We got some tough takes here. Dzhaughn points out that Wilder’s reputation has literally cratered, but Raghu points out:
If you invite Stigler, you’re just going to get a talk someone else has given before.
That’s not literally true—Stigler is an excellent speaker irl—but as a Greatest Seminar Speaker argument it’s good. So Laura will move on to face Malcolm in the next round.
Today’s matchup
Two celebrated artists, each a bit of an outsider who was nonetheless accepted into the mainstream. A Brooklyn-born cartoonist or a London-born director. Your choice!
Looking ahead to the next round, we simply have to have Margaret Wise Brown and Maurice Sendak.
I vote for Sendak because of the “wild rumpus” factor. Also, his monsters have wonderful teeth. But this, from an interview with Terry Gross, tops it off: “I’m writing a poem now about a nose. I always wanted to write a poem about a nose. But, you know, I thought. gee. It’s a ludicrous subject. Well, that’s why, you know, when I was younger I was afraid of something that didn’t make a lot of sense and there was not. There’s nothing to worry about. It doesn’t matter.”
Writing about an ordinary body part is akin to writing about ordinary people, which we’ve subsequently decided is worthwhile. So Sendak (as a stand-in for Barbara Streisand?)
So, it would have to be Sendak by a nose at the end?
With two creative types, we can determine which of their works has a title which would serve best as an engaging seminar topic. Steve McQueen’s “Girls, Tricky” is by far the best from his oeuvre. For Maurice Sendak, two of the books he illustrated are in close competition: “What Can You Do With A Shoe”, and “Let’s Be Enemies”. Ultimately I’d like to hear someone try to convince me not to agree with him/her for a change, so I’ll vote for Sendak.
I find Maurice Sendak to be much more enchanting, and I’m sure he could act out some of his Wild Things characters. Steve McQueen is too derivative, and I find directors to have too big of egos anyways.
I grew up on a dead-end alley off Revere St. on Beacon Hill. Seven small private houses with no car access. When the folks who made the first Thomas Crown Affair were looking for Beacon Hill locations to film at, one of their first choices was our alley. They approached us with a standard (for the period) filming contract.
All other six residents thought it would be kewl for their homes to be in a Steve McQueen movie, but my father read the fine print in the contract and vetoed it. They had to look elsewhere.
So I have to vote for Steve McQueen to make up for father’s temporarily discombobulating his plans back in the day.