports journalist.
I will also admit I've never heard of that book.
September 27th, 2011 at 3:23 PM ^
I read it senior year of high school and I do think of it whenever they mention Pahokee...
but yeah it sucked.
September 27th, 2011 at 3:56 PM ^
Ditto
September 27th, 2011 at 3:35 PM ^
Because this is MGoBlog and we're all MGoNerds, pop quiz - how many of those books have you actually read? Bonus - do you have a favorite among them?
I've read Slaughterhouse-Five (LSU), To Kill a Mockingbird (Bama), Grapes of Wrath (Oklahoma), A Prayer for Owen Meany (Boise St), The Catcher in the Rye (USC-NTUSC), Moby Dick (VT), The Invisible Man (TAMU), Huck Finn (Nebraska), Tom Sawyer (Clemson), The Great Gatsby (Florida), The Sun Also Rises (Arkansas), Last of the Mohicans (Baylor), Catch-22 (WVU), As I Lay Dying (ISU).
Woo, more than half! Although, admittedly, most were in high school, so it's been a while. Most recent read was A Prayer for Owen Meany, which is also my favorite of the bunch. I've never even heard of Their Eyes Were Watching God.
Also, does reading the SCar description make anyone else really wish we had signed Sammy Watkins?
September 27th, 2011 at 3:44 PM ^
Really like a lot of them (Mockingbird, Gatsby, Portnoy's Complaint, etc.) but I think Junot Diaz is really fucking talented.
I can't stand Jonathan Franzen and don't know why Oprah decided to make him popular.
September 27th, 2011 at 4:13 PM ^
ditto, the corrections sucked
September 27th, 2011 at 4:24 PM ^
It is as if he said, "Here are the three most obnoxious, self-absorbed, personality-less douches I can think of, let's write a book where they bitch and moan about their non-problems for 500 pages."
September 27th, 2011 at 5:37 PM ^
The only two I had not read were "A Man In Full" and "Semi-Tough" (although my wife has them in the office).
September 27th, 2011 at 4:04 PM ^
although theres a couple more on there I was supposed to read but went the lazy route, paid attention in class and bs'd my way through the paper
To Kill a Mockingbird is definitely my favorite read from anything assigned to me in academia that appears on this list. Also, I am astonished the author didnt find a way to work Lord of the Flies in there somehow
September 27th, 2011 at 4:18 PM ^
12/25. But I will admit that I haven't even heard of the book that Staples listed Michigan as.
Moby Dick is in my top 5 and Great Gatsby in my top 10.
All time favorite book is The Road by Cormac McCarthy.
September 27th, 2011 at 4:52 PM ^
I'm older so I pick up a couple books out of school (Bright lights .. & The Man in Full), and I read Their Eyes Were Watching God in a seminar class at U of M.
Edit: Top 5:
1. Catch-22
2. Huck Finn
3. The Invisible Man
4. The Grapes of Wrath
5. The Sun Also Rises
6. The Great Gatsby (Had to keep going until I got Gatsby in)
September 27th, 2011 at 5:39 PM ^
is in my top 10 all-time, maybe top 5. Anyone I know who has read it says the same thing. A must-read.
September 27th, 2011 at 7:40 PM ^
Agree. By far the best of Irving's books.
September 27th, 2011 at 11:24 PM ^
Owen Meany was my intro to John Irving and, frankly, his other works I read (Garp, Son of a Circus, 158 pound marriage) fell short.
September 28th, 2011 at 8:55 AM ^
Cider House Rules is pretty good.
September 27th, 2011 at 6:02 PM ^
Grapes has to be the favorite.
Does anyone think that Staples actually read all the books himself or was there input from SI staff? Quite an impressive list to read all of them.
September 27th, 2011 at 6:58 PM ^
My list:
Corrections
Man in full
Grapes of Wrath
Huck Finn
Gatsby
Moby Dick
To kill a Mockingbird
September 27th, 2011 at 8:45 PM ^
My favorite that he lists is The Sun Also Rises.
No Infinite Jest for Michigan? Has he not read this blog?
September 27th, 2011 at 3:36 PM ^
That's actually a pretty decent comparison the more I think about it.. though the comparison where Janie (Michigan) gets off for murdering (axing) Tea Cake (Rich Rod) via an all-white (Bo/Carr/Moeller camp?) jury is a tad uncomfortable.
September 27th, 2011 at 3:44 PM ^
The most recent book on that list deserves to be ranked with Faulkner, Hemingway, et. al - if you haven't already, go out and read The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao by Junot Diaz. Funny, honest, poignant. Wonderful book.
September 27th, 2011 at 4:16 PM ^
Never heard of it, but will have to check it out after I'm done with Tigana by Guy Gavriel Kay.
September 27th, 2011 at 8:05 PM ^
once I'm finished with Being Kendra, by Kendra Wilkinson
it's the riveting story of a whore
September 27th, 2011 at 10:14 PM ^
I'm a big fan of Kay's "Fionovar Tapestry."
September 27th, 2011 at 4:28 PM ^
I think I need to start reading.
September 27th, 2011 at 4:31 PM ^
I teach high school English (we're actually in class now...shhh...don't tell), so I've read a lot of this list, and I have taught Eyes. It's not my favorite to be sure (that'd be Grapes of Wrath...don't even get me started on how absolutely perfect that book is...which is why I was crushed that Staples gives it to OU on the most ridiculously obvious/surface level comparison)...ours is kinda a superficial comparison as well...what might have been better is to discuss how for years Eyes was ignored (our loss of our past stature) , and only when a devotee of the book, Alice Walker, (Brady Hoke) traveled back to literally the author's grave (return to past tradition) , did the book takes it's "rightful" place in the canon (our return to prominence)
September 27th, 2011 at 7:39 PM ^
And you haven't read Semi-Tough? Heresy!
It's probably a dated read now, but it's a quick and hilarious one. My mom (crazy, I know, but the woman taught me to hate the Crimson Tide and how can that ever be wrong?) was a huge football fan and a voracious reader and I worked my way through the works of Dan Jenkins in the 80s.
Beats the hell out of Melville and Franzen, that's for sure.
September 27th, 2011 at 7:59 PM ^
This list actually makes me regret that Michigan State dropped out of the rankings, as their book would have easily been the most apropos.
September 27th, 2011 at 10:12 PM ^
Sorry if someone already beat me to it, but I bet this equating of football teams with literary classics is none too popular amongst tSIO faithful. I envision them as the under-evolved, early pubescent bully on the school grounds who made fun of kids who got good grades. And, to borrow from A Christmas Story, the toadie(s) associated with said bully.
September 27th, 2011 at 11:20 PM ^
amazing novel.
and so it goes...
September 28th, 2011 at 9:45 AM ^
Man, I need to read more. I did the movies for some of the books I didn't read. Does that count?