In response to this piece in the NYT about the Web really being a list of lists (which i guess is cattily implying that the level of discourse is lowered by this nature,) i’d like to mention the 1711 Sales Auction Catalogue of the Library of Sir Thomas Browne again. Commentary about lists long precedes the internet. Let Boxer play games with labelling the blog as a ‘shopping list.’ The list almost certainly preexisted the review, considering the inventories than turn up throughout literature, probably even in cuneiform, since that’s what cuneiform was originally used for. So go moan about the demise of the review. Wah wah wah….
Not to mention that it was a great form of entertainment. Cf. Rabelais.
ach! since i put up that “abstractor of quintessence” tagline awhile back, i intended to read Rabelais again. Instead i ordered both volumes of the Haddawy translation of the Arabian Nights, but after three weeks, they still have not arrived.
Betcha if i ordered the Rabelais, it’d be here by now.