And then Self-Indulgence Before Bed
Phil: "Yeah, that guy's from Texas, isn't he?"
Sober girl: "Yeah. I wish I was from Texas. It seems like everyone here is from Texas, even though it's the Center for Michigan Universities."
Drunken Eric: "Well, you know, that's because, like John Steinbeck said, Texans, well, they sort of have a sense of, well, a sort of, a kind of, you know--"
SG: "I'm not gonna pretend I know who John Steinbeck is."
DE: "You don't know who John Steinbeck is?"
SG: "No."
DE: "He won the Nobel Prize for literature..."
SG: "How many Nobel Prize winners in literature do you think I've read?"
DE: "Fair enough, but he wrote, you know, 'Of Mice and Men.' Probably had to read that one in school. And 'The Pearl.' 'Grapes of Wrath.'"
SG: "Yeah, no, never heard of John Steinbeck."
Phil (After she leaves): "What are you doin', man? Don't shit on her with that literature stuff again, dude. That'll cost me some serious points."
Drunken Eric: "But seriously, John Steinbeck?"
Phil: "No..."
Now, come on, it's not like I was talking about Bellow or Nabokov (who aren't obscure enough to be pretentious, either). Steinbeck is a name that anyone who went to high school should know. If you know that there are 180 degrees in a triangle and that Archduke Ferdninand's death had something to do with WWI, even if you don't have a clue he was the Archduke of, you should at least know the name John Steinbeck. In the United States of America at the beginning of the 21st century, not knowing Steinbeck's name is about the same as not knowing Shakespeare's, in my opinion.
Sober girl: "Yeah. I wish I was from Texas. It seems like everyone here is from Texas, even though it's the Center for Michigan Universities."
Drunken Eric: "Well, you know, that's because, like John Steinbeck said, Texans, well, they sort of have a sense of, well, a sort of, a kind of, you know--"
SG: "I'm not gonna pretend I know who John Steinbeck is."
DE: "You don't know who John Steinbeck is?"
SG: "No."
DE: "He won the Nobel Prize for literature..."
SG: "How many Nobel Prize winners in literature do you think I've read?"
DE: "Fair enough, but he wrote, you know, 'Of Mice and Men.' Probably had to read that one in school. And 'The Pearl.' 'Grapes of Wrath.'"
SG: "Yeah, no, never heard of John Steinbeck."
Phil (After she leaves): "What are you doin', man? Don't shit on her with that literature stuff again, dude. That'll cost me some serious points."
Drunken Eric: "But seriously, John Steinbeck?"
Phil: "No..."
Now, come on, it's not like I was talking about Bellow or Nabokov (who aren't obscure enough to be pretentious, either). Steinbeck is a name that anyone who went to high school should know. If you know that there are 180 degrees in a triangle and that Archduke Ferdninand's death had something to do with WWI, even if you don't have a clue he was the Archduke of, you should at least know the name John Steinbeck. In the United States of America at the beginning of the 21st century, not knowing Steinbeck's name is about the same as not knowing Shakespeare's, in my opinion.