The Classics

[green rubber bands]

I used to have the mindset about classic books that they were boring and unnecessarily complex, and avoided them completely. But recently I've read Great Expectations and Oliver Twist by Dickens, and am currently reading For Whom the Bell Tolls by Hemmingway, and all of them are great. But on the other hand, I've read some sub-par classics (*cough*cough* The Scarlet Letter), so I feel that I wasn't completely wrong in my prejudice.

In general, do you guys like the classics, or feel that they are over-hyped? Also, what constitutes a classic in your mind?

[charcoal]

It's a classic if Penguin, Wordsworth, Oxford or Routlege Classics publish it.
I have started picking novels out of the cheap classics section whenever I'm in book shops. Lately, I've read Paradise Lost, Around the World in Eighty Days, Frankenstein, The Mill on the Floss, Heart of Darkness, Lady Chatterley's Lover, and some others. As far as I'm concerned, why trawl through book shops looking for a book that looks like it might be good when you can drop into the classics section and pick up something with a guaranteed standard. They wouldn't be as famous as they are if they were crap, right?
(Although, I hate Austen, Dickens, the Brontes, etc. and Lady Chatterley's Lover was pure softcore, so it's not an infallible method of getting a good read.)

[Oofie]

Crime and Punishment changed my mind about classics. I used to think they were too much work, but after reading Dostoyevsky I decided to give them a proper chance. I now love them, and like charcoal, I end up buying loads of cheap penguin softbacks whenever I'm in a bookshop.

[Jiggz]

Penguin is my staple literary diet. But not the novels mentioned above. I had a go at Great Expectations, but couldn't stomach it.

[Cristo]

I loved The Coral Island and 20,000 Leagues under the Sea, and I'm reading War of the Worlds at the moment, all of which have been truly enjoyable.

[timbot]

I am definitely a fan of the classics. Like Charcoal said, there is some standard for them. Trying to find a new book is tough. Just because it's popular doesn't mean it's good. In fact, the most vapid, and therefore worst, books are often most popular. Koontz, King, Grisham, etc. and all those genre series novels, romances and bad sci-fi. Sure they're huge sellers, but for the most part don't stand up to the classics. The classics aren't usually as popular among the general public, but are considered classics because of people with some training in literature.
Of course, not every classic is great. I've read some I thought were bad. And not every popular writer is bad. I used to be a big fan of King, and I've enjoyed a couple of Carl Hiaasen's books, and he's pretty popular.
I don't think I really got into the classics until I got to college, though.

[Zanna]

i just finished reading Little Women and loved it, i like all those romance classics, a bit of jane austen is always a good read.

[Heloisa]

I really love the classics... Books from George Orwell, for example, really makes me stop and think. When I read 1984, for example, my wolrd completely changed.

Kisses

[charcoal]

I dunno, I thought 1984 was weak in places. You shouldn't need to quote a fictional book for ages and ages to explain things about the world you've created. Poor that he had to use that device.

[INTUNEevolution]

"The Classics" is a really vague term that British people use to keep their crappy authors in print.

Honestly, Brits cannot write. I have no idea as to why they even try.

Especially the Brontes.


Fitzgerald is a good example of the Classics. He made a couple really good books, The Great Gatsby being the best IMO, and didn't dilute his good books with just absolute garbage.


Kisses

Oh, this is going to piss me off.

[Infinity]

I used to really be into the fiction classics. My favorite was Les Mes'. However, I mostly read non-fiction work now. I am reading John Stuart Mills 'on liberity' at this time.

[SuperTaisho]

Bram Stoker's "Dracula" = my favourite book of all time. Followed closely by "Captain Corelli's Mandolin" by Louis de Bernières, "Catch-22" by Joseph Heller and then "1984" by George Orwell. I'd also throw in "Lord of the flies", but I forget who that's by. Also, I agree that the Bronte's might not suit everybody's taste, but you have to admit they could write damn bloody well. They revolutionised female characters in fiction and helped spark off feminism.

[timbot]

"The Classics" is a really vague term that British people use to keep their crappy authors in print.

Honestly, Brits cannot write. I have no idea as to why they even try.

Especially the Brontes.


Fitzgerald is a good example of the Classics. He made a couple really good books, The Great Gatsby being the best IMO, and didn't dilute his good books with just absolute garbage.



Oh, this is going to piss me off.

What? You're too specific here by implying "The Classics" are all by the British. Kafka, Dostoevsky, Poe, Twain, Tolstoy, Hugo...those are just the first that popped into my head that aren't British. Of course, they are all European--and males--but that's different from British. While the term "classic" may be biased toward "dead white men" that doesn't change the fact that most of them are pretty damn good.

I always wondered, though, what is taught in non-European countries when it comes to "The Classics"? I know there is at least some movement in the US to include a broader cultural perspective in the cannon--more women, more non-western authors. But, if I lived in say...Ghana or Korea, what would I be reading? Do they read translations of European authors? If not, are they trying to include more? I'm not saying they should or shouldn't...I'm just curious.

[who_farted]

"The Classics" is a really vague term that British people use to keep their crappy authors in print.

Honestly, Brits cannot write. I have no idea as to why they even try.

Especially the Brontes.


What a load of nonsense... You may not like them, but you can't deny they are good writers.. Dickens, Thackeray, Jane Austen... Orwel, Huxley, Golding.. That's crappy for you???
Ok, I agree that Fitzgerald is an awesome author, but come on, just cause the Brits write more seriously and lengthy doesn't mean it's not good and without humor..

besides, don't you know that generalizations are stupid?

USER WAS PUT IN TIMEOUT FOR THIS POST. (http://forums.explosm.net/eventlog.php)
Reason: Don't... do... this... and also capitalize.

[Salmoness]

Well Faulkner may not be as old, but I'd still consider his books as classic and he's an American. He's in the same modernist period as Virginia Woolf, Joseph Conrad (Polish) and James Joyce (Irish)which are classic to me.

[Oodge]

I'm finding it to be an acquired taste, the more I read the more I can stomach. Hemingway's great, despite him ruining my fun in Death in the Afternoon when i was told to stop reading and watch a bullfight. Conrad I don't dislike, but can't enjoy, although I feel that I will if I simply read more of him. The Bronte's and Austen however will always elude me, the exhausting trollops that they are. Kipling grates as well.

The poetry is incredible though, Keats is by far my favourite.

[hoe_14]

I really love the classics... Books from George Orwell, for example, really makes me stop and think. When I read 1984, for example, my wolrd completely changed.

Kisses

I am reading 1984 right now it's really good and next year in high school I will have to read it again. So far the book is very interesting and I am enjoying it, I actually looked in this section of the forum to see if anyone would mention the book. : )

[Tabitha]

I thoroughly enjoyed great expectations, i thouhgt it was superb
i'm also a big fan of anythign Jane Austen has writen.
it all started with sense and sensability, although it's usually pride and prejudice, as it's part of the grade 10 reading curiculum in my province, i read sense and sensabilty first and i fell in love with Austen.

I'm not sure lilith by george macdonald counts as a clasic, although it's quite old.
it is another good read, very imaginative, couldn't put it down.
It is also a romance, but in a differnet way than Austens work, and the way circumstances are explained are a bit more round about, you have to be thinking while you read it.

almost all classics are top notch reading material

[herr_sexyhosen]

What I hate about "classics" is that they have to be ordaned by some high and mighty college professors or something. Fuuuuck that. 90% of them are absolutely unreadable, but there are certainly gems like Huck Finn and Candide.

[Oofie]

Unreadable if you're completely illiterate :indiff:

[Dodger]

I prefer satirists.
Mark Twain, Oscar Wilde, Jean-Paul Sartre. Many of them had very strong political and philosophical messages, and I love that kind of shit. I also love Shakespeare, his wit is overwhelming.

However, certain "Classic" authors and works are boring as fuck; I'll admit that. But you simply have to find which authors you don't like and avoid them. In my case, that's Jane Austen, James Joyce, Thomas Hardy and some others. I feel they try too hard to come up with some universal, profound message in their works and wind up sounding like soap operas and rather pedantic.

Not to say that I only read humorous classic works. William Faulkner and Kurt Vonnegut are pretty good at constructing serious stories and plots that make you think, without complicated love webs or other retarded shit like that.

[IronWire]

I loved To Kill a Mocking Bird, the rest of my class found it insanely boring, but I think it makes a good read and a great classic.

[Vir]

I prefer satirists.
Mark Twain, Oscar Wilde, Jean-Paul Sartre. Many of them had very strong political and philosophical messages, and I love that kind of shit. I also love Shakespeare, his wit is overwhelming.

However, certain "Classic" authors and works are boring as fuck; I'll admit that. But you simply have to find which authors you don't like and avoid them. In my case, that's Jane Austen, James Joyce, Thomas Hardy and some others. I feel they try too hard to come up with some universal, profound message in their works and wind up sounding like soap operas and rather pedantic.

Not to say that I only read humorous classic works. William Faulkner and Kurt Vonnegut are pretty good at constructing serious stories and plots that make you think, without complicated love webs or other retarded shit like that.

Wow. Pedantic. Anyways yes I partially rebel at the fact that I am told by an elderly upper crust of scholars what are books of worth. However a lot of the time the classics are well chosen even if it some of them are not of a style that you appreciate. I personally despise the authors who thought to bring some vague ultimate truth to their ignorant readers. Much more to my preference is the authors who, through wit, conveyed their views in more material terms. I prefer the concrete except when it comes to mathematics, natural philosophy holds little interest to me.

[Diomedes]

I'm trying to work my way up to where my English course is in terms of monumental classics that the authors of my course readings would have studied. In class we've done: Prufrock, The Wasteland, Ariel, Flannery O'Conner stories, Lolita, Things Fall Apart, Waiting for Godot, and To the Lighthouse. So far I've back-read Dante's Inferno (not the rest), Iliad, Odyssey, Bible, Ulysses, Don Quixote, The Three Theban Plays, some Shakespearian plays and other odds and ends.

What makes a classic for me is that it stays relevant. Some say Shakespeare invented modern art because he specified all the great tragedies of life in a few plays/poems. Some say that The Catcher in the Rye will always be taught in some high schools because as long as alienation and depression exist in kids it will always have a place. I think that if I can truly relate, even in a purely emotional or psychological way, it's a classic. Doesn't hurt if it's written well too.

[/.\]

Heart of Darkness was an excellent novel with a very intriguing message. Definitely a difficult read, though, there's a ton of symbolism packed into about a hundred pages.

In fact, anything by Joseph Conrad is great. And he wasn't even a native English speaker.

[coolexpert]

Bram Stoker's Dracula is one of my top favorites also. Since childhood I have read it in different forms. First it was a comic translated to Bengali (my mother tongue), then a text story in Bengali, then the English version, and these days right from our own website (WebLiterature.net).
Long live Dracula.