It is always a little bit disappointing (but not all that surprising) when I discover that someone in the arts and entertainment arena, whose work I have come to admire, turns out to be a rabid, Bush-hating, foaming-at-the-mouth Lefty. Over the years I have come to accept that most of my favorite musicians, actors, and writers hold political views that I find at best naive, at worst downright dangerous. C'est la vie.
Which explains why it was with no small amount of joy that I read this interview by the Lincoln Heights Literary Society with Michael J. Nelson of Mystery Science Theater 3000 renown . For the record, I am a long-time MST3K fan, and probably one of the few people on earth who can proudly claim to own all three of the books that Nelson has penned (although I believe only two are presently in my possession, the third having been sucked in the black hole that is "loaning" a book to JB Doubtless). If you are under the mistaken impression that Garrison Keillor is the funniest writer to hail from Minnesota, then I
As to the interview, RTWFT. Here are a few of my favorite tidbits:
On reading-
Laurel Sutton: What fiction are you currently reading?
Mike Nelson: I'm one of those unfocused people who has eight books going at once. I'm finishing a very large work of non-fiction by the almost supernaturally brilliant Paul Johnson called "Modern Times," a history of the world since WWI. I've also started working through the one volume Martin Gilbert biography of Churchill.
...Incidentally, I do a great deal of reading and study of Christian Ethics and Apologetics, especially J.P. Moreland, Norman Geisler, Greg Koukl, Francis Beckwith and William Lane Craig. And, on a different level, there's always the warm embrace of C.S. Lewis.
On writing-
LS: Do you consider yourself a writer or a journalist? What's the distinction?
MN: I'm most certainly a writer. I have no journalistic training and no interest in getting any. I think the distinction is accountability, and frankly, I don't want to have any. What I mean is, I want to serve the laugh first, and sometimes that means being sloppy with facts.
On politics-
Ginger Mayerson: Do you have any idea what GW Bush's appeal is?
MN: Clarity, I think. And his shoes.
LS: Who will win the next presidential election? Who should win the next presidential election?
MN: I think it will be very close, but I'll say Bush. And if it isn't clear by now, I think Bush should win.
And most importantly of all-
LS: Guinness or Glenmorangie?
MN:Guinness and Glenmorangie double-wood.
Scotch AND beer? A man after my own heart.
(Thanks to CW for the tip)
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