The Enlightened Bracketologist

Book excerpt: Every March, the NCAA men's basketball tournament blankets newspapers and the Internet, and attracts millions of television viewers over the course of three weeks. Will a perennial favorite like Duke win? Or will it be a dark horse like Gonzaga? The phenomenon known as March Madness galvanizes a nation of viewers as few other sports events can. The reason? Bracketology. America eagerly watches as 64 teams become 32, then 16, then 8, then 4, then 2, and finally #1. Now it's time to use the same rigorous method for everything that really matters in culture, people, history, the arts and more. In The Enlightened Bracketologist the editors have organized the world's most haunting and maddeningly subjective questions into a scheme of binary pairings that finally reveal what is truly the best in its class: La Tache or Chateau Latour? (1) Barry Bonds or Terrell Owens? (2) "Vissi d'arte" or "Dove Sono"? (3) OJ verdict or JFK assassination? (4) "Top of the world, Ma" or "Nobody's perfect"? (5) Two by two, The Enlightened Bracketologist pits our cultural mainstays against each other; only the finest survive. Every double-page spread of this book will contain a series of brackets compiled by experts and celebrities, with text call-outs that highlight the reason why one competitor moves on and another doesn't. Already committed are Elvis Costello on popular songs; David Bouley on cookbooks; Leon Fleisher on piano music; Reneé Fleming on opera arias; Henry Beard on French phrases; Joseph Ward on wine.