The Hot New Thing vs. The Venerable Classics

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When it comes to the culture you consume, do you typically seek out whatever's new and fresh and exciting, or do you find yourself returning to the canon of old standards?

For me:
For music and especially literature, I tend to seek out classics that I think I might be interested in that I haven't heard/read before. The last new book I bought/read was Everything is Illuminated. This may be due to the lack of good libraries in Richmond though. Occasionally for music I buy into the hype of some up-and-coming band, but am usually disappointed. So more typically I've been buying up slightly older stuff that has a reputation for being great. I'm still occasionally disappointed, but not as much.
For movies, I tend to see newer movies versus older movies. Occasionally I'll check out an old black-and-white movie I've never seen, but probably 75% of the time I'll get something from the last 5 years.

― NA (Nick A.), Tuesday, 28 October 2003 17:02 (twenty-two years ago)

I have had a real desire to look to the past in the last 18 months or so. I think it's partly escapism, but I've enjoyed reading books set in the 15th-19th centuries possibly more than any modern ones.

― Mark C (Mark C), Tuesday, 28 October 2003 17:05 (twenty-two years ago)

the thing about HNTs is that there's a good chance you'll be suckered into paying for or wasting time on something that's no damn good. But with a VC, it's already been long established that it's of quality.

I think I've read/heard/seen most of the classics that I want to at this point, which is not to say that some future endeavour won't all of a sudden make me want to read some Jane Austen or something, but I'm kinda looking out for new stuff, but it's really hard, esp. with books, because there are SO MANY new ones, so it's hard to pick any to take a chance on.

― Horace Mann (Horace Mann), Tuesday, 28 October 2003 17:09 (twenty-two years ago)

Pop Music - new new new

Fiction - old old old

Cinema - would love to see more old films as I tend to enjoy them more but I'm very lazy.

TV - mostly older

Videogames - new, mostly because I don't like PC gaming and emulators force you into it.

Art - it's all terrific! (i.e. old and new intrigue me in equal measure)

― Tico Tico (Tico Tico), Tuesday, 28 October 2003 17:10 (twenty-two years ago)

Horace, seriously, read Northanger Abbey - it's short, hilarious and really cute.

― Mark C (Mark C), Tuesday, 28 October 2003 17:11 (twenty-two years ago)

I've always held the view that if you haven't got a good breadth of reading it impairs your enjoyment of it. Culture is such a vast thing that it helps to have a few points of reference, if only to give what you're reading a bit of context.

― Matt (Matt), Tuesday, 28 October 2003 17:16 (twenty-two years ago)

Very good question indeed. Hm. I think for me it's less new/old necessarily as it is familiar/unfamiliar, with more cautious steps rather than full plunges into the latter.

― Ned Raggett (Ned), Tuesday, 28 October 2003 17:24 (twenty-two years ago)

i'm always torn between trying to read/hear/see all the "classics" and keeping up with whats going on now...

― robin (robin), Tuesday, 28 October 2003 17:31 (twenty-two years ago)

For me, the ease of sampling something (I mean trying it out, not using it on a hip hop record) is a factor here: I can turn on the radio and am likely to hear, sooner or later, a few minutes of hot new musical things. Trying out a hot new author takes far more effort, and giving them a proper go takes hours. But I couldn't imagine just going for one end of this scale. If you look at my blogging on NYLPM lately, I've talked about the new Bubba Sparxxx and a Louis Armstrong box set covering material from the 1920s - that variety seems a necessary thing to me.

― Martin Skidmore (Martin Skidmore), Tuesday, 28 October 2003 18:36 (twenty-two years ago)

I second Northanger Abbey.

I am all about letting the dust accrue first.

― Casuistry (Chris P), Tuesday, 28 October 2003 18:52 (twenty-two years ago)

I used to have a real hard time getting into literature or visual art that was under a century old.

― kate (kate), Wednesday, 29 October 2003 09:38 (twenty-two years ago)

TV - mostly older

How?!

I have a hard time with anything pre-1914 or so. Or post-1968... The hot new things don't often become venerable classics.

― Enrique (Enrique), Wednesday, 29 October 2003 09:43 (twenty-two years ago)

venereal classics

― Horace Mann (Horace Mann), Wednesday, 29 October 2003 18:08 (twenty-two years ago)

Mostly classic stuff, be it art, music, or movies. There's just a lot more quality stuff to choose from, and modern things generally don't appeal to my sensibilities.

― oops (Oops), Wednesday, 29 October 2003 18:17 (twenty-two years ago)

I grew up 90 minutes from the nearest movie theatre, then I went to college with no car, then I started being a workaholic, so I've not seen hardly any movies and I've pretty much given up on ever coming close to catching up.

― teeny (teeny), Wednesday, 29 October 2003 18:46 (twenty-two years ago)

so, um, to answer the question, the internet wins.

― teeny (teeny), Wednesday, 29 October 2003 18:47 (twenty-two years ago)

the internet ALWAYS wins

― Horace Mann (Horace Mann), Wednesday, 29 October 2003 18:47 (twenty-two years ago)

apparently it smash grammar, 'not seen hardly any' what the fuck?

― teeny (teeny), Wednesday, 29 October 2003 18:49 (twenty-two years ago)

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