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By (user no longer on site) OP
over a year ago
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Although I'm a big reader I have never been a lover of 'the classics' - I tend to go for 20th/21st century novels. But I know not all of you are philestines like me so what are your favourite classics and what do you like about them? |
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By (user no longer on site)
over a year ago
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Gatsby, Lady Chatterly’s lover, and Cal are all ‘modern classics’ that I love.
I loved Twelfth night in school if that counts? Tried Mrs Dalloway and wurthering heights but hated them both. They’re still on my shelf though so might give them another bash. I generally prefer more modern romantic novels though or non fiction. |
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By (user no longer on site) OP
over a year ago
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"The Time Machine. It's slightly different to the film."
I tend to think of The Time Machine as one of the first 20th century novels, even though it was published in 1895 - Wells has a run from then to 1901 in which Wells basically invents 20th century sci-fi. The Time Machine is superb. |
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By (user no longer on site)
over a year ago
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Wuthering Heights
Macbeth if that counts!
Just realised since I finished my English degree I’ve read far more modern classics than classics! There must be more but can’t think of them right now! |
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By (user no longer on site) OP
over a year ago
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"The literary works of Bram Stoker and Sir Arthur Conan Doyle  "
I read Dracula after struggling through Frankenstein and was relieved to find it a much better novel. I'm not a big fan of the epistolary novels normally but it worked pretty well.
Big fan of Sherlock Holmes but found ACD's non-Holmes short stories mostly poor. I need to read the Professor Challenger novels though. |
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By (user no longer on site)
over a year ago
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"Add the yellow wallpaper to list of enjoyed actually. If that counts as a classic.
That was a tragically fantastic read. "
CPG is great. I think I have like 3 copies of this book  |
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By (user no longer on site)
over a year ago
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"Add the yellow wallpaper to list of enjoyed actually. If that counts as a classic.
That was a tragically fantastic read.
CPG is great. I think I have like 3 copies of this book "
Its one of the books I make everyone I know read. Ive had to buy it a few times. |
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By (user no longer on site)
over a year ago
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Pride and Prejudice for me also, just love the wit, "For what do we live, but to make sport for our neighbours, and laugh at them in our turn"
Always thought it was an apt quote for swingers |
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Tend to get more out of re-reading a classic novel than freshly reading a new one. And no man reads the same book twice: come back to it another year and it's a different you and a different experience.
I sometimes wonder if English degrees put a lot of people off reading, or at least put them off reading the classics. Seems to have happened to a few friends of mine. |
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By (user no longer on site)
over a year ago
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"Add the yellow wallpaper to list of enjoyed actually. If that counts as a classic.
That was a tragically fantastic read.
CPG is great. I think I have like 3 copies of this book
It’s one of the books I make everyone I know read. Ive had to buy it a few times. "
Hmmm. I think I’m in love with you. |
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By (user no longer on site)
over a year ago
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"Think the first one I read was the secret garden. My favourite is Jane Eyre I think, but one flew over the cuckoo's nest really had an impact on my way of thinking. "
I read the secret garden in primary school and I think that has impacted my views on it. Maybe I’ll reread it
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"Think the first one I read was the secret garden. My favourite is Jane Eyre I think, but one flew over the cuckoo's nest really had an impact on my way of thinking. I read the secret garden in primary school and I think that has impacted my views on it. Maybe I’ll reread it "
I think it wouldn't be published these days, due to some of the views in the book. My favourite book at primary school level was Pollyanna, loved that book so so much. Used to play the glad game, which looking back is kinda really sad. |
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"I’ve read very few but I was totally absorbed in Pride and Prejudice. Bit of a departure from my usual material.
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All time classic, it reads so much like a script that adaptations hardly have to alter it, they only cut for time. (apart from the famous BBC 6 parter which was the whole book apparently). It's always been my recommend classic because it's such a breeze to read and still really funny too. pt |
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Frankenstein - I love the story surrounding the story. Mary Shelley fascinates me.
Dracula - just brilliant horror, an actual strong female lead.
As Julie says - anything Edgar Allen Poe
Anna Karenina - I have a love/hate relationship with this one. But I do like things that are divisive. |
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Wuthering Heights is my favourite classic. Really like a lot of Victorian novels, but also a big Jane Austen fan - hence the username!
I read Madame Bovary for the first time this year and loved it. - Mrs P |
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The Woman In White- Wilkie Collins.
Collins was quite obviously a grumpy old man, and I love the gothic nature of the tale, coupled with his writing style.
Bleak House- Charles Dickens.
This book has a bit of everything- political satire, ghost story, romance, domestic drama, detective story. It's a 19th-century melodrama. I devoured it in two weeks over Christmas holidays when I was in sixth form and I still love it twenty years later. Made me cry on first reading.
Mrs Dalloway- Virginia Woolf. I love that the novel mirrors an ordinary day within the life of an ordinary woman, but how within that we topple back in time through her memories and everything she's been through. You can almost hear the ticking of time as we jump back-and-forth. A challenge but one with infinite rewards.
Anything William Faulkner- another tough nut to crack but The Sound and The Fury as an example is close to perfect. Beautiful imagery, characters who are so well drawn though not very likeable that they're people that are instantly recognisable on reading. Books written so well that on multiple reads you get more and more out of them each time. IMO the best writer America has ever given the world, Steinbeck and Capote close second and third for me.
Modern writers I love- Haruki Murakami, Donna Tartt, Jeffrey Eugenides, Hanya Yanagihara (try not to be broken by A Little Life), Pat Barker, Toni Morrison, Marlon James, Hilary Mantel.
Love the modern stuff but there's some fantastic classics.
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Rebecca and Jamaica Inn by du Maurier, haunting and beautifully written. Absolute favourites.
Others include:
Wuthering Heights, Jane Eyre, Dracula, Frankenstein, Animal Farm, Of Mice and Men
Children's classics: Heidi, Charlotte's Webb, Alice in Wonderland, The Secret Garden |
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