Tuesday, May 10, 2011

Okay.

I admit that it was a stupid poll. I got an email from an eager-beaver summer-planner student asking that question, and I thought I'd throw it out there. But of course the only possible answer is, "It depends." Depends on what you're looking for, and to what use you'll put the info. I think that MS contains more rigorous scholarly investigations, but I read perfectly useful stuff--seemingly with a less grave prose style--in MQ. Maybe it's all a matter of aesthetics. MS looks heftier than MQ. Anyway. Just thought I'd toss it out there, but no catchers.

Yesterday I made my slightly-more-than-semi-annual running shoe update. And for the first time since I was 14 years old, I didn't buy Nikes. The shoe guy (who just came in 20th in a serious triathlon, by the way) said to me, "Whoa. Leaving the monster." I don't like the new Nikes: weird technology, awkward padding, bad colors, and they seem to be sizing wider than they used to. In any case, I got Asics Nimbus, which these two nights have lived up to their name. We'll see how many miles they go.

4 comments:

Ink said...

Congrats on the new shoes! Yay!

Kristen said...

Cool. What color did you get?

Flavia said...

Sorry! Was traveling Monday, and then Blogger was down for an epic length of time and prevented me from commenting.

I'd say that from the perspective of the scholarly C.V., Milton Studies is unquestionably the more prestigious, if only because its acceptance rate is lower/its gatekeeping more elaborate. I do think the average quality of the work it publishes is higher, too--but I've read some fantastic work in Milton Quarterly and some lame-ass ones in MS, so there's definitely no way to assert that any given essay is inherently better/worse because of its venue.

The other distinction I'd make is that MQ seems friendlier to shorter essays than does MS.

(And as of last month, I am in possession of my first pair of running shoes. O brave new world.)

Renaissance Girl said...

Flav: I agree, and I'd also add that I think that MQ is perhaps the better journal to direct students just starting out in the major/ just starting out in Milton. It's less intimidating, the prose tends (I think) to be less dense.