Idiosyncratic special-made authors card game

[asakiyume]

Did you ever play the authors card game? We had this when I was a kid: 13 authors--a pretty random assortment of 19th-century English and American writers, all men with the exception of Louisa May Alcott--with four works for each author. You play it like you play Go Fish, with the goal being to get as many completed sets of authors' works as possible. Wakanomori and I enjoyed playing it the other day, but I thought it would be fun to make up a set of YA fantasy works. osprey_archer is visiting, and we created a set. It's a fairly random assortment, only two male authors (CS Lewis and Lloyd Alexander), and two authors I follow here one LJ/DW (that would be sartorias and pamaladean). The authors had to have four works or series of works; we tried not to list individual works in a series, and we decided all the works should be fiction.

The original Authors game features portraits of the authors...



But we are not good at portraiture, so we used symbols for each author. sartorias, you're a fan! pameladean, you're a sprig of rosemary!

(click through to embiggen)










Just now wakanomori, osprey_archer, and I played it. Very satisfying!

Comments

[nineweaving]

That is a thing of beauty!

Nine

[asakiyume]

It was a lot of fun to make and play ^_^

[missroserose]

Oh wow, I totally did have that game as a tween (although when I was that age they just said "child", or "pre-teen") - I'd completely forgotten about it until now. No wonder I grew up to be such a literary nerd. :)

Hello to you both! I'm glad you're having such a delightful time together. I'm going to be in Boston (well, technically Gloucester, although I'll be staying in Boston) for a wedding next weekend; I thought about asking if I might visit as well but unfortunately my schedule's a little too tight this trip. Perhaps next time?

[asakiyume]

Sure, drop me a line another time you're in Massachusetts (though we're about two hours west of Boston, so it's a bit of a side trip).

[pameladean]

I am honored to be a sprig of rosemary! This sounds like a great update of a classic game.

P.

[asakiyume]

Rosemary is perfect for you (not to say that other items wouldn't be as well, but it's an eminently drawable perfect thing ^_^)

[amaebi]

Since Authors was clearly an acceptably Wholesome game in Louisa May Alcott's Little Women, I strove as a child to be edified by it, but always felt that I failed. Nowadays I'm on the fence about whether Alcott really thought Authors edifying, or whether she was referring to some quite different game.

Like Shirley Jackson's Janny, in Raising Demons, I was troubled by the presence of Louisa May Alcott in the deck, as well....

[asakiyume]

I liked the game--I had not known that Tennyson wrote a whole long poem about King Arthur, and I was curious about it. And I learned about Evangeline--and the Acadian exile from Canada--from it, and I was glad for that. My sister and I were fascinated by the different portraits. It was an easy game to play, too, which I appreciated.

Checking in Wikipedia just now, I learned that the first Authors card game was created in 1861, in Salem, Massachusetts, and then Parker Brothers put out a version in 1867. Little Women was published in 1868-1869, so if she meant the Authors card game, she was getting in a super current reference.

I wonder if they included her in later decks because she promoted them ;-)

[amaebi]

Ah, so it was the nouvel chic!

Evidently which authors are included varied.

I like the idea of one of the publishers buttering up Ms. Alcott. :)

Have you ever played Forfeits?

[asakiyume]

I haven't! Is it easy to play? (I like playing card games, but I don't do it very often, and I tend to forget the rules pretty much as soon as I stop playing.)

[amaebi]

I had to reckon the rules out from a scene in Eight Cousins. IIRC it seemed to be a game in which the It had to guess what property-of-another-player was held over her head so she couldn't see it. Failing, she faced a Truth or Dare.

So not a card game.

In Eight Cousins naughty cousin Charlie set Rose up for a suggestive tease, but she cleverly weaseled out of it.

I forgot to say-- I also always liked laying Authors! I just didn't feel I was receiving its wholesome bounty appropriately, try though I did.

I am still not list-minded.

[asakiyume]

I love that you were able to figure out the rules--it seems sort of like reconstructing how a dance works. I can imagine doing this for a dance in a Jane Austin novel: noticing how the protagonist changes partners and when they have their backs to each other and when they link arms or whatever.

When you say list-minded, do you mean like lists of best works, lists of important monuments, lists of cardinal virtues, and that sort of thing?

[amaebi]

Have you ever tried to suss out the rules of cricket from Murder Must Advertise?

Yes, those sorts of lists and more. A lot of people like to think in and about lists, to compose lists, and so on-- that's why listicles are clickbait-- but my mind seems to resent being asked to respond to questions that ask for lists. When I try, it's always a matter of vague fishing.

[asakiyume]

I'm lucky in having a Brit for a spouse, so I can have the mysteries of cricket laid bare to me. In fact, I think he has explained them to me... but then I forgot.

re: lists, I don't have strong feelings about them, but I get nervous about anything that asks me to be comprehensive. In other words, I don't think I'd mind listing things for people so long as they didn't jump all over me if I left something out that they thought was important.