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Mike Schilling

Mike has been a software engineer far longer than he would like to admit. He has strong opinions on baseball, software, science fiction, comedy, contract bridge, and European history, any of which he's willing to share with almost no prompting whatsoever.

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57 Responses

  1. Kolohe says:

    2. Huck Finn, Mark Twain, The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn.
    7. Tywyn Lannister, George R. R. Martin, A Game of Thrones.
    15. Winston Smith, George Orwell, 1984Report

  2. Marchmaine says:

    20. Julia Flyte, Waugh, Brideshead Revisited.

    (Speaking to a horrid member of the Italian Parliament).Report

  3. zic says:

    #6 is Doctor Watson from Scandal in Bohemia describing Irene Adler, Sherlock Holmes’ great love from the books by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle.Report

  4. Ken S says:

    18 is “The Casque of Amontillado” by Poe. The character is the narrator, Montresor.

    19 sounds like Sam Spade, just like 13. Would you do that, Mike?Report

  5. Tod Kelly says:

    OK. Let’s start with the ones I am pretty damn sure I have right…

    1. Quentin, Faulkner, Absalom Absalom
    2. Huck, Twain, Adventures of Huckleberry Finn
    3. Arthur, White, Once & Future King
    4, Queeg, Wouk, The Cain Munity
    6.Watson, Doyle, Scandal in Bohemia
    7. Tyrian, Martin, Game of Thrones
    8. Gatsby, Fitzgerald, The Great Gatsby
    11. Lady Ashley, Hemingway, Sun Also Rises
    13. Sam Spade, Maltese Falcon, Hammett
    15. Winston, Orwell, 1984?18. Montresor, Poe, Cask of Amontillado
    19. Marlowe, Chandler, Big Sleep

    Now the ones am pretty damn sure I have partially right…

    9. Brave New World, Huxley (Can’t remember character name)
    12. Tolkein, (Best guess: Frodo, Fellowship of the Ring?)
    14. Woodhouse, Uncle Fred Flits By (Can’t remember character name)

    No idea at all on 5, 10, 16, 17, 20. (Though I feel like I actually know 16; I just can’t quite reach it with my brain.)Report

  6. Jim Heffman says:

    #10 Yossarian, Heller, Catch-22

    #13 Sam Spade, Hammett, The Maltese FalconReport

    • Marchmaine in reply to Jim Heffman says:

      Dang, I keep missing the Heller quotations and that’s too bad as I rather like Heller – though I might be a minority of one who prefers “Picture This” to “Catch-22”Report

      • Kimmi in reply to Marchmaine says:

        I’ll check it out on your recommendation.
        I like Heller better than I like Douglas Adams.
        Though I have been meaning to play Bureaucracy…Report

      • Marchmaine in reply to Marchmaine says:

        Yeah, I’ll have to go back and read it again to see if it holds-up as well as I remember. But how could you go wrong with politico-economic ruminations of Heller contemplating Rembrandt contemplating Aristotle contemplating the bust of Homer?Report

      • Mike Schilling in reply to Marchmaine says:

        “Picture This” is my second favorite Heller book. I didn’t care much for God Knows or Good as Gold and the less said about Closing Time the better.Report

      • Marchmaine in reply to Marchmaine says:

        “God Knows” is a book I like for it being Heller struggling with the ancient question of Theodicy…except that I found his struggle, alas, to be sophomoric and not as insightful as I might have hoped. I might even like it more than Catch-22, which in my darker moments I think might have been pinched from Waugh’s “Sword of Honour” series. I’m a sucker for religious re-imaginings, though…Report

      • Tod Kelly in reply to Marchmaine says:

        I have tried God Knows a couple of times. Each time, I find myself loving it for about 50 pages or so, and then getting bored.Report

    • Jim Heffman in reply to Jim Heffman says:

      The funny part is that I found Catch-22 a frightful bore and didn’t even actually make it to that part. I just remember the quote from having heard it quoted somewhere else.Report

  7. Ken S says:

    17 is, I believe, The Man Without a Country, by Edward Everett Hale. I don’t remember the character’s name.Report

  8. Mike Schilling says:

    Recap so far:

    1. Quentin Compson (the elder), Faulkner, Absalom Absalom (Tod)
    2. Huck Finn, Mark Twain, The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn (Kolohe)
    3. King Arthur (AKA The Wart), T. H. White, The Once & Future King
    4. Lt. Cmdr. Philip Francis Queeg, Wouk, The Caine Mutiny (Tod)
    6. John H. Watson, Conan Doyle, Scandal in Bohemia (Zic)
    7. Tyrion Lannister, George R. R. Martin, A Game of Thrones (Marchmaine)
    8. Jay Gatsby, Fitzgerald, The Great Gatsby (Tod)
    10. Yossarian, Heller, Catch-22 (Jim H)
    11. Lady Brett Ashley, Hemingway, The Sun Also Rises (Tod)
    13. Sam Spade, Hammett, The Maltese Falcon (Tod)
    15. Winston Smith, George Orwell, 1984 (Kolohe)
    17. Philip Nolan, Edward Everett Hale, The Man Without a Country (Ken S)
    18. Montresor, Poe, The Cask of Amontillado (Ken S)
    19. Philip Marlowe, Chandler, The Big Sleep (Tod)
    20. Julia Flyte, Waugh, Brideshead Revisited (her brother)

    Partially solved: 9, 12, 14
    Open: 5, 16Report

  9. Tod Kelly says:

    Oh, my brain finally touched 16:

    Charlie, Miller, Death of a SalesmanReport

  10. Tod Kelly says:

    And since I think I got the partials, I’ll try these two additional process-of-elimination guesses:

    12. Bilbo, Tolkein, Hobbit

    14. Wooster, Woodhouse, Uncle Fred Flits By

    I swear to god, I can’t remember one single character name from BNW to save my life so I think I need to have someone else get 9.Report

  11. Mike Schilling says:

    Further progress:

    12. Bilbo Baggins, Tolkien, The Hobbit (Tod)
    14. Frederick Altamont Cornwallis Twistleton, Earl of Ickenham Wodehouse, Uncle Fred Flits By (Tod)
    16: Charley, Miller, Death of a Salesman (Tod)

    9 is still only partially solved. Per Marchmaine’s suggestion, the judges will accept the series rather than the exact book for 5.Report

  12. Shelley says:

    The comment on Obama is jejune.

    All the others are fascinating. I think the Huck Finn quote is not only the literary but also the moral bedrock of all American literature.Report

    • Mike Schilling in reply to Shelley says:

      The Obama comment was, I’m sure, tongue in cheek, and I thought it was hilarious.

      I agree100% about Huck Finn. It’s a bit inconsistent with Huck’s description of his religious training in Chapter 1:

      Then she told me all about the bad place, and I said I wished I was there. She got mad then, but I didn’t mean no harm. All I wanted was to go somewheres; all I wanted was a change, I warn’t particular. She said it was wicked to say what I said; said she wouldn’t say it for the whole world; she was going to live so as to go to the good place. Well, I couldn’t see no advantage in going where she was going, so I made up my mind I wouldn’t try for it. But I never said so, because it would only make trouble, and wouldn’t do no good.

      Now she had got a start, and she went on and told me all about the good place. She said all a body would have to do there was to go around all day long with a harp and sing, forever and ever. So I didn’t think much of it. But I never said so. I asked her if she reckoned Tom Sawyer would go there, and she said not by a considerable sight. I was glad about that, because I wanted him and me to be together.

      But Twain was like very Whitman in that he contained multitudes.Report

  13. Mike Schilling says:

    Tuesday hints:

    The character who says 9 in the Resident World Controller of Western Europe. (Emphasis present for a reason.) His name alliterates.

    The character who says 5 is an Easterner.Report

  14. Dan Miller says:

    9 is Mustapha Mond, from Brave New World.Report

  15. Mike Schilling says:

    9: Mustapha Mond, Huxley, Brave New World (Dan)

    Only 5 remains unsolved. It turns out that the 14th book in that series came out a few months ago. I should have been watching for it like a Hawk.Report

  16. Mike Schilling says:

    To close this out:

    5. Vlad Taltos, Steven Brust, IssolaReport