What are some of those 'classics' in literature that you can't figure out WHY?

[Paisley Hedgehog]

.

[Jane in NC]

It appears that some of my fellow boardies have been subject to the Vapours!

 

Moby Dick is a wonderful book. Hemingway's Nick Adams stories are a delight. I'll take Hardy, Steinbeck and Flaubert.

 

And now for the blasphemy: I prefer my Dickens via Masterpiece Theater. Dickens spins a great yarn, but please do not make me read him!

 

Now to dodge the tomatoes,

Jane

[Nan in Mass]

My family all dote on Wind in the Willows. The language is wonderful, and we love the story. I used it to explain the concept of war to my very small children and was sad to put it to such a horrid use. It made the concept very understandable for them, though. And of course, our family completely identifies with how Ratty feels about boats. We spend as much time as possible messing about with them. That passage was mentioned by a professor during the visiting day for potential students at my sons' college and my sons got brownie points for being able to quote it. It is interesting that some people don't like it. Why? Pan? The anthropomorphism? Now you have me wondering if I would like Moby Dick, something I have managed to avoid so far GRIN.

 

As far as what I wonder about being included - I don't. I used to wonder lots, as I read them, but during high school, I compared notes with my boyfriend-now-husband and discovered that although we saw eye-to-eye on most things, he did not appreciate many of the Englsih books I had loved (like Jane Eyre), and I did not appreciate many of the ones he loved (like Catcher in the Rye and For Whom the Bell Tolls). We decided that it must be a boy/girl thing. Then, being part of this hive has made me realize that everyone has different tolerances for well described awfulness. Most classics are all too good at making awfulness seem real. My tolerence is very low so for me, in many classics the awfulness completely outweighs the usefulness. I also waded through Reading Lolita in Tehran. I have not read Lolita (hope I never have to), but I did figure out what it was about. Gak! And why is this considered a classic? But that is the whole point of Reading Lolita in Tehran - that for the girls reading it, Lolita was an important book, dealing with issues that they, personally, had to deal with. I, on the other hand, have lead an almost idyllic life, so Lolita just strikes me as yucky. Reading Lolita strengthened my belief that literature appreciated more if it relates to one's life, and made me feel a bit less guilty about not making my sons read many of the classics. I understand that some people are able to read something, find it useless at the time despite the efforts of teachers to point out its beauties, and then appreciate it as an adult, but I am afraid my family tends to avoid forever anything that at one time caused a bruise, so I am trying to avoid doing that. Probably not a very good educational strategy, especially when one has a female picking books for males, but there are so many classics and so little time, it has worked out fine.

 

What a fun thread!

-Nan

Edited February 23, 2011 by Nan in Mass

[Susan in TN]

I think some people are listing books they just didn't like rather than books they didn't think should be classics.

 

.

 

True, but the thread is more fun this way ;).

[Nan in Mass]

Ionesco was baffling, so baffling that I have never gone back to see what I might have missed. I have gone back and read Waiting for Godot (another baffling one) and now appreciate it. I still hate The Lottery and Lord of the Flies. I don't think I could bear to read Cry the Beloved Country now, although I loved it at the time. I'm sure now that I am the parent of boys, some of whom are taking a circuitous route to adulthood, it would haunt me. I never understood why we were reading To Kill a Mockingbird, but so many people here love it that I suspect I should reread it as an adult. I completely missed the creepiness of The Haunting of Hill House as a teenager, so I know that I was blind to many things. Now Poe - I'd be just as happy if all of his writing had been lost before it was ever published. Yuk. I never understood why people like The Gift of the Magi, and I still don't. I guess some things don't change. I loved Beowulf and Canterbury Tales in high school and I still love them. Maybe, the farther back in history you go, the more stable my taste is in literature? I bet I would have felt the same about The Iliad then as now, too. On the other other hand GRIN, I didn't like The Fountainhead when my friends were reading it in college and I don't like it now, either.

-Nan

Edited February 23, 2011 by Nan in Mass

[Jane in NC]

My family all dote on Wind in the Willows. The language is wonderful, and we love the story. I used it to explain the concept of war to my very small children and was sad to put it to such a horrid use. It made the concept very understandable for them, though. And of course, our family completely identifies with how Ratty feels about boats. We spend as much time as possible messing about with them. That passage was mentioned by a professor during the visiting day for potential students at my sons' college and my sons got brownie points for being able to quote it. It is interesting that some people don't like it. Why? Pan? The anthropomorphism? Now you have me wondering if I would like Moby Dick, something I have managed to avoid so far GRIN.

 

 

 

Another fan of Wind in the Willows!

"There is nothing- absolutely nothing-half so much worth doing as simply messing about in boats."

 

 

The image that I use on my WTM profile page is of Ratty, Toad and Mole.

[Crimson Wife]

Anna Karenina and Madame Bovary had horrible endings with the title characters killing themselves. They seemed a bit more nasty and killy towards adultresses than sympathetic.

 

But the reader is clearly supposed to think it's *SOOOO TRAGIC* that the "heroines" died. A tragedy is when Shakespeare's Juliet or his Ophelia died. I felt absolutely zero sympathy for either Anna or Emma and considered it good riddance to bad rubbish when they died.

[Crimson Wife]

This completely floors me, because I've always assumed you were a Mad Men fan due to your avatar! It looks like the "Mad Men yourself" thing you can do on their website.:tongue_smilie:

 

Love the clothes, hate the show. My mom is a big MM fan (the couple of episodes I've watched have been while visiting her house) and sent me the link to the "Mad Men yourself" website one time.

[mrsrevmeg]

Let me put your wondering to rest. I hate the book. It is a string of obsentities tied together with the random conjunction. I found my internal dialogue laced with swear words (against my will - I tend to internalize speech patterns of others - great for learning languages, not so good in this case) for days later. I felt personally violated having to read such a string of obscenities and wanted to clean my brain with bleach afterwards.

 

Yes, I also found the character entirely unsympathetic, but the writing... I know that's supposed to be Holden's way of talking/thinking, but I don't care. I don't want that in my head. Just like I don't want to listen to rap or those violent movies where people drop the f-bomb every other word and call it dialog. I don't mind the occasional swear-word placed in a book for emphasis, but this was relentless.

 

I am absolutely sure there are other books that deal with adolescent alienation that are 5000 times more worthy of being called a classic. I have no problem with people who enjoy this book, but I am still upset that I was forced to read it. I don't think I feel that way about any other book I've read, assigned or otherwise.

 

Almost everything you said is exactly my thought. It wasn't a required reading for me. My sister read this in high school and said it was her favorite book. Since she isn't one to read much I thought I'd give it a shot. I felt as if I had wasted the two hours or so of my life reading it. It had no plot. It was just obscene ramblings of a spoiled smart-aleck, then it ends.