Aww, poor Hugo. Hugo.

are you kidding me? hugo for sure.

Orwell, nothing beats a pig named Napolean

Orwell 10
Hugo 5

Yeah, I read Hugo, SYnapse...I gave my reasoning--

Hugo's the bigger literary titan, but Orwell's had the bigger social impact...look at our social media-driven world today...constantly we see stories about a fear of "Big Brother"-style surveillance and control.

Orwell called that coin perfectly, he's one of the few writers where it's somewhat appropriate to say he was both a product of and ahead of his time.

i thought you have discarded impact as a factor in your decision process? ;)

It's favorite author... why not just let the votes go as they may? Orwell isn't necessarily the better author but I read 20 pages of Hugo and quit, whereas I've read way too much Orwell. He's one of my favorite authors ever. That's all that needs to be said.

Dickens: 0
Woolf: 1

Let it begin.

Woolf: 2
Dickens: 0

I really, REALLY hope Woolf can pull it out, but it's an uphill battle--

Both are incredible authors...

I think Dickens is the pinnacle of his era/form, whereas Woolf, by contrast, isn't the most celebrated of her period, yet still stands out as one of the most unique writers of her period (Dickens sticks to the conventions of Victorian literature, he just arguably does it better than anyone and has the most memorable characters in the English language after Shakespeare...by contrast, Woolf was and still IS hugely experimental and innovative) let alone the fact that she's, again, arguably the best female/feminist writer of all-time.

Either way, the winner deserves it, though, it's definitely a win-win.

It was the best of times; it was the worst of times... Then let them die and decrease the surplus population... Please sir, may I have some more?

Dickens - Could there be any doubt from me?

Dickens 1
Woolf 2

Dickens

To be honest neither of them particularly appeal to me. I liked Orlando well enough. And while A Christmas Carol has been so over produced its trite, there's a reason.

Over all though, I prefer a writer who doesn't have pretensions. Dickens.

Dickens 3
Woolf 2

Dickens

Dickens 4
Woolf 2

Woolf

Dickens.

Dickens. What the Woolf would make you vote Virginia?

Dickens.

Dickens 7
Woolf 3

Anyone noticed the "host" of this competition is constantly on the losing side? Why is that you ask? Because he votes for the snooty people trying to impress others and not for the most read and popular.

Other than Orwell versus Hugo (titan v. titan) he always seems to go with the losing side.

Yeah, the final four of this are going to be Dickens, Poe, Orwell, and Tolkien. I can't put any of these in even my top 10. It's turned into the "most snooty highbrow author" contest.

Poe, Dickens, Tolkien high brow? Their competition was more high brow. And it could be Dumas over Tolkien...

No case for it being too high brow can be made when Shakespeare, Vergil, and Dostoyevsky are out.

^Exactly

"It's turned into the 'most snooty highbrow author' contest."
This is just silly. But then, other people have already pointed this out.

What we have is a lot of people voting for authors they DO like, rather than necessarily authors they "should" like, and the anti-elitist in me (which comes out most when dealing with art and literature) thinks this is fantastic. I also enjoy reading the reasons people give for their votes, and the occasional (reasoned) disagreement. The fact that different people like different things is actually pretty cool.

I think the Sweet 16 was a good list but it missed a few like Bradbury and Clarke.

Dickens, for sure.

Since the thread is about your "favourite" author, it is vague enough to have a lot of arguments over what "favourite" means...most enjoyable vs. most socially influential vs. most pivotal etc. Some of that has been fun, but sometimes people get pretty upset over what is supposed to be a fun and non-consequential thread.

I think that, although I would like a "what I like to read thread", it wouldn't have been as much fun as this one.