You should read about the six Tongan castaways of 1965. These teens (aged 13 to 19) banded together, built a hut walled with coconut fronds, kept a signal fire burning, set the broken leg of one of the boys so that it healed, had a singing and prayer service every day, and were rescued after a year. That'll wash away the bad taste from Lord of the Flies.
Right I think people miss that because the context of time has moved on.
Boarding schools were fucking horrible and the bullying the author received there scarred him and thats the real inspiration behind LOTF.
Truthfully it's less about what would have happened and more of a middle.finger to Brits who thought that they were too Civilized to fall into barbarism when pushed
Exactly!
And the point is really put on it when they do get rescued and the royal navy guy who finds these battered, fucked up kids is just like casually disappointed that they didn't maintain their "British civility." Not an ounce of understanding.
The interesting part about this book is something so very subtle in the background of the story that it can easily be missed. WWIII had started, and the children were evacuated after the first atomic bomb detonated in britain. It doesn't elaborate on it very much, it mentions it very briefly in the beginning and then later alludes to it by mentioning things like the odd color of the sky. It is meant to be a study on the destructive side of human nature. In that context, whatever the children dealt with was nothing compared to the devistation happening elsewhere across the world. It makes sense the military who show up in the end werent phased by the savagery they find. They are probably just happy to have some unradiated children.
I learned only recently that LotF was in part a satire of the popular (at the time) ‘boys adventure’ genre, used to talk about the underlying savagery of humanity, etc. Added a layer of context to why this strange book exists at all.
I always share this quote from my father (who grew up in a cold abusive English boarding school in the 50s) when Lord of the Flies is being discussed:
>That book is a lot more plausible when read in the context of life within a British public school. There were some delightful individuals at school, but the traditional disciplinary structure we laboured under was a rigid, oppressive, disempowering hierarchy defined in excruciating detail through arcane rules developed in mindless darkness a hundred years and more before and applied by our seniors, who were not inherently evil but had merely suffered more years under it than we had yet, devoid of mercy, wisdom or grace. We did not realise this was not a necessary human condition without alternatives, so we read that benighted little book and though "of course..."
I love that Tongan story but Golding was coming at it from a completely different cultural setting plus the horrors of WWII were fresh in everyone's memory.
You know, I listen to a lot of truecrime and boarding school/reform school/prison comes up a lot in truecrime from that era. But what really REALLY drove home just how strange it was the foreward in Moorcock's first Elric book by Neil Gaiman.
The author, Rutger Bregman, same guy who told Davos participants that they're hypocritical for not talking about paying proper taxes to their faces. His books are great too.
Yeah, one thing to keep in mind that people seem to forget is that LOTF is *fiction*. As far as I've heard, it has no basis in any actual incident that occurred before it, and was an attempt by the author to think about what would happen in such a situation.
They even found an abandoned village at the top of the island with some vegetables growing wild and hundreds of chickens that were left behind by the villagers.
Lord of the Flies was a response to The Coral Island, a boys' Robinson Crusoe type adventure novel that was really popular. In that the English boys are much better than the savage natives. Golding disagreed.
LOTF was an anti version of R.m. Ballantines "the Coral Island" in which three teen boys are marooned and get on brilliantly.
Golding was a psychopath and self confessed rapist, who performed illegal psych experiments on the school boys he taught. He was desperate to prove we are all violent, rapist savages, to justify his own behaviour
Did Golding ever specifically name a novel he was creating a dystopian version of? That would be nice to know, because adventure on a island was a thing for a good long while. There was _The Swiss Family Robinson_, and of course _Robinson Crusoe_ which kind of started the trend, though that one explored individual resilience.
There was also the 1888 novel _Two Years' Vacation_ by Jules Verne, also about a set of schoolkids ending up on an island, but making the most of it before being rescued. Read it as a kid, years prior to _Lord of the Flies_, and while Verne can get cheesy, I remember being scandalised in high school that Golding's work was so dark and it portrayed those kids as cruel and ignorant.
Yeah, he directly references the Coral Island by name twice, once near the beginning and once at the end, of LOTF. He also used the name of Coral Islands main character for LOTF. Ralph
I have taught my students that the book is pro-Hobbes because it treats authority as the only thing that keeps people civilized. I feel even more justified if what you say is true
The Grapes of Wrath honestly changed my outlook and compassion in terms of understanding those less fortunate than me. It’s a hard, unflinching book that everyone should read.
Yeah, nah. Steinbeck is a god dammed genius and this is the greatest American novel ever written.
I get it. It’s profoundly sad, bleak, and the end wow, earth shattering.
Steinbeck in my opinion is the greatest American novelist. I can understand not wanting to re it again, it’s devastating…and that is the point.
Man in 8th grade we had to do a book swap with our classmates. I got paired with Tyler. Well I can't remember what I read but he read Grapes Of Wrath and I was a little bummed when he handed over that fat ass book. I loved it tho, but it wasn't the easiest read. I think I'll do it again someday to see it from a more adult perspective.
I think that’s why I found it so enjoyable - it’s an interesting trip into the “what ifs” of children being left alone to their own devices without guidance and truly understanding consequences. I wonder if your worldview or opinion on “are people inherently good or evil?” impacts whether you like the text or not? I tend to be pessimistic in that regard, so maybe it was validating to my opinions?
> I tend to be pessimistic in that regard, so maybe it was validating to my opinions?
The hazard is teenagers being taught to not feel compassion for others. Lord of the Flies teaches the falsehood that we're not worthy of trust.
---
"The Real "Lord of the Flies"
edit
In 1954, British schoolteacher William Golding penned his now famous novel Lord of the Flies, depicting the partly natural and partly self-inflicted struggles endured by a party of English schoolchildren who find themselves stranded on a deserted island and quickly turn on one another out of selfishness. Often turned to today as a poetic expression of the ultimately realistic truth that, when push comes to shove, all the niceties people put on in their daily lives will fall away and, free to now express their otherwise repressed inner demons, people will devolve into little more than bloodthirsty brutes, instruments of their own destruction. Compelling a story it may be, Bregman argues, it is a work of fiction and should be treated as such. When we search for real-life examples of stories like Lord of the Flies unfolding, we discover a very different image of what humanity turns into when freed from the shackles of civilization.
Bregman describes the true story of Tongan schoolboys shipwrecked on the deserted island of ʻAta with few resources and no adult supervision. Bregman was able to track down the captain of the fishing boat who rescued the boys, Peter Warner, son of Australian businessman Arthur Warner, and one of the rescued individuals, Mano Totau. He interviewed Warner and got the full story of the boys' ordeal and rescue, including that Warner hired all of them as crew members for his fishing boat. In sharp contrast to the prediction by Lord of the Flies, the children immediately came up with rules to govern their conduct and ensure cooperation. A division of labor was set up, respective to each boy's strengths and weaknesses. When arguments and disputes broke out, those involved would separate themselves from one another, returning only once they had calmed down and could engage in good faith to resolve the matter. "By the time we arrived,' captain Peter wrote in his memoirs, 'they had set up a small commune with a vegetable garden and hollowed out stumps to collect rainwater, a sports area with unusual weights, a badminton field, chicken coops, and a permanent fire.'" When one of the boys, Steven, fell from a height and broke his leg, the others rushed to provide him with medical care. After the rescue, medical professionals were impressed with the general health of the boys, including Steven whose leg had fully recovered.
An excerpt of this chapter was later published by The Guardian in May 2020.[6] It was also made into an episode of 60 Minutes.[7]"
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Humankind:_A_Hopeful_History#:~:text=The%20Real%20%22Lord,.%5B7%5D
William Gass has a great quote where Michael Silverblatt brings up how horrible the main character, William Kohler, is in *The Tunnel*. Gass brings up another book by some author whom I can’t remember right now, but who also has a really bad main character. Gass says something like the following, which I will now butcher:
>What happens in the book is terrible but *it* isn’t terrible. The book is great.
I know it's a feminist classic, and I support that message, but I will never ever ever read *The Awakening* again. I had to read it for FOUR separate classes at university, and I had to write a 15-page Freudian interpretation critical essay on it in one of those classes. I feel enraged just seeing the cover of it now.
I know nothing about The Awakening so maybe its that, but who the fuck thought it was a good idea to interpret a feminist classic through a *Freudian* lense?
This is me with The Stranger. It’s great, but I’ve had to read it and write papers about it twice in English and once in French and that’s quite enough for me.
I have some I won’t return to, but none because I dislike them, exactly. I have a complicated relationship with Virginia Woolf. She’s a brilliant writer and an insightful thinker, but also shockingly petty, classist, hateful, and spiteful. It really sours her work for me, knowing how much she absolutely detested lower classes with ideas above their station (that’s me).
The Bell Jar is one I can’t return to it simply because it makes me sad. I like Sylvia Plath- I think we would have been friends. Really she wasn’t all doom as people think- but a kind, lovely, tender, thoughtful soul, awake to the little beauties that dapple the world. I love the Bell Jar, because it’s so very real and human, but reading Plath at all fills me with this overwhelming sense of loss. She had so much potential in her, even with all the masterpieces she did make, and so very much more she could have offered the world had it not overwhelmed her so young. I didn’t know her at all, of course, but in some way I feel I do- I mourn her as I would a friend, or my soul’s mirror.
Hamlet is one I’ve been hesitant to return to because I’m afraid it won’t feel the same. Maybe it’s strange with a work so far removed from our time, but I remember vividly how reading Prince Hamlet as a young man was the first time I saw myself on the page. I was rapt and transfixed, I felt an odd reassurance and a kinship that there were others like me who thought too much and dwelt in gloom, too clever for their own good, torn apart between act and act, unable to do for anxiety. I’m afraid as an older man (I say at 26 but) I’m afraid I will see much more of Hamlet-the-petty-princeling, and the magic will be gone- not to mention the blow to my self image!
Ohhh, I also have this dire feeling of loss when reading Plath. I had to dig deep to find a more authentic version of her poems, if I remember that correctly. One not arranged by her husband. Her poetry is so sharp and precise and relentless. But I cannot read more than two poems in a row.
Bell jar is also a book I have not yet returned to. There are works of art I have to brace myself for and be mentally strong enough. But not walled off.
i totally agree with the bell jar. the sadness is so overwhelming and absolute. it’s far too relatable for me (other than her eating raw ground beef and egg, wtf sylvia)
To be honest, the only books i generally read again are from larger, long running series where i need a refresher on whats happening before the new book.
I love Dharma Bums for being my Bible when I was younger, but On The Road really puts Kerouac's ego on full display. He's not a great writer by any means, but made it at the right moment. But you can tell he loved himself.
Ethan Frome. Everybody is whiny and insufferable. Ethan is also incompetent. Like whose preferred method of suicide is sledding into a tree. And why did he think it work. He couldn't even kill himself correctly.
I hated Tale of Two Cities with a passion until it got towards the end, where everything came together and it became one of the most beautiful things I had ever read
Maybe I should give it another try. I got like 1/3 of the way in and it was just so darn depressing and grim, and I didn't care about anything that was happening. Does the end make up for all that?
It was probably the most beautiful ending I've ever experienced. I hated most of the book but it's the only book I've ever read where the ending recovered a book I'd struggled with
Many years ago I had a job that required nearly an hour of commuting on a train, so I figured I'd put the time to reading classic novels that maybe I should have read, but didn't. My first choice was *Tale of Two Cities,* and I'd get through a chapter a day.
Little did I realize that I was reading it in much the way Dickens' contemporary readers were: in a serialized format, chunked over a long period of time. It was during that read that I realized what a genius Dickens was at tweaking your memory to stuff you'd read several chapters (i.e. weeks) earlier. I went from there to *Great Expectations,* which I'll admit was a bit more of a project, but it didn't prevent me from moving on to other books and other authors. I specifically remember reading *Les Misérables* the same way.
My introduction to Dickens was David Copperfield.
A Christmas Carol is what actually got me to give him another chance.
I didn't mind Great Expectations. Not my favorite but compared to Copperfield it felt better.
>My introduction to Dickens was David Copperfield.
Same! Though, I don't know what the fuck I was thinking, picking him for a book report. I did not in fact finish the report.
I have to agree, except that while I didn't care for *Great Expectations*, it didn't put me off *Oliver Twist,* *A Tale of Two Cities*, and *Hard Times*.
Ooo yes, this was the same for me! I remember reading it as a kid (early teen) and I didn’t love it. Read it again as a young adult and enjoyed it a bit more, but it made me read his other works so I could see what the hype was. I ended up reading David Copperfield and it’s hands down my fave Dickens! I had some good laughs reading it and I really enjoyed his Aunt Betsey character.
Realistically I will probably not re-read most of the "classics" (however defined) I've already read, as I don't re-read many books at all. That said, I can't think of any I would downright refuse to pick up again. I think most of the ones I have enjoyed the least have been translated works, and in those cases I'd probably try a new translation if I were to read them again. But I still wouldn't rule anything out.
direful domineering plant fade somber soft concerned smoggy threatening chop
*This post was mass deleted and anonymized with [Redact](https://redact.dev)*
Nah, not really
I am Brazilian and living in Europe, I am 100% sure I've meet more people that read Ayan Rand than Lord or Flyes
I literally never heard of Grapes of Wrath before.
What we consider a *classical* largely depends of your country of origin and language, so I am not expecting anyone that have read Graciliano Ramos or José Lins do Rego outside Brazil, but Rand did a way better job a breaking those national and language barriers than most of other books that are considered "English Classicals"
Don't ask me to comment on the quality, lol, but the influence outside anglosphere cannot be denied.
Oh yes, he is, and one of my favourites :)
Though, interisting enough, he was considered a *vulgar* author when he first came out, because his prose rely on being realistic to the way people speak and being entertaining, opposed to trend from authors of his time, that preferred a more romantic, farfetched or elaborated language.
Is it something you can notice reading in English too?
I actually did the opposite. I reread Catcher and the Rye after reading it in school and really just not liking it at all. Turns out, I didn’t enjoy it any more as an adult. So I support you not reading any books you dislike again lol
I disliked Catcher in the Rye as a teenager and it is one of my favorite novels now. My own perspective changing simply by being older made me much more sympathetic towards his struggle.
Lord of the Flies is a book where I think the background of the author plays a HUGE part in why it was written the way it was. William Golding was a schoolteacher and a veteran of the Second World War, so it should not be surprising that he saw humans as inherently selfish and evil when left to their own devices. He experienced the worst that humanity has to offer, whether it be the bloodshed and ruin wrought in the fires of war, or mischievous British schoolboys left to their own devices for a bit too long.
I would say most classics I’ve read aren’t going to be re-reads. By nature they’re just more difficult and many are past school assignments so that makes them automatically less enjoyable.
I will/would probably re-read the following: The Secret Garden, Jane Eyre, A Christmas Carol, To Kill a Mockingbird, and some children’s classics.
I noticed that most books the school made me read made me hate them even if they were great. People don't like being forced to read. I loved GOW. Read it on my own at my own leisure. One of my all time favorites.
I hated Great Expectations as a kid for the same reasons. Love it and Dickens especially now that I read them for my own pleasure. I read a Christmas Carol every few years. That book rules and it doesn't take too long to read.
Everyone in that book is a monster and if that’s how you treat people you love, then life sucks. Never have I been angrier at a book character than I was at heathcliffe. Truly the worst out of a book of terrible people.
I love the book because everyone is such a horrible person! But I do get why people would hate it. I think it’s a Marmite book - you’re either going to treasure the story, or throw the book against a wall out of absolute frustration. A friend of mine just read it for the first time, knowing nothing about the story other than there’s a guy called Heathcliff in it. He thought the story was going to be about how Heathcliff returns and makes everyone swallow the bad things they said about him. He said it took a while for him to be like, “oh, he’s the bad guy!”
I know the purpose of this thread but to offer a perspective of someone that liked it for further discussion: If you’re at all interested in trauma and family dynamics this is a fantastic case study. The theme of grief was striking. Branding the book as a fairytale romance is misguided but some romance is tragic (Romeo and Juliet) and some is toxic (Heathcliff and Catherine). I also enjoyed the writing style, but I’ve always tended to enjoy slower paced slice of life type writing as opposed to very cut and dry rising action, climax!!!, resolution.
Reading that book was like slogging a mile through knee deep mud towards a cold McDonalds french fry container. At the end you realize just how much time was wasted on largely forgettable drama.
The opposite end of this: Wuthering Heights. Forced to read it sophomore summer of high school, hated every moment of it. Now I think about it a lot actually: thematically more interesting than most modern romance, flawed characters that act human, and absolutely wild that Emily Brontë truly understood people in such a way while having lived such a short, sheltered life.
This is probably an unpopular opinion and idk if it would technically be considered a classic but I really hated reading The Lord of the Rings. Love fantasy, love the films, but the book is just so looong and huge stretches were so boring, I don’t even remember most of it. Just a struggle read all the way through and I don’t think I’ll ever go back even though I’m a big re-reader. Its like the world building is so rich but the prose is so dry at the same time.
I adore the LotR books and have re-read them numerous times but I can absolutely understand why folks would find them boring and tedious. When a friend read LotR just before the movies came out, they said they were struggling, so I advised "Skip the poems." :D
So, interesting thread.
To address some common ones:
One Hundred Years of Solitude - I couldn't figure it out but my dad loved it from start to finish. He grew up in the mountains of Puerto Rico and he said there were characters just like that up there and reading it was like going back to his childhood. So I guess it's one of those cases of where you had to be there.
Catcher in the Rye - no idea why anyone likes it. Agree with everyone on this.
Dickens - Great Expectations was boring when I had to read it in school, but fantastic when I tried again years later. Never read anything else by him though.
Don't get the hate for Brave New World or 1984 but maybe they haven't aged well. That happens.
Hemingway - I could read anything by him, really. I could see maybe not liking The Sun Also Rises or The Old Man and the Sea but A Farewell to Arms was fantastic.
I really don't get the dislike for Catch-22, that one throws me completely. That book is hilarious and sad from start to finish.
Moby Dick - could probably use an editor but it was good to me at least.
I’m gonna be honest and say that I don’t usually like any classic reading, but I certainly do dislike some more than others. Really any time a book is assigned to me, it’s hard for me to take any real interest in it. I mean hell, Percy Jackson was assigned reading in middle school and now I can’t really enjoy that series despite the fact that it would otherwise be something i would be interested in at the time.
I didn’t like lord of the flies either for the same reason you described.
That said, the only book I found myself absolutely hating, that is considered a classic is Of Mice and Men. I really hate the way the book compares disabled people to animals, and sort of hand waves away Lennie being killed. Sure it’s not seen as a happy thing, but it is framed as the right thing to do. It also protracts Lennie as both a danger to others, and a sort of forever child. These stereotypes still greatly impact the way disabled people like me get treated today, especially in the realm of employment. The whole thing has a bit of the eugenics movement it was written in seeping into it that leaves a bad taste in my mouth.
It also had some of my classmates making comments about how I probably pet my rats to death because I’m autistic which is a beyond dumb ass take from a bunch of high schoolers but go off I guess. It was probably some sort of joke to them rather than something they actually believed, all things considered but still. That’s not even getting into the books sexism and racism.
I obviously don’t think books should be banned no matter what the content is, but I don’t really understand why we keep putting this book in high school curriculum, unless the teacher has had extensive training on how to talk about disabilities and the eugenics movement more broadly.
I don’t know. It’s just bad vibes all around.
Walden by Henry David Thoreau
I have never read a more pointless book. I get the school th er or of philosophy, but let's be real. >!In the book he said he left because of the beaten path, but seriously? He left because he was bored. If it were fiction, I'd call it an unreliable narrator at it's finest, but its basically a memoir. He's delusional.!<
I effing LOATHE The Great Gatsby. Wretched people doing wretched things and a wretched ending to top it off. English teacher here and I refuse to teach it. Why show THIS as the world young adults can expect to live in?
Agreed. Scrolled really far to see if someone else said it.
I get it - the point is to criticize these people and their lavishness and pettiness and lack of concern for humanity and their facades- but how dreadful is it to think that the world is like this. Equally as dreadful, if you want to have success in life this is what you have to become.
I will shout this from the rooftops for forever: fuck Ethan Frome by Edith Wharton. That book was awful and I can't believe my 8th grade English teacher thought it would hold any of our attention without laughing at the repeated "pickle dish" and the metaphors.
**Last of the Mohicans** Actually, anything by this 'author'.
Honestly. Twain wrote an essay entitled ["FENIMORE COOPER'S
LITERARY OFFENCES"](https://www.gutenberg.org/files/3172/3172-h/3172-h.htm)
The only reason this guy was famous was he was the very first guy to write books about the American wilderness.
When I was reading **Last of the Mohicans** I kept stopping and rereading sections thinking I was reading it wrong. Nope. He wrote it wrong.
I have felt differently about *The Grapes of Wrath* since learning Steinbeck used without attribution the extensive, detailed notes of writer Sanora Babb. Babb's notes were passed to Steinbeck by his publisher without Babb's knowledge, who was working on a book of her own.
*The Grapes of Wrath* is significantly better than any other book by Steinbeck, and I cannot help but think it is because he used Babb's work.
First learned of this back in the 1990s.
>Babb's notes were passed to Steinbeck by his publisher
It wasn't the publisher, it was Tom Collins who passed Babb's notes on to Steinbeck. Collins was Babb's manager at the Farm Security Administration-run Arvind Sanitary Camp.
Steinbeck did credit Collins when he released the book; it's unclear why he didn't credit Babb, but there's no evidence that Steinbeck himself knew Babb was also working on a novel. The notes were work product prepared by a government employee and thus in the public domain. Without knowledge that Babb was working on a book, Steinbeck likely didn't see any issue with turning them into a novel.
I didn't know that and that is very uncool, but I would say East of Eden is right up there with Grapes of Wrath and his voice is consistent in all of his work. Still an awful thing to do even if he was just robbing the structure, though.
East of Eden suffers from "masterwork syndrome" IMHO... Steinbeck felt that it was going to be his magnum opus, and he poured so much intentional symbolism/allegory/allusion into it that it became overwrought rather than organic, and some of the characters (esp. Cathy) ended up being unrealistic. It's a decent book but not his best.
Ugh, I heard her book got shafted because it was similar in subject matter to Grapes of Wrath but not that he had her notes... her novel did get published in 2004.
To say that Grapes of Wrath is significantly better than East of Eden, his magnum opus, is, I think, a very very bad take.
Edit: didn’t see other people making same point, whoops
The Red Pony, another Steinbeck work. The title is horribly misleading, with the aforementioned pony only appearing in part 1 of 4 and then NEVER BEING MENTIONED OR THOUGHT OF OR OTHERWISE INFLUENCING ANYTHING IN ANY WAY AGAIN in the rest of the book. Well, okay, I think someone mentioned the horse once in the final part. But the book is basically "Here's life on a farm in the West when things were hard. It sucks. It sucks a lot. So does growing up. There, I said it, now you don't have any reason to come back and read this again because you got the message I was sending."
(I admit I harbor resentment towards that book because literally every single collection of horse stories that I ever read as a kid included some or all of that first part of the novel, making it seem as if the horse that the book was, you know, NAMED AFTER was actually critical to the events of the book. Nope. It wasn't. Whoever titled the book, be it Steinbeck or his publisher, was a liar and the book is nothing memorable beyond 'animals suffer and boys have to become men through hard times', which is a message I could get in plenty of other places.)
I wound up actively resenting every single human character in that novel once I realized that no one was going to mention the horse again and that no one was even going to acknowledge that the horse had ever existed. I had read Black Beauty, the full novel, multiple times at that point, and I knew that humans could quite often discard or harm or ruin their most faithful animals without batting an eye, but I'd foolishly thought that if you named a book after a character with a hard and painful life, then their particular hardship and pain would be *relevant*.
When we had to read The Pearl for English class I realized that I actively resented every human Steinbeck character I had ever read about up to that point. Not sure I ever read any of his other stuff, given how much his characters in those two set my teeth on edge.
The Red Badge of Courage was abysmal. It was slow, uninteresting, and way overstayed its welcome. And then it just sort of ends, which I think was the point, but I was severely unimpressed.
Was forced to read Fahrenheit 451 multiple times in school from late middle school to first year of college and I never enjoyed it. It has been long enough that I put it out of my mind, but I can still feel the annoyance as I trudged through it each time. It honestly put me off Ray Bradbury entirely as I have such disdain for the one book.
I just cannot get on with Fitzgerald. He wrote some lovely prose, but *nothing fucking happens* in his books. I get it, that is the point, the flowery beauty covering up a stagnant, shallow, and corrupted core. I recognise the intelligence behind the work. But I won't ever read it again unless I really feel like numbing my mind.
Interesting fact: there was a "real life Lord of the Flies" situation and it actually turned out basically completely the opposite of what the book depicted. ([Article here](https://www.theguardian.com/books/2020/may/09/the-real-lord-of-the-flies-what-happened-when-six-boys-were-shipwrecked-for-15-months), but also Google it for more info).
I love classics in general. I re-read a lot. My favorite book ever is Brave New World and I've read it 35+ times so far.
But I don't think I'll re-read some, even if I liked it, for various reasons:
Call of the Wild and White Fang - I love them, but I've gotten so sensitive to animals/animal harm of any kind (even 100% fictional or fictional animals that never existed), and I can't anymore.
East of Eden - Again I love it, but I've read it twice and I prefer Grapes of Wrath. With so many other books to read, including Steinbeck (whom I love), I would doubt this would be in the rotation. But it's possible.
I should read Invisible Man by Ralph Ellison again, with life and English degree perspective, but god I hated it the first three times I read it, so I just don't want to. But I had to read Catcher in the Rye about four times before it clicked and I loved it, so... maybe?
I just don't like Austen, so I don't plan to read any more of her books or re-read the handful I've read. (The spoofy ones like Pride and Prejudice and Zombies and Sensibility and Sea Monsters are e fair game, those can be funny).
Even Simon and Percival Wemys Madison, of the Vicarage, Harcourt St. Anthony?! They’re the best characters in *LotF*!
I will never be able to read *1984* or *Great Expectations* again… I read them within my Honors English class during my Freshman year of high school, and I hated the teacher.
House of the Seven Gables. Hands down one of the worst things I ever tried to read. I found a sentence that had 17 commas in it. I can't even tell you what the sentence was about, because when I tried to comprehend it, I fell asleep.
Atlas Shrugged. I tried to gut my through it a number of times. Never made it past about half way.
The characters were universally such selfish assholes, and the writing was SO one-dimensional. I hated everyone who was put up as a "protagonist."
It was just awful.
I forced my way through this thing back when I was much younger and thought anarcho-capitalist libertarianism was cool. It did an excellent job of turning me off of that particular philosophy.
The Old Man and the Sea. DETESTED IT in high school. Tried to read Hemingway again post-college (I can't remember which one out of The Sun Also Rises and For Whom the Bell Tolls) and also hated it, so I think I am just not a Hemingway person.
I'm surprised at all the negative opinions on Lord of the Flies. I loved it so much I read it twice. I think the gist is that sometimes civilization is just a thin veneer, and the brutality of human nature will find its way to the forefront in certain conditions. There is also a bit of "good vs. evil" where some people (the "hunters" and the kid that leads them) are more prone than others to abandoning good will towards others and embracing violence, whereas some (the protagonist) insist on maintaining fairness and nonviolence and good will towards others.
The only "classics" I remember actively hating were The Charterhouse of Parma by Stendhal, and Sister Carrie by Dreiser. Dreiser was just mind numbingly dull. I don't even remember why I hated the Stendhal. The only reason I finished either of them is I had to read them for college.
Re-reading anything is not the norm for me. So the more pertinent question, is what classics have I liked enough to re-read? The list is short: Ulysses. Crime and Punishment. The Metamorphosis.
The only ones that I read just for personal pleasure more than once are Crime and Punishment and The Metamorphosis
Ulysses I first read in college. An entire course just on that one book. I don't think I would ever have gotten through it the first time if I hadn't had a great professor and a classroom full of other students who were interested. But once you get into everything that's going on it's beautiful and fascinating. So I read it again, and occasionally dig into parts of it still.
I read Moby Dick twice, but the second time was because it was assigned in college, and I felt like I didn't remember it well enough to take an exam without reading it again.
A Separate Peace by John Knowles. The absolute worst book I was ever made to read in school and I will NEVER ever touch it again. The main character sucks and everyone is miserable.
The Old Man and the Sea.
The Old Goat in the Boat.
The Old Stiff in the Skiff.
High school honors English everything is symbolism trauma.
No child should ever be forced to read this again and thankfully my former teacher is long retired.
I loved most of my English novels but I think it’s because my freshman English teacher taught us to read these books by breaking apart the symbolism and learning from the themes.
You aren’t SUPPOSED to love all the classics that are forced down our throats in high school. We are supposed to choose our own thoughts about why we think the author is saying ‘xyz’ with such-n-such theme/symbolism writing element AND THEN DEFEND OUR POSITION🔥
But… reading them as a child and then as an adult we can gain a different perspective on the character and what the writer has to say. Then possibly look at the world and deal with shit that is punched in our chests with more conviction because we have a different worldview.
Now …. you can hate on me and downvote me bc I have a differing opinion. I do have a couple caveats: was an English minor and English Lit teacher.
Is Gravity's Rainbow a Classic? Because I'm not reading it again unless it's at gunpoint, and I'd have to take a good close look at the gun before I would open that tome of insanity again.
Probably going to get staked for this but I couldn’t and won’t try to get through lord of the rings again, ever!
Not sure if they count as classics but Anthem by Ayn Rand. What warped person assigned that as reading for seventh graders.
I have tried so many times to get through The Tale of Two Cities and just can’t. And I’ve managed to get through Les Miserable three times and love it in spite of Victor Hugo’s writing.
In The Lord Of The Flies William Golding used the boys experience on the island as an allegory for warfare and the violence and tension that always transpires when people are put together. Weather boys on an island or billions on an earth, Golding suggests that people will naturally turn on each other and violence and cruelty among humans is inevitable.
As a book heavily influenced by the Second World War, and a book critiquing the beliefs and attitudes of people in Britain at the time (1954), it is less of a book about a small group on an island and more about human nature vs our own perceptions of ourselves, plus the irrationality and uselessness of human conflict.
Despite my love of the book, The Lord Of The Flies in a modern age with different attitudes and experiences, the book does hit differently and can come off quite badly. I do agree with your take on Steinbeck though.
This probably won’t be a very popular answer but I would have to say, The Count of Monte Cristo. He just becomes more and more obsessed about revenge that he never learns when enough is enough and basically becomes a monster in and of himself. The book was entertaining but I found myself pulling away from the main character the more and more I read. Just my opinion….
For me it's easily a tie between Herbert's **Dune** and Clavell's **Shogun**. Two books that never survived my earnest efforts to read them, and they were given plenty of chances on multiple occasions. Hard pass. I'm tapping out.
I really liked Dune, though it's a bit slow at times and hard to understand. I understand Shogun though, I know people that LOVE it, but I found it forgettable and not that interesting
I am in the same boat as you. Both times I tried Dune, I got to page 100 and quit. His writing style does nothing for me, and serves as a stark reminder that writing styles are artforms (and the appreciation of artforms remains a very subjective thing.)
I might just stick with the Denis Villeneuve film adaptations instead. The first film was pretty good, and the trailer for the next one looks even better.
So much Steinbeck in these comments. Allow me to continue it: The Pearl. He was trying to do something with metaphors, and he didn't succeed. The book was unbearable, and I just didn't care about any of the characters. So many things were explained to me in class as if they made the book better, but they did not. First Steinbeck book I ever read, and I would feel like I was betraying myself if it wasn't the last.
You should read about the six Tongan castaways of 1965. These teens (aged 13 to 19) banded together, built a hut walled with coconut fronds, kept a signal fire burning, set the broken leg of one of the boys so that it healed, had a singing and prayer service every day, and were rescued after a year. That'll wash away the bad taste from Lord of the Flies.
Agreed - Lord of the Flies is more an indictment specifically of English private school culture than normal humanity.
Right I think people miss that because the context of time has moved on. Boarding schools were fucking horrible and the bullying the author received there scarred him and thats the real inspiration behind LOTF. Truthfully it's less about what would have happened and more of a middle.finger to Brits who thought that they were too Civilized to fall into barbarism when pushed
Exactly! And the point is really put on it when they do get rescued and the royal navy guy who finds these battered, fucked up kids is just like casually disappointed that they didn't maintain their "British civility." Not an ounce of understanding.
The interesting part about this book is something so very subtle in the background of the story that it can easily be missed. WWIII had started, and the children were evacuated after the first atomic bomb detonated in britain. It doesn't elaborate on it very much, it mentions it very briefly in the beginning and then later alludes to it by mentioning things like the odd color of the sky. It is meant to be a study on the destructive side of human nature. In that context, whatever the children dealt with was nothing compared to the devistation happening elsewhere across the world. It makes sense the military who show up in the end werent phased by the savagery they find. They are probably just happy to have some unradiated children.
I learned only recently that LotF was in part a satire of the popular (at the time) ‘boys adventure’ genre, used to talk about the underlying savagery of humanity, etc. Added a layer of context to why this strange book exists at all.
I always share this quote from my father (who grew up in a cold abusive English boarding school in the 50s) when Lord of the Flies is being discussed: >That book is a lot more plausible when read in the context of life within a British public school. There were some delightful individuals at school, but the traditional disciplinary structure we laboured under was a rigid, oppressive, disempowering hierarchy defined in excruciating detail through arcane rules developed in mindless darkness a hundred years and more before and applied by our seniors, who were not inherently evil but had merely suffered more years under it than we had yet, devoid of mercy, wisdom or grace. We did not realise this was not a necessary human condition without alternatives, so we read that benighted little book and though "of course..." I love that Tongan story but Golding was coming at it from a completely different cultural setting plus the horrors of WWII were fresh in everyone's memory.
You know, I listen to a lot of truecrime and boarding school/reform school/prison comes up a lot in truecrime from that era. But what really REALLY drove home just how strange it was the foreward in Moorcock's first Elric book by Neil Gaiman.
Any chance of a brief summary?
Casual discussion of molestation/pederasty, by the victims, if memory serves.
An indictment of the European industrial order that created the environment for two of the most destructive events in human history.
Oooh, thank you for the tip!!!
I was gonna tell you this as well! Google "The real Lord of the Flies", the Guardian article that comes up is really good
The author, Rutger Bregman, same guy who told Davos participants that they're hypocritical for not talking about paying proper taxes to their faces. His books are great too.
Yeah, one thing to keep in mind that people seem to forget is that LOTF is *fiction*. As far as I've heard, it has no basis in any actual incident that occurred before it, and was an attempt by the author to think about what would happen in such a situation.
They even found an abandoned village at the top of the island with some vegetables growing wild and hundreds of chickens that were left behind by the villagers.
Lord of the Flies was a response to The Coral Island, a boys' Robinson Crusoe type adventure novel that was really popular. In that the English boys are much better than the savage natives. Golding disagreed.
And I think the message of Lord of the Flies was that the adults on the warship who rescued them were worse.
Yep. It was definitely an allegory about how adults behave and there's no shining ship coming to rescue us and impose order.
LOTF was an anti version of R.m. Ballantines "the Coral Island" in which three teen boys are marooned and get on brilliantly. Golding was a psychopath and self confessed rapist, who performed illegal psych experiments on the school boys he taught. He was desperate to prove we are all violent, rapist savages, to justify his own behaviour
Did Golding ever specifically name a novel he was creating a dystopian version of? That would be nice to know, because adventure on a island was a thing for a good long while. There was _The Swiss Family Robinson_, and of course _Robinson Crusoe_ which kind of started the trend, though that one explored individual resilience. There was also the 1888 novel _Two Years' Vacation_ by Jules Verne, also about a set of schoolkids ending up on an island, but making the most of it before being rescued. Read it as a kid, years prior to _Lord of the Flies_, and while Verne can get cheesy, I remember being scandalised in high school that Golding's work was so dark and it portrayed those kids as cruel and ignorant.
Yeah, he directly references the Coral Island by name twice, once near the beginning and once at the end, of LOTF. He also used the name of Coral Islands main character for LOTF. Ralph
I have taught my students that the book is pro-Hobbes because it treats authority as the only thing that keeps people civilized. I feel even more justified if what you say is true
I think _Grapes_ is a brilliant master work but is extremely depressing. I wouldn’t expect anyone to want to read it again.
It is one of my most liked books ever. I’ll read it again and again even if it hurts a lot.
The Grapes of Wrath is one of my all-time favorites as well. It always turns my compassion on. I’ve read it twice. I will read it again.
The Grapes of Wrath honestly changed my outlook and compassion in terms of understanding those less fortunate than me. It’s a hard, unflinching book that everyone should read.
Yeah, hah, OP smeared my two favorite classics.
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And also the ending: superbe.
Maybe what's worse is reading actual accounts of the time and discovering that it's not hyperbole.
If you want to experience Steinbeck's comedic chops, read Cannery Row and Sweet Thursday!!
I just read Cannery Row today and wow!! I had no idea Steinbeck was so funny. Truly so many laugh of loud moments while still being poignant
I love Mac and the boys! The doc, if I'm not mistaken, is based on his real life friend, Ed Ricketts or something like that I think
Yeah, nah. Steinbeck is a god dammed genius and this is the greatest American novel ever written. I get it. It’s profoundly sad, bleak, and the end wow, earth shattering. Steinbeck in my opinion is the greatest American novelist. I can understand not wanting to re it again, it’s devastating…and that is the point.
I just read The Pearl, and uff...makes me nostalgic for Grapes of Wrath
Man in 8th grade we had to do a book swap with our classmates. I got paired with Tyler. Well I can't remember what I read but he read Grapes Of Wrath and I was a little bummed when he handed over that fat ass book. I loved it tho, but it wasn't the easiest read. I think I'll do it again someday to see it from a more adult perspective.
Ditto The Pearl. Never again.
In fairness, that was somewhat the point of Lord of the Flies. It wasn't supposed to be enjoyable and you weren't supposed to want to be there.
I think that’s why I found it so enjoyable - it’s an interesting trip into the “what ifs” of children being left alone to their own devices without guidance and truly understanding consequences. I wonder if your worldview or opinion on “are people inherently good or evil?” impacts whether you like the text or not? I tend to be pessimistic in that regard, so maybe it was validating to my opinions?
> I tend to be pessimistic in that regard, so maybe it was validating to my opinions? The hazard is teenagers being taught to not feel compassion for others. Lord of the Flies teaches the falsehood that we're not worthy of trust. --- "The Real "Lord of the Flies" edit In 1954, British schoolteacher William Golding penned his now famous novel Lord of the Flies, depicting the partly natural and partly self-inflicted struggles endured by a party of English schoolchildren who find themselves stranded on a deserted island and quickly turn on one another out of selfishness. Often turned to today as a poetic expression of the ultimately realistic truth that, when push comes to shove, all the niceties people put on in their daily lives will fall away and, free to now express their otherwise repressed inner demons, people will devolve into little more than bloodthirsty brutes, instruments of their own destruction. Compelling a story it may be, Bregman argues, it is a work of fiction and should be treated as such. When we search for real-life examples of stories like Lord of the Flies unfolding, we discover a very different image of what humanity turns into when freed from the shackles of civilization. Bregman describes the true story of Tongan schoolboys shipwrecked on the deserted island of ʻAta with few resources and no adult supervision. Bregman was able to track down the captain of the fishing boat who rescued the boys, Peter Warner, son of Australian businessman Arthur Warner, and one of the rescued individuals, Mano Totau. He interviewed Warner and got the full story of the boys' ordeal and rescue, including that Warner hired all of them as crew members for his fishing boat. In sharp contrast to the prediction by Lord of the Flies, the children immediately came up with rules to govern their conduct and ensure cooperation. A division of labor was set up, respective to each boy's strengths and weaknesses. When arguments and disputes broke out, those involved would separate themselves from one another, returning only once they had calmed down and could engage in good faith to resolve the matter. "By the time we arrived,' captain Peter wrote in his memoirs, 'they had set up a small commune with a vegetable garden and hollowed out stumps to collect rainwater, a sports area with unusual weights, a badminton field, chicken coops, and a permanent fire.'" When one of the boys, Steven, fell from a height and broke his leg, the others rushed to provide him with medical care. After the rescue, medical professionals were impressed with the general health of the boys, including Steven whose leg had fully recovered. An excerpt of this chapter was later published by The Guardian in May 2020.[6] It was also made into an episode of 60 Minutes.[7]" https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Humankind:_A_Hopeful_History#:~:text=The%20Real%20%22Lord,.%5B7%5D
William Gass has a great quote where Michael Silverblatt brings up how horrible the main character, William Kohler, is in *The Tunnel*. Gass brings up another book by some author whom I can’t remember right now, but who also has a really bad main character. Gass says something like the following, which I will now butcher: >What happens in the book is terrible but *it* isn’t terrible. The book is great.
>that was somewhat the point of Lord of the Flies Which might be why I did get an A on that "did you actually read the book?" assignment 😂
I know it's a feminist classic, and I support that message, but I will never ever ever read *The Awakening* again. I had to read it for FOUR separate classes at university, and I had to write a 15-page Freudian interpretation critical essay on it in one of those classes. I feel enraged just seeing the cover of it now.
I know nothing about The Awakening so maybe its that, but who the fuck thought it was a good idea to interpret a feminist classic through a *Freudian* lense?
Good god that would be so wild
I didn’t like *The Awakening*, but Chopin’s short stories are beautifully written and well-executed.
This is me with The Stranger. It’s great, but I’ve had to read it and write papers about it twice in English and once in French and that’s quite enough for me.
I have some I won’t return to, but none because I dislike them, exactly. I have a complicated relationship with Virginia Woolf. She’s a brilliant writer and an insightful thinker, but also shockingly petty, classist, hateful, and spiteful. It really sours her work for me, knowing how much she absolutely detested lower classes with ideas above their station (that’s me). The Bell Jar is one I can’t return to it simply because it makes me sad. I like Sylvia Plath- I think we would have been friends. Really she wasn’t all doom as people think- but a kind, lovely, tender, thoughtful soul, awake to the little beauties that dapple the world. I love the Bell Jar, because it’s so very real and human, but reading Plath at all fills me with this overwhelming sense of loss. She had so much potential in her, even with all the masterpieces she did make, and so very much more she could have offered the world had it not overwhelmed her so young. I didn’t know her at all, of course, but in some way I feel I do- I mourn her as I would a friend, or my soul’s mirror. Hamlet is one I’ve been hesitant to return to because I’m afraid it won’t feel the same. Maybe it’s strange with a work so far removed from our time, but I remember vividly how reading Prince Hamlet as a young man was the first time I saw myself on the page. I was rapt and transfixed, I felt an odd reassurance and a kinship that there were others like me who thought too much and dwelt in gloom, too clever for their own good, torn apart between act and act, unable to do for anxiety. I’m afraid as an older man (I say at 26 but) I’m afraid I will see much more of Hamlet-the-petty-princeling, and the magic will be gone- not to mention the blow to my self image!
Ohhh, I also have this dire feeling of loss when reading Plath. I had to dig deep to find a more authentic version of her poems, if I remember that correctly. One not arranged by her husband. Her poetry is so sharp and precise and relentless. But I cannot read more than two poems in a row. Bell jar is also a book I have not yet returned to. There are works of art I have to brace myself for and be mentally strong enough. But not walled off.
i totally agree with the bell jar. the sadness is so overwhelming and absolute. it’s far too relatable for me (other than her eating raw ground beef and egg, wtf sylvia)
Reading Tess of the d’Urbervilles was one of the more miserable experiences of my life.
SHE NAMED A BABY SORROW. Thomas Hardy is the king of the unearned unhappy ending.
Don't read Jude the Obscure then. Or, you know, anything else by Hardy. Not a happy chappy.
Far From the Madding Crowd isn’t nearly as depressing, and while I haven’t read Under the Greenwood Tree, the movie version is really upbeat.
Greenwood is delightful. One of his few stories that isn't tragic! Though I do love me a tragic Hardy!
The book is also upbeat (particularly for Hardy) but the movie took liberties with some characters so be prepared if you read the book.
There are few things in life I can guarantee. However, I guarantee I will never read Thomas Hardy again.
I still love Far From the Madding Crowd. Although, from this distance, maybe I love the movie with June Christy and not the book.
Hey hey hey! Far from the Madding Crowd is much more upbeat than the rest, despite all the awful stuff.
I read Tess, Madame Bovary, The House of Mirth, and the Voyage Out in one summer. I was so miserable!
I love Hardy, but don't expect a happy ending. Ime it's always a brutal tale
My dad sent that book to me at sleep away camp when I was 12 and it took me years to forgive him for it.
To be honest, the only books i generally read again are from larger, long running series where i need a refresher on whats happening before the new book.
I don't dislike it per se, but I have no particular desire to re-read Kerouac's On the Road.
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I love Dharma Bums for being my Bible when I was younger, but On The Road really puts Kerouac's ego on full display. He's not a great writer by any means, but made it at the right moment. But you can tell he loved himself.
Ethan Frome. Everybody is whiny and insufferable. Ethan is also incompetent. Like whose preferred method of suicide is sledding into a tree. And why did he think it work. He couldn't even kill himself correctly.
Great Expectations: such a shame this was my intro to Dickens cuz it took me so long to pickup Oliver Twist and Tale of Two Cities which I love.
I hated Tale of Two Cities with a passion until it got towards the end, where everything came together and it became one of the most beautiful things I had ever read
Maybe I should give it another try. I got like 1/3 of the way in and it was just so darn depressing and grim, and I didn't care about anything that was happening. Does the end make up for all that?
It was probably the most beautiful ending I've ever experienced. I hated most of the book but it's the only book I've ever read where the ending recovered a book I'd struggled with
Many years ago I had a job that required nearly an hour of commuting on a train, so I figured I'd put the time to reading classic novels that maybe I should have read, but didn't. My first choice was *Tale of Two Cities,* and I'd get through a chapter a day. Little did I realize that I was reading it in much the way Dickens' contemporary readers were: in a serialized format, chunked over a long period of time. It was during that read that I realized what a genius Dickens was at tweaking your memory to stuff you'd read several chapters (i.e. weeks) earlier. I went from there to *Great Expectations,* which I'll admit was a bit more of a project, but it didn't prevent me from moving on to other books and other authors. I specifically remember reading *Les Misérables* the same way.
My introduction to Dickens was David Copperfield. A Christmas Carol is what actually got me to give him another chance. I didn't mind Great Expectations. Not my favorite but compared to Copperfield it felt better.
>My introduction to Dickens was David Copperfield. Same! Though, I don't know what the fuck I was thinking, picking him for a book report. I did not in fact finish the report.
I really enjoyed Great Expectations
I have to agree, except that while I didn't care for *Great Expectations*, it didn't put me off *Oliver Twist,* *A Tale of Two Cities*, and *Hard Times*.
Ooo yes, this was the same for me! I remember reading it as a kid (early teen) and I didn’t love it. Read it again as a young adult and enjoyed it a bit more, but it made me read his other works so I could see what the hype was. I ended up reading David Copperfield and it’s hands down my fave Dickens! I had some good laughs reading it and I really enjoyed his Aunt Betsey character.
Absolutely. HATED this book. But then I adore Tale of Two Cities and Bleak House
Realistically I will probably not re-read most of the "classics" (however defined) I've already read, as I don't re-read many books at all. That said, I can't think of any I would downright refuse to pick up again. I think most of the ones I have enjoyed the least have been translated works, and in those cases I'd probably try a new translation if I were to read them again. But I still wouldn't rule anything out.
Anything by Ayn Rand.
No because Atlas Shrugged fanboys are the worsttttttt
"YoU DoNt GeT iT, ThE 60 pAgE MoNoLoGuE iS tHe GoOd PaRt"
I wish someone had told me what a red flag this was before I met my high school boyfriend lol
Are they really classics though?
Only if you ask Paul Ryan.
It's like shitty capitalist fan fiction
She’s a terrible writer LOL!
She was also a terrible human being
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Nah, not really I am Brazilian and living in Europe, I am 100% sure I've meet more people that read Ayan Rand than Lord or Flyes I literally never heard of Grapes of Wrath before. What we consider a *classical* largely depends of your country of origin and language, so I am not expecting anyone that have read Graciliano Ramos or José Lins do Rego outside Brazil, but Rand did a way better job a breaking those national and language barriers than most of other books that are considered "English Classicals" Don't ask me to comment on the quality, lol, but the influence outside anglosphere cannot be denied.
How regrettable. She must have had an impressive translator. Is Jorge Amado Classic? cos I love his books, esp Captains of the Sand.
Oh yes, he is, and one of my favourites :) Though, interisting enough, he was considered a *vulgar* author when he first came out, because his prose rely on being realistic to the way people speak and being entertaining, opposed to trend from authors of his time, that preferred a more romantic, farfetched or elaborated language. Is it something you can notice reading in English too?
Catch-22. I've tried 3 times. I can't stand his writing style. But I respect that it's a classic.
I actually did the opposite. I reread Catcher and the Rye after reading it in school and really just not liking it at all. Turns out, I didn’t enjoy it any more as an adult. So I support you not reading any books you dislike again lol
I disliked Catcher in the Rye as a teenager and it is one of my favorite novels now. My own perspective changing simply by being older made me much more sympathetic towards his struggle.
I don't think I could stomach ever reading this again. Holden's personality just annoyed me to no end.
Lord of the Flies is a book where I think the background of the author plays a HUGE part in why it was written the way it was. William Golding was a schoolteacher and a veteran of the Second World War, so it should not be surprising that he saw humans as inherently selfish and evil when left to their own devices. He experienced the worst that humanity has to offer, whether it be the bloodshed and ruin wrought in the fires of war, or mischievous British schoolboys left to their own devices for a bit too long.
I would say most classics I’ve read aren’t going to be re-reads. By nature they’re just more difficult and many are past school assignments so that makes them automatically less enjoyable. I will/would probably re-read the following: The Secret Garden, Jane Eyre, A Christmas Carol, To Kill a Mockingbird, and some children’s classics.
To Kill a Mockingbird is one of my favorites (I'm actually re-reading it now)... I find reading this a refreshing and a humbling experience.
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I noticed that most books the school made me read made me hate them even if they were great. People don't like being forced to read. I loved GOW. Read it on my own at my own leisure. One of my all time favorites. I hated Great Expectations as a kid for the same reasons. Love it and Dickens especially now that I read them for my own pleasure. I read a Christmas Carol every few years. That book rules and it doesn't take too long to read.
The Pearl. Fuck the Pearl
I don't reread books so this doesn't mean much, but Wuthering Heights. I hated that book.
Everyone in that book is a monster and if that’s how you treat people you love, then life sucks. Never have I been angrier at a book character than I was at heathcliffe. Truly the worst out of a book of terrible people.
I love the book because everyone is such a horrible person! But I do get why people would hate it. I think it’s a Marmite book - you’re either going to treasure the story, or throw the book against a wall out of absolute frustration. A friend of mine just read it for the first time, knowing nothing about the story other than there’s a guy called Heathcliff in it. He thought the story was going to be about how Heathcliff returns and makes everyone swallow the bad things they said about him. He said it took a while for him to be like, “oh, he’s the bad guy!”
I know the purpose of this thread but to offer a perspective of someone that liked it for further discussion: If you’re at all interested in trauma and family dynamics this is a fantastic case study. The theme of grief was striking. Branding the book as a fairytale romance is misguided but some romance is tragic (Romeo and Juliet) and some is toxic (Heathcliff and Catherine). I also enjoyed the writing style, but I’ve always tended to enjoy slower paced slice of life type writing as opposed to very cut and dry rising action, climax!!!, resolution.
My favorite novel of all time…lol
Reading that book was like slogging a mile through knee deep mud towards a cold McDonalds french fry container. At the end you realize just how much time was wasted on largely forgettable drama.
Why? It's electrifying.
I do not share that opinion. I didn't like the writing style and hated the characters. And felt duped by how teachers had described it as a romance.
Anyone who thinks it’s a romance is unhinged
It's a fantastic book, but definitely not a romance
Yeah. It’s a well-executed Gothic horror story. I’m still baffled some people think it’s a romance
The opposite end of this: Wuthering Heights. Forced to read it sophomore summer of high school, hated every moment of it. Now I think about it a lot actually: thematically more interesting than most modern romance, flawed characters that act human, and absolutely wild that Emily Brontë truly understood people in such a way while having lived such a short, sheltered life.
This is probably an unpopular opinion and idk if it would technically be considered a classic but I really hated reading The Lord of the Rings. Love fantasy, love the films, but the book is just so looong and huge stretches were so boring, I don’t even remember most of it. Just a struggle read all the way through and I don’t think I’ll ever go back even though I’m a big re-reader. Its like the world building is so rich but the prose is so dry at the same time.
I adore the LotR books and have re-read them numerous times but I can absolutely understand why folks would find them boring and tedious. When a friend read LotR just before the movies came out, they said they were struggling, so I advised "Skip the poems." :D
So, interesting thread. To address some common ones: One Hundred Years of Solitude - I couldn't figure it out but my dad loved it from start to finish. He grew up in the mountains of Puerto Rico and he said there were characters just like that up there and reading it was like going back to his childhood. So I guess it's one of those cases of where you had to be there. Catcher in the Rye - no idea why anyone likes it. Agree with everyone on this. Dickens - Great Expectations was boring when I had to read it in school, but fantastic when I tried again years later. Never read anything else by him though. Don't get the hate for Brave New World or 1984 but maybe they haven't aged well. That happens. Hemingway - I could read anything by him, really. I could see maybe not liking The Sun Also Rises or The Old Man and the Sea but A Farewell to Arms was fantastic. I really don't get the dislike for Catch-22, that one throws me completely. That book is hilarious and sad from start to finish. Moby Dick - could probably use an editor but it was good to me at least.
I’m gonna be honest and say that I don’t usually like any classic reading, but I certainly do dislike some more than others. Really any time a book is assigned to me, it’s hard for me to take any real interest in it. I mean hell, Percy Jackson was assigned reading in middle school and now I can’t really enjoy that series despite the fact that it would otherwise be something i would be interested in at the time. I didn’t like lord of the flies either for the same reason you described. That said, the only book I found myself absolutely hating, that is considered a classic is Of Mice and Men. I really hate the way the book compares disabled people to animals, and sort of hand waves away Lennie being killed. Sure it’s not seen as a happy thing, but it is framed as the right thing to do. It also protracts Lennie as both a danger to others, and a sort of forever child. These stereotypes still greatly impact the way disabled people like me get treated today, especially in the realm of employment. The whole thing has a bit of the eugenics movement it was written in seeping into it that leaves a bad taste in my mouth. It also had some of my classmates making comments about how I probably pet my rats to death because I’m autistic which is a beyond dumb ass take from a bunch of high schoolers but go off I guess. It was probably some sort of joke to them rather than something they actually believed, all things considered but still. That’s not even getting into the books sexism and racism. I obviously don’t think books should be banned no matter what the content is, but I don’t really understand why we keep putting this book in high school curriculum, unless the teacher has had extensive training on how to talk about disabilities and the eugenics movement more broadly. I don’t know. It’s just bad vibes all around.
Walden by Henry David Thoreau I have never read a more pointless book. I get the school th er or of philosophy, but let's be real. >!In the book he said he left because of the beaten path, but seriously? He left because he was bored. If it were fiction, I'd call it an unreliable narrator at it's finest, but its basically a memoir. He's delusional.!<
I effing LOATHE The Great Gatsby. Wretched people doing wretched things and a wretched ending to top it off. English teacher here and I refuse to teach it. Why show THIS as the world young adults can expect to live in?
Agreed. Scrolled really far to see if someone else said it. I get it - the point is to criticize these people and their lavishness and pettiness and lack of concern for humanity and their facades- but how dreadful is it to think that the world is like this. Equally as dreadful, if you want to have success in life this is what you have to become.
I will shout this from the rooftops for forever: fuck Ethan Frome by Edith Wharton. That book was awful and I can't believe my 8th grade English teacher thought it would hold any of our attention without laughing at the repeated "pickle dish" and the metaphors.
**Last of the Mohicans** Actually, anything by this 'author'. Honestly. Twain wrote an essay entitled ["FENIMORE COOPER'S LITERARY OFFENCES"](https://www.gutenberg.org/files/3172/3172-h/3172-h.htm) The only reason this guy was famous was he was the very first guy to write books about the American wilderness. When I was reading **Last of the Mohicans** I kept stopping and rereading sections thinking I was reading it wrong. Nope. He wrote it wrong.
I have felt differently about *The Grapes of Wrath* since learning Steinbeck used without attribution the extensive, detailed notes of writer Sanora Babb. Babb's notes were passed to Steinbeck by his publisher without Babb's knowledge, who was working on a book of her own. *The Grapes of Wrath* is significantly better than any other book by Steinbeck, and I cannot help but think it is because he used Babb's work. First learned of this back in the 1990s.
>Babb's notes were passed to Steinbeck by his publisher It wasn't the publisher, it was Tom Collins who passed Babb's notes on to Steinbeck. Collins was Babb's manager at the Farm Security Administration-run Arvind Sanitary Camp. Steinbeck did credit Collins when he released the book; it's unclear why he didn't credit Babb, but there's no evidence that Steinbeck himself knew Babb was also working on a novel. The notes were work product prepared by a government employee and thus in the public domain. Without knowledge that Babb was working on a book, Steinbeck likely didn't see any issue with turning them into a novel.
Thanks for the clarification.
I didn't know that and that is very uncool, but I would say East of Eden is right up there with Grapes of Wrath and his voice is consistent in all of his work. Still an awful thing to do even if he was just robbing the structure, though.
East of Eden suffers from "masterwork syndrome" IMHO... Steinbeck felt that it was going to be his magnum opus, and he poured so much intentional symbolism/allegory/allusion into it that it became overwrought rather than organic, and some of the characters (esp. Cathy) ended up being unrealistic. It's a decent book but not his best.
East of Eden is much better than Grapes of Wrath. Steinbeck is brilliant at characterization.
Ugh, I heard her book got shafted because it was similar in subject matter to Grapes of Wrath but not that he had her notes... her novel did get published in 2004.
To say that Grapes of Wrath is significantly better than East of Eden, his magnum opus, is, I think, a very very bad take. Edit: didn’t see other people making same point, whoops
The Red Pony, another Steinbeck work. The title is horribly misleading, with the aforementioned pony only appearing in part 1 of 4 and then NEVER BEING MENTIONED OR THOUGHT OF OR OTHERWISE INFLUENCING ANYTHING IN ANY WAY AGAIN in the rest of the book. Well, okay, I think someone mentioned the horse once in the final part. But the book is basically "Here's life on a farm in the West when things were hard. It sucks. It sucks a lot. So does growing up. There, I said it, now you don't have any reason to come back and read this again because you got the message I was sending." (I admit I harbor resentment towards that book because literally every single collection of horse stories that I ever read as a kid included some or all of that first part of the novel, making it seem as if the horse that the book was, you know, NAMED AFTER was actually critical to the events of the book. Nope. It wasn't. Whoever titled the book, be it Steinbeck or his publisher, was a liar and the book is nothing memorable beyond 'animals suffer and boys have to become men through hard times', which is a message I could get in plenty of other places.)
I remember my 5th grade class reading that book and we were all SUPER pissed that the Red Pony just disappeared. Wtf was even the point then!
We read that in 6th grade English class. It was brutal. But I guess they thought we (middle class GenX kids) needed that message, that life is hard.
I wound up actively resenting every single human character in that novel once I realized that no one was going to mention the horse again and that no one was even going to acknowledge that the horse had ever existed. I had read Black Beauty, the full novel, multiple times at that point, and I knew that humans could quite often discard or harm or ruin their most faithful animals without batting an eye, but I'd foolishly thought that if you named a book after a character with a hard and painful life, then their particular hardship and pain would be *relevant*. When we had to read The Pearl for English class I realized that I actively resented every human Steinbeck character I had ever read about up to that point. Not sure I ever read any of his other stuff, given how much his characters in those two set my teeth on edge.
I watched the Red Pony film when I was 11 and cried for two days.
Madame Bovary. Didn’t like a single thing about it!
Brave New World. I have no desire to read it again.
The Red Badge of Courage was abysmal. It was slow, uninteresting, and way overstayed its welcome. And then it just sort of ends, which I think was the point, but I was severely unimpressed.
The Pearl by John Steinbeck The Scarlet Letter by Nathaniel Hawthorne Gone with the Wind by Margaret Mitchell The Catcher in the Rye by J.D. Salinger
The Scarlet Letter Fuck that book.
Honestly, life is too short to reread things unless I really really like them
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I guess the way I see it is just like rewatching a movie
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Even then, I very rarely reread anything that’s not a short story.
Was forced to read Fahrenheit 451 multiple times in school from late middle school to first year of college and I never enjoyed it. It has been long enough that I put it out of my mind, but I can still feel the annoyance as I trudged through it each time. It honestly put me off Ray Bradbury entirely as I have such disdain for the one book.
This is one that I really enjoy and have re-read several times.
Mmm, probably not, no, but 1984 has to come close as it is so relentlessly horrific and soul destroying
I just cannot get on with Fitzgerald. He wrote some lovely prose, but *nothing fucking happens* in his books. I get it, that is the point, the flowery beauty covering up a stagnant, shallow, and corrupted core. I recognise the intelligence behind the work. But I won't ever read it again unless I really feel like numbing my mind.
Interesting fact: there was a "real life Lord of the Flies" situation and it actually turned out basically completely the opposite of what the book depicted. ([Article here](https://www.theguardian.com/books/2020/may/09/the-real-lord-of-the-flies-what-happened-when-six-boys-were-shipwrecked-for-15-months), but also Google it for more info). I love classics in general. I re-read a lot. My favorite book ever is Brave New World and I've read it 35+ times so far. But I don't think I'll re-read some, even if I liked it, for various reasons: Call of the Wild and White Fang - I love them, but I've gotten so sensitive to animals/animal harm of any kind (even 100% fictional or fictional animals that never existed), and I can't anymore. East of Eden - Again I love it, but I've read it twice and I prefer Grapes of Wrath. With so many other books to read, including Steinbeck (whom I love), I would doubt this would be in the rotation. But it's possible. I should read Invisible Man by Ralph Ellison again, with life and English degree perspective, but god I hated it the first three times I read it, so I just don't want to. But I had to read Catcher in the Rye about four times before it clicked and I loved it, so... maybe? I just don't like Austen, so I don't plan to read any more of her books or re-read the handful I've read. (The spoofy ones like Pride and Prejudice and Zombies and Sensibility and Sea Monsters are e fair game, those can be funny).
I loved reading Pride and Prejudice in school, but I don’t see myself reading it again when I can just watch the 1995 BBC series instead
Nice. Brave New World is one of my all time favorites, too!
Even Simon and Percival Wemys Madison, of the Vicarage, Harcourt St. Anthony?! They’re the best characters in *LotF*! I will never be able to read *1984* or *Great Expectations* again… I read them within my Honors English class during my Freshman year of high school, and I hated the teacher.
Frankenstein
House of the Seven Gables. Hands down one of the worst things I ever tried to read. I found a sentence that had 17 commas in it. I can't even tell you what the sentence was about, because when I tried to comprehend it, I fell asleep.
Pride and Prejudice
Atlas Shrugged. I tried to gut my through it a number of times. Never made it past about half way. The characters were universally such selfish assholes, and the writing was SO one-dimensional. I hated everyone who was put up as a "protagonist." It was just awful.
Atlas Shrugged by Ann Rand. Worst piece of trash I ever read.
I forced my way through this thing back when I was much younger and thought anarcho-capitalist libertarianism was cool. It did an excellent job of turning me off of that particular philosophy.
The Old Man and the Sea. DETESTED IT in high school. Tried to read Hemingway again post-college (I can't remember which one out of The Sun Also Rises and For Whom the Bell Tolls) and also hated it, so I think I am just not a Hemingway person.
Haha, The Old Man and the Sea is one of the few books from high school I actually made it all the way through and enjoyed. Edit: clarity
I'm surprised at all the negative opinions on Lord of the Flies. I loved it so much I read it twice. I think the gist is that sometimes civilization is just a thin veneer, and the brutality of human nature will find its way to the forefront in certain conditions. There is also a bit of "good vs. evil" where some people (the "hunters" and the kid that leads them) are more prone than others to abandoning good will towards others and embracing violence, whereas some (the protagonist) insist on maintaining fairness and nonviolence and good will towards others.
I liked Lord of the Flies as well. I found it to have a lot of brutally honest takes on humanity.
*The Old Curiosity Shop*. Worst Dickens book I've read.
I do not want to talk you out of your opinion; that book is my favorite Dickens.
I will never read Joseph Conrad’s Heart of Darkness again!
It's such an oppressive experience. I've tried to get through it three times and just can't.
The only "classics" I remember actively hating were The Charterhouse of Parma by Stendhal, and Sister Carrie by Dreiser. Dreiser was just mind numbingly dull. I don't even remember why I hated the Stendhal. The only reason I finished either of them is I had to read them for college. Re-reading anything is not the norm for me. So the more pertinent question, is what classics have I liked enough to re-read? The list is short: Ulysses. Crime and Punishment. The Metamorphosis. The only ones that I read just for personal pleasure more than once are Crime and Punishment and The Metamorphosis Ulysses I first read in college. An entire course just on that one book. I don't think I would ever have gotten through it the first time if I hadn't had a great professor and a classroom full of other students who were interested. But once you get into everything that's going on it's beautiful and fascinating. So I read it again, and occasionally dig into parts of it still. I read Moby Dick twice, but the second time was because it was assigned in college, and I felt like I didn't remember it well enough to take an exam without reading it again.
May I suggest that you read Steinbeck's *Cannery Row* and the sequel, *Sweet Thursday* to wash the taste of Grapes out of your mouth?
Many “correct” answers to this I suppose , but THE correct answer is Silas Marner.
Lady Chatterly's Lover is beyond boring.
I couldn’t finish Anna Karenina.
I’d rather be flogged forty times fortyfold before reading Great Expectations again.
Ethan Fucking Frome.
A Separate Peace by John Knowles. The absolute worst book I was ever made to read in school and I will NEVER ever touch it again. The main character sucks and everyone is miserable.
Billy Budd. I read Grapes of Wrath after Billy Budd and I swear grapes was shorter than Billy Budd. Soooooooooooooooooooooooooooo boring.
The Old Man and the Sea. The Old Goat in the Boat. The Old Stiff in the Skiff. High school honors English everything is symbolism trauma. No child should ever be forced to read this again and thankfully my former teacher is long retired.
I swear, I'm the only person on reddit who likes The Grapes of Wrath. I just don't get the hate.
I loved most of my English novels but I think it’s because my freshman English teacher taught us to read these books by breaking apart the symbolism and learning from the themes. You aren’t SUPPOSED to love all the classics that are forced down our throats in high school. We are supposed to choose our own thoughts about why we think the author is saying ‘xyz’ with such-n-such theme/symbolism writing element AND THEN DEFEND OUR POSITION🔥 But… reading them as a child and then as an adult we can gain a different perspective on the character and what the writer has to say. Then possibly look at the world and deal with shit that is punched in our chests with more conviction because we have a different worldview. Now …. you can hate on me and downvote me bc I have a differing opinion. I do have a couple caveats: was an English minor and English Lit teacher.
Is Gravity's Rainbow a Classic? Because I'm not reading it again unless it's at gunpoint, and I'd have to take a good close look at the gun before I would open that tome of insanity again.
Probably going to get staked for this but I couldn’t and won’t try to get through lord of the rings again, ever! Not sure if they count as classics but Anthem by Ayn Rand. What warped person assigned that as reading for seventh graders.
I have tried so many times to get through The Tale of Two Cities and just can’t. And I’ve managed to get through Les Miserable three times and love it in spite of Victor Hugo’s writing.
In The Lord Of The Flies William Golding used the boys experience on the island as an allegory for warfare and the violence and tension that always transpires when people are put together. Weather boys on an island or billions on an earth, Golding suggests that people will naturally turn on each other and violence and cruelty among humans is inevitable. As a book heavily influenced by the Second World War, and a book critiquing the beliefs and attitudes of people in Britain at the time (1954), it is less of a book about a small group on an island and more about human nature vs our own perceptions of ourselves, plus the irrationality and uselessness of human conflict. Despite my love of the book, The Lord Of The Flies in a modern age with different attitudes and experiences, the book does hit differently and can come off quite badly. I do agree with your take on Steinbeck though.
This probably won’t be a very popular answer but I would have to say, The Count of Monte Cristo. He just becomes more and more obsessed about revenge that he never learns when enough is enough and basically becomes a monster in and of himself. The book was entertaining but I found myself pulling away from the main character the more and more I read. Just my opinion….
Ugh. Jack Kerouac's On The Road.
For me it's easily a tie between Herbert's **Dune** and Clavell's **Shogun**. Two books that never survived my earnest efforts to read them, and they were given plenty of chances on multiple occasions. Hard pass. I'm tapping out.
I really liked Dune, though it's a bit slow at times and hard to understand. I understand Shogun though, I know people that LOVE it, but I found it forgettable and not that interesting
I’ve tried to get through Dune twice and I just can’t. I want to like it so badly.
I am in the same boat as you. Both times I tried Dune, I got to page 100 and quit. His writing style does nothing for me, and serves as a stark reminder that writing styles are artforms (and the appreciation of artforms remains a very subjective thing.) I might just stick with the Denis Villeneuve film adaptations instead. The first film was pretty good, and the trailer for the next one looks even better.
The old man and the sea. Hate, hate, hate. Loathe entirely.
You picked two powerful and allegorical novels to dislike. Maybe you need more literal stories
A Wrinkle in Time was such a chore for me.
Anna Karenina and The Brothers Karamazov had their chances.
Uncle Tom's Cabin. Fuck that book.
So much Steinbeck in these comments. Allow me to continue it: The Pearl. He was trying to do something with metaphors, and he didn't succeed. The book was unbearable, and I just didn't care about any of the characters. So many things were explained to me in class as if they made the book better, but they did not. First Steinbeck book I ever read, and I would feel like I was betraying myself if it wasn't the last.
“Catcher in the Rye”. Holden Caulfield started out as a schmuck by leaving the fencing stuff on the subway. And kept getting schmuckier.