Friday, June 05, 2009

Top ten rascals in literature

Director Spike Jonze and the Where the Wild Things Are film team came up with a list of their top 10 rascals in literature.

David Barnett does not approve of several of the rascals to make the list:
Is Scout Finch from Harper Lee's To Kill a Mockingbird really a rascal? I suppose she can hold her own in a fistfight, and there was that business with Boo Radley's porch, but she seems to have too much of a sense of social justice to really merit a place. And Oliver Twist? Despite his asking for more, he always seemed a bit too simpering. Surely Dickens's Artful Dodger should have the place on the list instead of Oliver. Catcher in the Rye's Holden Caulfield is too old and world-weary, surely, and Harriet the Spy, from Louise Fitzhugh's 1964 novel and the later movie version, is more of a sneaky loner than a proper rascal.
Read more about Barnett's take on the list.

Check out the list of the top 10 rascals in literature.

Augusten Burroughs hopes parents will read Where the Wild Things Are to their children.

--Marshal Zeringue