To be fair, I have a couple of (English) friends who studied French and French literature at university, and they both hold that they have the stronger literature, at least pre-20th century. Us (English speakers) do not tend to read so much of it, I suspect, which leads us to believe we have the stronger tradition. My knowledge of French literature is pretty abysmal, but the lists above seem short (beatnik muppet that I was, I'd add Rimbaud and other symbolists).

sunlore, are you serious about Shakespeare not existing? You're going to ruin our tourist industry.

The UK has done pretty well for such a weird island. Add in our nearby colonial victims (hullo again Mr Joyce, Mr Beckett, Mr Yeats, and back), we'd edge it.

It's interesting how the benchmark for answering this 'question' seems to be writers. Why not florists? Blacksmiths? Fishmongers? It's all a bit recent, this writing lark y'know. What about who's got the best King? Who's burnt the most heretics? Who had the best civil war? Who shat on their neighbours from the greatest height? Who's got the most pregnant teenagers and skinheads?

sparky wrote:sunlore, are you serious about Shakespeare not existing? You're going to ruin our tourist industry.

Just half-serious.

C2, I think we're just chopping away at NB's insane assertion that the English literary tradition is greater than the English one.

That's it.

sunlore wrote: the English literary tradition is greater than the English one.

That's certainly an assertion worth chopping.

France, I've never lived in the UK so I have no idea what it is like... I live in London.

Chapter Two wrote:

sunlore wrote: the English literary tradition is greater than the English one.

That's certainly an assertion worth chopping.

Tata!

sunlore wrote:Plus the fact that Shakespeare didn't even exist.

i voted france for reasons already discussed but this struck me as odd.
i'm imagining that there is some conspiracy theory out there that says that shakespeare was a mythical conglamorate of several writers. even if this is the case (i doubt it) wouldn't the works of shakespeare still be english anyhow regardless of whether they were penned by the bard or not?

Chapter Two wrote:Joyce was Irish.

Yes, I know. I broadened my definition to include the entire United Kingdom.

I included James and T.S. Eliot because, though they were both born in America, they legally became English subjects.

I included the Irishmen Swift, Joyce and Sterne, because I think it's fair to include the Irish in an account of English literature. Plenty of people do it.

Sterne is not "obscure at best". He's one of the greatest novelists ever! Tristram Shandy was a work of genius.

The English national genius is for wordsmithery. Their best writers have huge vocabularies and write long, complex sentences. The French have a handful of geniuses and a whole host of mediocre writers (Camus and Sartre among the latter).

I'm not bashing the French literary tradition. They win the Silver Medal. But they absolutely cannot compare with the English writers.

By the way, I could go on and on with more names: Milton, Bacon, Ruskin, Pater, Chaucer, Wordsworth, Hazlitt, Coleridge, Thackeray, Spenser, Marlowe, etc., etc. etc.

tommydski wrote:

sunlore wrote:Plus the fact that Shakespeare didn't even exist.

i voted france for reasons already discussed but this struck me as odd.
i'm imagining that there is some conspiracy theory out there that says that shakespeare was a mythical conglamorate of several writers. even if this is the case (i doubt it) wouldn't the works of shakespeare still be english anyhow regardless of whether they were penned by the bard or not?

There is an insane theory floating about that a member of the nobility named Edward De Vere wrote Shakespeare's plays. This is utter nonsense given the fact that De Vere died many years before Shakespeare completed his writing career.

There's also a harebrained notion that Francis Bacon wrote the plays. Anyone who reads Bacon's essays can see that they really are nothing like Shakespeare's writing.

tommydski wrote:wouldn't the works of shakespeare still be english anyhow regardless of whether they were penned by the bard or not?

10 points!

Now, a few questions…

How come no one’s mentioned (off the top of my head) Mary Shelly (‘Shelly’ usually refers to her husband), Milton, Douglas Adams, H.G. Welles, Iain Banks, Arthur C. Clarke or Geoffrey Chaucer, one of the greatest writers in history?

If Byron isn’t British because he emigrated then can we consider Stanley Kubric as a brit (ok, not a writer but lets not limit the debate to literature here)?

And why is it that any stupid nationalist debate between BRITAIN and who/whatever dissolves into the relative merits of ENGLAND and the selected opposition?