What classic are you reading now?

I am reading The Gulag Archipelago unabridged by Solzhenitsyn. Very engaging so far.

I haven't read that one, but read One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich recently and enjoyed it.

I'm in the midst of Sigrid Undset's Master of Hestviken tetralogy right now. I notice that she didn't make the list you posted of classic authors, but I think that she belongs on there as one of the possibly lesser known ones.

She was Norwegian, and wrote both this series and the Kristin Lavransdatter trilogy in the 1920s, setting them in medieval Norway. She won the Nobel Prize in 1928 for her historical literature.

I wasn't terribly enthralled by her contemporary fiction, but I'm pretty enchanted with her historical writing. They're great novels to read in the winter.

Hi JM1942 :)
I think the list is a basic list which is incomplete but a good starting point.
Your author sounds interesting, I will have to check out her books in more detail. As a Nobel Prize author she must be worth reading.
I think I will add the Nobel Prize author list to this group too. It's a good reference.

Have just finished A Parisian Affair and Other Stories by Guy de Maupassant, just starting Au Bonheur des Dames by Zola.

Are they 'classic' if they're old and French??

Gave up on One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich just recently, couldn't make it through the first half at all. Not tried any other Solzhenitsyn though, but if I didn't like One Day in the Life of I don't think I'd get on with much of his other work.

I am reading White Fang by Jack London right now.

I finished The Gulag Archipelago, Volume 1 in November. I am looking for the other two volumes in the series to finish it. It is an subject area I am enterested in; communism and its effects.

n3ko
I haven't read anything by Maupassant yet but have many on my TBR pile. I love Zola and Au Bonheur des Dames was one of my favorite of his novels. It's the only one that I have read so far that.......well I can't tell you or I'll ruin it for you but it's different from the others :) I'm sure you will LOVE this novel. Zola is one of my top 4 favorite authors of all time.
I read One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovitch and I liked it but The Gulag is non-fiction so it will be even more intense.

Bill_Massom
Jack London is a favorite of my best friend, he's read everything written by him. I don't personally enjoy animal/nature stories much but I know he's a fabulous writer.
The same friend started The Gulag 4 years ago and had been trying to find the other two since. He found the second one this year and I have been able to get a copy of the third one from a Bookcrosser who was awesome enough to send it to me via mail. It has just arrived this week. My friend is reading this last volume while I am working on the other two which he has finished. I noticed in my search on LibraryThing that over 200 people have the first one, only 80 something have the second one, and only 40 something have the third one. I think that not many people actually got past the first book so there aren't many in circulation. Also I couldn't buy a copy new here either. The bookstores only have the single book abridged version. I guess one could order it but I always enjoy the challenge of the hunt to seek them out secondhand no matter how long it takes :)

Finished The Black Sheep by Balzac a few days ago, and am now about half way through The Brothers Karamazov by Dostoevsky, and really loving it!

BookAddict - RE: Jack London

I just finished White Fang. Not bad, but not great.

I bought the Dover Thrift Edition of it for $1, mainly for the kids. But I am on a classics reading jag, so had to read it myself.

RE: The Gulog Archipelago,

I haven't found hide nor hair of the other two books at all. I don't like abridged versions of anything.

Check that, I just did a search of our library and it appears they have all three volumes. Might have to get Vol 2 next time I am in there.

balzac - RE: Solzhenitsyn

I haven't read anything other than The Gulag Archipelago, Vol 1 by him. It is an account of his personal experiences in the Soviet Gulags, not a fictional story. So, it might be worth a try (?). Nonfiction vs Fiction. I thought it was a very compelling read. Again, haven't read anything else, though I have August 1914 on my TBR shelf and will try that in a while.

RE: Dostoevsky

I liked Crime and Punishment better. The Brothers was a bit "high brow" for me. Lots and lots of stuff to make you think about though, so it wasn't a wasted read, just liked Crime and Punishment lots better.

RE: Maupassant

I have a Harvard Classics Shelf of Fiction book #13, French Fiction, with three stories by him.

Walter Schnaff's Adventure
Two Friends
The Cripple

The book also has stories by Balzac, Sand, De Musset, and Daudet. It is on my TBR shelf.

Bill

It's really only come into my consciousness as a "classic" because The Modern Library tells me so, but I'm slowly making my way through We by Yevgeny Zamyatin, the "powerful new translation" by Natasha Randall.

It's about a dystopian future where mankind is yoked by a totalitarian ideology based on mathematical ideals. While not exactly fast-paced, it's eerie and modern-feeling, despite being written in 1921. I won't read the Foreword by Bruce Sterling until I'm done with the book, lest Bruce give something away, but I can't wait for his take on it. Impressive quotes on the cover, too, from George Orwell and Ursula K. Le Guin (who says it's "the best single work of science fiction yet written").

A Room with a View - it is quite a strange experience. Having seen the film a couple of times it is disconcerting how closely it follows the book, even much of the dialogue is lifted straight from the text. It feels less like reading a 'classic' than a novelisation of a film.

Xiguli
I recently read We by Zamyatin. It was interesting to see how it may have influenced the later utopian/dystopian novels and also how it was a kind of premonition of what was to come in Russia.
A friend made an interesting point yesterday about this book and was something that I had not thought of. He said the Integral was made of green glass and tubes and used to transmit information. Television a little later was also made of green glass and tubes and used to transmit information. In both cases control of this medium was the ability to influence large groups of people. Later still, the internet: glass and numbers ;) Could Zamyatin have known what was to come? I found this very interesting.

Xiguli
Let me know what you think of the 'pink slips' when your done LOL

We is my "side" book, so I won't be done for awhile, but I'll definitely watch for the pink slips, BookAddict.

I don't know about the TV analogy, entirely. Mathematics is not evil, but it's the language used by a totalitarian regime. In the same way, the structures, the technology of their world aren't inherently evil, but they're the framework upon which evil acts take place. I don't know; obviously Zamyatin is making some point about past vs. future, because of I-330's obsession with ancient clothing... but I'm not sure he's anticipating an entertainment form. I'll get back to you. I need to go over the actual description of the Integral again...

I started Sister Carrie by Theodore Dreiser this weekend. Hope to have it finished by the following weekend.

Enjoying it so far

Bill

I am currently reading A Tale of Two Cities, which is only the second Dickens I have read of my rather large, hardback collection, which I bought cheap on eBay.

Haven't read that much British 19th Century classics, as I've always preferred my Balzac and Zola, but Great Expectations was great (a suggestion from my Dad), and this one is looking to be pretty good too, especially with the little 'cliffhangers' at the end of each installment, which have kept me reading. I don't think I could read a novel (or anything, for that matter) broken up over weeks or even months, though, especially not one as good as this!

The Penguin version I'm reading also has some great little illustrations to go with the text, though not as good as another of the Penguin 'classics' I've read this week, Alice in Wonderland, which had the original drawings scattered about, a nice little addition to an otherwise fairly mediocre book; certainly nowhere near as good as other Penguin black classics that I've read recently.

Being a younger reader who loves classics, I haven't got around to reading all of those that you guys are. At the moment, I'm not actually reading any 'classics', but more companions or sequels to classics. I'm reading March by Geraldine Brooks and Rebecca's Tale by Sally Beauman.
They are both really good, although they are not written by the same author that wrote the 'classic'.

#16
balzac,
How do you like A Tale of Two Cities so far?

#17
Like you franklymydear, I haven't read many classics. I could count the ones I read on one hand.=) Or list them right now: Pride and Prejudice, Wuthering Heights, and 1984.

I'm reading Emma and will try to tackle War and Peace sometime in the future...

Anyone that reads One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich should read Dostoevsky's The House of the Dead too. To appreciate fully appreciate both I think they need to be read together.

I am reading Rob Roy by Sir Walter Scott.

I don't read the classics purely for entertainment, I am reading them now because I didn't read any in High school, and never went to college. So I am making up for that as I approach midlife. I read to learn, enjoyment is secondary, but a nice treat.

Bill

Have finally got around to reading Nana by Emile Zola, which I have been meaning to read for ages. Have enjoyed all of his other works, and after Vanity Fair, which I abandoned out of sheer ennui, I'm hoping a good, racy Zola will lift my spirits. Becky Sharp has nothing on these French girls!

#20: A noble goal. I too am trying to buff up on my classics, even though they tend to be big bulky things and totally ruin any reading goals I set for myself.

Just started The Brothers Karamazov

Bill Massom,
I'm in the same boat as you and trying to catch up. It sometimes seems like there will never be enough time so I just focus on the ones that I REALLY want to read or that I think are extremely important. That's the best I can do :)
I do think that we will absorb them more now than we would have in college though because we are doing it because we want to not because it's required.

I am reading Notes from the Underground; The Double at the moment. I have previously read The Brothers Karamazov and will be taking on Devils: The Possessed next, saving Crime and Punishment as the last Dostoevsky book I read.

With regards to Bill (message 20), I too am focusing on the classics for the same reason. My extensive college education lacked any reading of classics. In the good old days, the whole purpose of a college education was for (rich) kids to study the classics. I've just finished The Prince by Niccolo Machiavelli. A very chilling and timely essay on political leadership.

Two things missing from this discussion of the classics, especially for you autodidacts: the Greeks and Shakespeare. Reading Aeschylus, Aristophanes, Sophocles, Euripides, Plato, Aristotle, and Shakespeare make it perfectly clear that the only difference between us and them are flush toilets.

All western philosophy, including much of the Gospels and Paul, have their origins in either Heraclitus, Plato or Aristotle. The past 2300 years of philosophy are commentary on these three.

Shakespeare came as close to creating modern man as can be said that an artist can create anything. Shakespeare had an uncanny knack for interpreting the tea leaves of the Renaissance and pointing to its teleological conclusion.

Re Solzhenitsyn. I have all three unabridged volumes of the Gulag and if I can round them up will be happy to lend one at a time to someone, although having just finished August 1914 would be more interested in a borrow/swap with someone for its sequel, October, 1916. I'm currently on a Russian Revolution jag. I'm reading And Quiet Flows the Don by Sholokhov and will follow that with The Don Flows Home to the Sea. I just purchased Natasha's Dance and A People's Tragedy by Orlando Figes to read when I've finished The Silent Don.

Like you booklover79 I have not read many classics, but the ones that I have read I have enjoyed so much that I am setting myself a target this year to read at least 12. I know that sounds like a lot but is really only one per month. at the moment I am reading Northanger Abbey and while I am enjoying it I can't help but compare it to my all time favourite novel which is pride and prejudice and I find it wanting.

I read Emma when I was in high school and hated it, but it is on my TBR pile because I really think that i should revisit it with more mature eyes. Hope that you enjoy it and let me know what you think.

I just found LT, and it is great. It's so refreshing to hear about people reading this kind of literature just because they want to for a combination of fun and enlightenment. That is what reading should be all about. I kind of get a little quesy hearing about people that exclusively read stuff like Harry Potter, Dan Brown and Tom Clancy. It would really be a lot quicker to watch the movie. I'm reading Moby Dick right now. I read a lot of classics, but mix in slightly less dense modern work to keep things progressing at a respectable clip. Other classics I plan on getting to in the near future are The Iliad, David Copperfield and The Blind Assassin. Not sure if Atwood qualifies as classic yet, but that's only a matter of time. Anything written by her that I have yet to read is automatically on my TBR pile.

Hi, I'm a recent member... This year, I've read Tom Jones by Henry Fielding (great!), The Female Quixote by Charlotte Lennox (which was only ok) and am currently reading Evelina by Frances Burney (and really liking this).

I just finished Pinocchio which was definitely interesting, and now I'm really enjoying The Last of the Mohicans.

Hi, I'm Silvia, 22, Italy
My anthem is "If it is written after 1930s, I can't read it!" ;)
Currently I'm reading Lost Illusions by Honoré de Balzac. I'm enjoing it, even if I'm used not to be so found in French literature...I like British literature the most

The Last of the Mohicans was great. I really enjoyed it too AJWyrm.

I am about a third of the way through Mansfield Park by Jane Austen.

I am finding it a very slow read compared to Pride and Prejudice (a delightfully fast-paced, entertaining novel), but it is a much more thoughtful and analytical work. The reader really has to stay alert to pick up all the nuances.

As I prefer substantial works (however difficult) over sheer entertainment I suspect Mansfield Park will become my Austen favourite.

I'm about to start Middlemarch.

I'm actually working my way through three books by John Sutherland, which investigate puzzles/oddities in many classics: Is Heathcliff a murderer? : great puzzles in nineteenth-century literature, Can Jane Eyre be happy? : more puzzles in classic fiction, and Who betrays Elizabeth Bennet? : further puzzles in classic fiction.

Some questions considered ... "What Does Arabella Donn Throw?" (Jude the Obscure), "Does Becky Kill Jos?" (Vanity Fair), "How Do the Cratchitts Cook Scrooge's Turkey?" (A Christmas Carol) -- and the most pressing question of all: "Is Daniel Deronda Circumcized?"

I just finished Anna Karenina and am about one book into War and Peace. I really enjoyed the former. As for the latter, I've cheated by seeing 2 of the movies and listening to an abridged version. That's helped me nail the characters down.

I am currently read four books, three of which are classics:

The Idiot; Fyodor Dostoevsky
The Aeneid; Virgil
Don Quixote; Miguel de Cervantes

Our Mutual Friend Charles Dickens.

I just finished Heart of Darkness. It was a book I'd been avoiding ever since I'd heard about it, but since I'm in the process of moving and have already packed up many of my books and a lot of them haven't been unpacked since the last time I moved...it was slim pickings around the house. I was very surprised to finish it within 24 hours. I got sucked into the story and Conrad was describing an unfamiliar world, so that was interesting. I know a lot of people find the book dense and tedious or hard to read, but I think it's worth reading.

As I said somewhere in another thread. Heart of Darkness is my favorite book. I have read it eight or nine times, I read it once sometimes twice a year and every time I find myself thinking about it, continuously unpacking nuggets from it. It is truly a book that keeps giving wisdom.

I just finished Don Quixote. Some of it felt repetitive, what with the hero being run over in turn by sheep or by pigs and all those lovelorn young people running off to be shepherds. ;) But the fault is no doubt mine, I am sure I missed a lot of the book's allusions and finer points.

I am very glad I read it though, since it is referenced by so many other (great) books. And the language (even translated in finnish) is beautiful, it made me want to read passages out loud.

I recently finished reading Our Mutual Friend by Charles Dickens, which was great, and Persuasion by Jane Austen, which was just 'OK' for me. Now I'm onto Anthony Trollope's The Small House at Allington - I love the Barsetshire series :)

You're all reading some wonderful books. I decided to reread To Kill A Mockingbird, and that's what I'm doing at present.

Although Charles Dickens isn't my favorite...well, he's not even high on my non-favorites, I've always wanted to read Our Mutual Friend. I've just never gotten around to it. Right now I'm reading Franz Kafka's tales and I'm trying to start Giovanni Boccaccio's The Decameron...which, when I tell non-classic readers, always seems to amaze them...probably because it sounds so scholarly and unfamiliar but who knows...it does roll off the tongue quite nice though.

I love the Decameron! I read it in high school, during (several) history class(es). My teacher was incredibly antagonized, but still had to give me an A at the end of the year. Those were the days. Also, it's a very nice read.

The Brothers Karamazov; Fyodor Dostoevsky

Just finished Woman in White and thoroughly enjoyed it. I've heard "Moonstone" is not so good. I've so many TBR piles now, I don't know what I'll do next. I'm thinking about "All the Kings Men" which I recently purchased at a library sale.

Finished Jane Eyre about a week ago and now am onto Wuthering Heights. It's fun to compare the two. I'll post the comparisons in Books Compared when I'm done.

WH was a little confusing at first. I wasn't sure who the narrator was or what he had to do with Heathcliff and Cathy, but now I'm settling into the story.

I just finished Wuthering Heights and thought it was great! Ghosts, sadistic revenge, hero-villains, class-prejudice, chronic burning passion. It must have created quite a stir when published. I enjoyed it much more than Jane Eyre.

And, per several other LT posts, I am STILL reading War and Peace. One short chapter after the other.

I just picked up a two-volume, 1935 John Payne translation of The Decameron. I couldn't resist (2 bucks), plus I've heard it was a source of inspiration for The Canterbury Tales. I'll get to it sooner or later. 'Can't resist a good, ol' bawdy tale once in a while.

Sandydog1, I feel your pain. I've been at War and Peace for about a month now. I took a week off of it after Book 2 though. The first 400 pages or so I was feeling cocky, don't know what the big deal is, etc. Now I'm at about 850 of 1455 thinking, wow, this is a seriously long book ... very entertaining, but yap yap yap yap yap. ;-)

Yeah, and what a cool (cold?) bunch those Bolkonskis are. If I had to suffer through any time at Bald Hills, I'd be hanging with that vapid French girl.

At the moment I'm reading Bleak House - my fourth Dickens for the year! I'm not sure how it happened, but I seem to be in the midst of a 'Dickens binge' all of a sudden ;)

Hats off to all those reading War and Peace .... maybe one day I'll give it a go!

The short stories of Ivan Bunin.

digifish - that's a lot of Dickens! I haven't read any Dickens since A Tale of Two Cities in high school. I should probably remedy that eventually ...

Sandydog, I agree. I'd probably be hanging out with Pierre. And even though he's an ass, Kuragin could be fun to be around. We had some crazy times in college, but it never occurred to any of us to tie a policeman to a bear and throw them both in a river! It makes one wonder, what else have I missed out on?

Digifish et al, What Dickens would you suggest? What was your favorite? I've read A Tale of Two Cities, Hard Times, and Great Expectations. The latter was by far the best and I enjoyed Pip's sense of humor.

jmskone & sandy ~

I read Tale of Two Cities many years ago at school and didn't care for it much. I was 11 and it was just too much! I read Great Expectations in about 1990 and then didn't read any more Dickens after that...until I discovered LT this year and esp. the 'What the Dickens' Group. Just knowing that others still read and enjoy his works motivated me to give Dickens another chance :)

My favourites so far have been David Copperfield and Nicholas Nickleby, even though they are quite long, as they are easier to follow. I also watched the BBC adapatations after reading them, and found them to be excellent.

Our Mutual Friend is tougher and more of a slog, and one can get bogged down in the story a bit. Bleak House also takes a while to get going, but is nevertheless excellent.

Thanks for the suggestions! Now it's back to that Russian tome that I constantly whine about, on LT :) I think I'm going to celebrate when I finish. I found a great way to cheat too. I purchased the Blackstone Audiobook, War & Peace - Part III. So now I can really accelerate through to the end, during my commutes!

digfish, I also went through a Dickens immersion, but still have some on my TBR list. Great Expections is also one of my favorites, as is David Copperfield. I slogged through the weepy Old Curiosity Shop, mainly because it had been such a success when it was published. Not high on my recommended list. I struggled with Tale of Two Cities, so I stopped for awhile. I will go back as I probably burned out on Dickens while reading it. I then discovered Zola and Balzac, and enjoy their books so much, I'm into France now. Obviously, between France and England, Tale of Two Cities should be more enjoyable.

digfish, I also went through a Dickens immersion, but still have some on my TBR list. Great Expections is also one of my favorites, as is David Copperfield. I slogged through the weepy Old Curiosity Shop, mainly because it had been such a success when it was published. Not high on my recommended list. I struggled with Tale of Two Cities, so I stopped for awhile. I will go back as I probably burned out on Dickens while reading it. I then discovered Zola and Balzac, and enjoy their books so much, I'm into France now. Obviously, between France and England, Tale of Two Cities should be more enjoyable.

I have much company on my love for JANE EYRE, and my Russian-loving friends should know that A DAY IN THE LIFE OF IVAN DENESOVITCH was probably Solsenitzyn's shortest book. Funny no one has mentioned THE CANCER WARD or THE FIRST CIRCLE. Right now I'm spending a week with the Trask and Hamiltons in EAST OF EDEN/Steinbeck, with Twain's A TRAMP ABROAD on deck.

I finally finished War And Peace last night. Judging from the epilogue, I think Tolstoy wanted to write another 300,000 words or so and thought, no, that'd just be stupid, let's wrap this up.

I think I'm going to slip in a Jeffery Deaver pulpy crime story before I dive into a modernist stint here. After W&P my ego needs a book that I can read at 150 pages/hour and finish in a day.

>63 jmskone:, jmskone - Did you read the new translation, by chance? Just wondering how people are liking it.

This one is translated by Ann Dunnigan, circa 1968 (Signet Classic), so I doubt that's the new one. This one was fine (but a translation would probably have to be really god awful for me to recognize it as such, not knowing Russian or having read much Russian lit).

Well, I was driving in the car listening to a Blackstone audio version and suddenly the narrator said "this ends thi recording of War and Peace". I had been spacing out during the second epilogue. Easy to do, but there is so much brilliant thought within those final essays. 'So timely today, too. I had also read chunks from translators Louise & Aylmer Maude (Simon & Schuster, 1942) and Ann Dunnigan (Signet, 1968). Wow finally my last post about War & Peace. What a great march it was.

I don't have any classics scheduled for the rest of the year and through spring, but "Native Son" by Richard Wright and "The Bell Jar" by Sylvia Plath, are scheduled for May.

I'm reading snippets of Beowulf every day. It's been years since I read it--I was planning to brush up on the story before the movie, but I've decided that the movie will probably make me angry and so I'll stick to the real version. lol

I'm currently reading La Bete Humaine, following another of the Lantier brothers* as he grapples with psychosis, along with more sexual jealousy, corruption and shattered dreams in working-class France; everything I've come to expect from a Zola novel!

Recently grappled with Wuthering Heights; expected a gripping Gothic horror and all I got was some rather weak and rambling nonsense. A wonder I finished it at all. I'll stick to the continental classics from now on, I think.

(Jacques - his brother Claude was the miserable artist in The Masterpiece and Etienne, who was the agitator in Germinal. Their alcoholic mother is a character in another great novel, L'Assommoir, and, if I remember their complicated family tree correctly, the brother of the coquette Nana in the novel of the same name... )

I have the new translation of War and Peace translated by Richard Pevear and Larissa Volokhonsky. They also translated Anna Karenina. It came out this October and is a beautiful volume. I don't know when I will get around to reading it though and applaud all of you who are reading it and who have finished. Anyway, I reccomend this translating team when it comes to the russian authors. Though I never finished it, their translation of Crime and Punishment was very readable.

The Decameron and it's slow going...

Right now I'm reading John Locke; ie, having trouble coming up with the touchstone for his Second Treatise of Civil Government. A classic of philosophy/civics.

Well, despite my claims above, Bunyan's "The Pilgrims' Progress" snuck up on me. It's been a moral keystone my whole life and, despite my despisement of religious fundamentalism, it stays strong in me. Maybe it's the language, e.g., "Slough of Despond,: "Celestial City," "Mr. Worldly Wiseman," et cetera. Maybe I just love allegory? Whatever. It works, one page at a time.

I just started to read Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte

Is Tobacco Road a classic? I just started reading it.

74: I read Jane Eyre at the end of November and really enjoyed it, although it took a 9-hour car trip for me to finally finish it. I love how classic novels like Jane Eyre, The Moonstone, and Sense and Sensibility often have so many twists and turns.

I'm currently reading Suetonius' The Twelve Caesars, which is enjoyable, although I think Plutarch wrote more entertaining biographies. I'm having a hard time retaining it, but maybe I just need to sit down and read it uninterrupted for a couple of hours, instead of reading it while I cook or during commercials.

Sorry none of the touchstones are working.

Is The Plague a classic? I'm 2/3 through it. I've already read The Stranger. Wow, what happy stories!

I'd say so. Although maybe less chipper than, say, well, most books, The Plague is one of my all-time favorites, especially in the field of philosophy. But then I love those Russkies too, so maybe I have a proclivity for depressing literature.

I'm back to Middlemarch. I started it in July and before I got very far, life got crazy. And then I actually physically misplaced the book for three months! Now I'm back in it and really enjoying it.

#76 - Funny, I felt the same way about The Twelve Caesars. It was really engaging, but at the end I fell I hadn't retained much of it.

I just finished As I Lay Dying and agree with the dozens of reviews in Amazon and other sources. Difficult, disturbing and well worth reading. Prior to that I knocked off Orlando which is a bit more fanciful and easier to read. I think I'm done with stream-of-consciousness novels, for a while. Time to give the old gray matter a rest.

I'm reading Oliver Twist by Dickens and Guy Mannering by Walter Scott for classes. I like Dickens in general, but OT is definitely not his best. Scott, I'm still making up my mind about (this is the second of his books I've read, the first being The Bride of Lammermoor.)

Digifish, vivienbrenda, et al,

With regards to our earlier Dickens comments, I only recently noted a LT Group called "What the Dickens?" There are so many great groups to be discovered!

>82 Sandydog1: Ooops, I must have overlooked mentioning the Dickens group before. Apologies!

>81 beschrich: I recently finished Oliver Twist and agree with its not Dickens at his best.

I'm about half-way through The Age of Innocence. It's not a bad little soap opera.

I'm reading The Buccaneers by Edith Wharton (my favorite author) and The Inferno of Dante.

A few right now for classes. Notes from Underground, along w/ Invisible Man.

I'm now reading The House of Mirth. I'm feeling sorry for poor, poor Lilly.

Enough Edith Wharton for now. I've now got a BOT (audio) copy of Tom Jones. I'll be "reading" (listening to) this for some time.

I finally went back to Tale of Two Cities but this time listened to it, and enjoyed it much more. It's still not one of my favorite Dickens novel.

I recently began listening to the Don Quixote, and while I have to agree with one of the above posters that it is somewhat repetitive, Cervante's understanding of human nature, and the charming way in which the stories are told makes the book feel almost as if it could have been written today. The language and cadences are wonderful, and the details are exquisite. I listen to it in small segments on my ipod, and savor the moments.

I'm also reading The Moonstone by Wilkie Collins. It's not as compelling as Woman in White, but I will finish it. I certainly want to know where the story is going.

I finally went back to Tale of Two Cities but this time listened to it, and enjoyed it much more. It's still not one of my favorite Dickens novel.

I recently began listening to the Don Quixote, and while I have to agree with one of the above posters that it is somewhat repetitive, Cervante's understanding of human nature, and the charming way in which the stories are told makes the book feel almost as if it could have been written today. The language and cadences are wonderful, and the details are exquisite. I listen to it in small segments on my ipod, and savor the moments.

I'm also reading The Moonstone by Wilkie Collins. It's not as compelling as Woman in White, but I will finish it. I certainly want to know where the story is going.

I finished Middlemarch. It was absolutely wonderful. I have the much shorter Ethan Frome up next.

#91 Was Middlemarch really wonderful? I have the book on my TBR list, but am daunted by length and mixed reviews. Tell me what you liked about it.

#92 - It's a Victorian novel, so if you can get into the characters and the cultural tension and obligation. If you can do that and not worry too much about the "action" then you'll love it.
Basically I liked how the characters say one thing but are really thinking something else. I liked Eliot's way of writing about the characters' motivations. I also really liked what the book had to say about life and struggle in the end. Not sure if any of this really helps you though...

I have to put a shout in for Middlemarch as well. The characters are so well-drawn and the network of interwoven lives and intrigues in the town is so rich. I became very emotionally sucked in and was sad when it ended despite the legnth. It was one of my favorite reads over the last several years.

Thanks for the input. I do like Victorian novels. I'll move this up my TBR list. Maybe I can get it on audio. I get all mine through the library, and even though the system allows interlibrary loan, many of the classics are on cassettes. I don't have a cassette player, and I don't know if I want to invest in one. I hear that a lot of those old cassettes are stretched and broken.

I'm still listening to Don Quixote, in small bits. As I've posted before, it's a great book and George Guidell, the reader is magnificent. But it is very long, and so I break it up. A few chapters, then on to something else. I read most of my books that way. Crazy, I know.

I just started reading Les Miserables and so far it is boring. I'm having to force myself to keep reading.

I finally, finally, finally got through Tom Jones. I found the mid 18th century prose surprisingly hard to follow. I really had to concentrate through all those plot/character twists and turns. I did enjoy it though.

Tess of the D'Ubervilles by Hardy. I am reading it with the Yahoo CRGII group. I am through Phase the First, and am totally enjoying it.

#97- Sandydog1, I sympathize. I pick that one up every couple of years, struggle through a bunch of pages and give up. Glad you got through it (and enjoyed it!).

Just finished The Decameron a couple of hours ago. I dropped it for a good while and started reading some other stuff. Now that I've completed it, I want my eight months of reading back.

I'm reading Villette by Charlotte Bronte. It's really good, but I haven't decided yet whether it's better than Jane Eyre.

Just started Oblomov. It's amazingly funny in a very funny way. And it reads faster than I thought - faster than Tolstoy or Dostovesky anyway. This probably means I've given up on The ogre.

I was reading {A High Wind in Jamaica} by {{Richard Hughes}} but then stopped because I just HAD to re-read {The Great Gatsby}.

I'm looking ro Oblomov soon. But now I'm reading the Greek plays. I just finished the Oresteia and now I'm reading some Sophocles. I'm reading the Oedipus trilogy.

Sandydog1, One of Shakespeare's early plays, Titus Andronicus reminds me an awful lot of the Oresteia. I guess it's all the cannabalism. BTW, if you've never read Titus Andronicus you should give it a look.

The goremeisters of the 70's and 80's had nothing on Shakespeare.

Funny you should mention blood and gore. I just finished Oedipus Rex. Oh well, even a blind man knows when the sun is shinin'...

Thanks. These Greek Plays and I'm sure Shakespeare as well, lend themselves to audiobooks. Im looking forward to listening to Shakespeare during my commute.

I too am making up for lost time in reading the classics. I did go to college, but getting a professional degree suprisingly doesn't involve reading classic literature. Just finished the new translation of War and Peace, and absolutely loved it.

rich

War and Peace, the newest translation.
For Whom the Bell Tolls
The Dangerous Summer
Islands in the Stream
A Farewell to Arms
The Sun Also Rises
Don Quixote
are what I have read over the last year.
I'm currently working on:
Aenid, the Fagles translation
Iliad, the Fagles translation
Odyssey, the Fagles translation

rich

I'm on my first Iris Murdoch, Under The Net. (Touchstones never work for me.)

I finished To Kill a Mockingbird last week. Not sure what I'll be reading next yet...Perhaps Of Mice and Men. I'm trying to cover some of those classics everyone usually reads in high school.

I just finished Sir Gawain and the Green Knight translated by Tolkien, which was wonderful. Now I have started The Children by Edith Wharton.

I started an all-time favorite, "A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court" last weekend (which is in a one-dollar broken-back hardcover of "The Family Mark Twain" that I scored for a buck at the Cumberland town library book sale!), and not long ago I re-read a bunch of Robert Service poems, especially "The Cremation of Sam McGee" from "Best Tales of the Yukon: Including the Classic."

I'm reading War and peace
and
Middlemarch
(both in Norwegian)

I finished Lady Anna by Anthony Trollope and have started Middlemarch for the 'Group Reads - Literature' group.

I've just finished The Gods Will Have Blood (Les Dieux ont soif) by Anatole France - my first by him and really rather good. About a young artist who gets swept along by the patriotic fervour during 'The Terror' in Paris, who eventually becomes a brutal magistrate, sentencing to death all and sundry in the vain quest for justice and Liberty.

Next up, The Secret Agent by Conrad; have had this one on my shelf for a good while now...

As for Les Miserables, #96, it really is worth sticking with!

Moby-Dick - page 3 or so and already hilarious. I always had the impression that it was a dour book, even having read some of his quite funny short stories. So glad to be wrong...

I am reading Sigrid Undset's Kristin Lavransdatter and am quite enjoying though I forsee a long journey as I manage about 50 pages a day.

I just finished The Voyage of the Beagle by Charles Darwin. A fascinating travelogue of the 5 year scientific mission around the world. I wish I could travel like that, some day.

#118
I thought I was buying that but it turned out to be a study of Darwin's studies. Still want to get his own writing but this book is good. It's called Charles Darwin's The Voyage of the Beagle by Michael Kerrigan.
I'm reading a Josephine Tey mystery called Miss Pym Disposes.

I think I've read that book by Kerrigan too. Another short, interesting read was Darwin and the Beagle.

The Voyage of the Beagle was at least more interesting than The origin of species.

Decided to go with Madame Bovary next.

I've just started on Candide by Voltaire.

I just got started in Chateaubriand's Memoires d'outre-tombe. It has a very nice, nostalgic voice.

mstrust, I loved Candide. Ironically, I've just started Zuleika Dobson. I think they have some similarities.

Sandydog1-
I finished Candide a couple of days ago and it was NOTHING like I expected. I understood Candide was a coming-of-age tale but I didn't know it was a parody. I have the Modern Library translation from the 50's and the humor is like a Monty Python skit. I really enjoyed it.
I don't know the author you mentioned. What works do you recommend?

mstrust,
Poor, naive Candide! Wasn't that great?

Anyway, you totally caught me on your question about Max Beerbohm. I haven't read any of him but Michael Dirda in Classics for Pleasure, suggests Seven Men, A Christmas Garland, And Even Now and of course, Zuleika Dobson.

Dirda's review mentions Beerbohm's "elegant, sly, wit." I'm only a few chapters into Zuleika Dobson but I'm at least catching some of the irony. Has anyone else read much of this Edwardian charicaturist?

Me again, and I finally finished the relatively short Zuleika Dobson. Overall a very funny theme of love, relationships and a total lack of value of college undergrad males.

I'm listening to and reading The Bible now, so that should be taking me some time.

M 128: I'm listening to and reading The Bible now, so that should be taking me some time.

I should imagine! The whole shebang, or just the more interesting bits? Because, man, those laws in Leviticus can get pretty dry. I'm also curious- is this just for your edification, or as an assignment? Soryr if I'm being nosy- I was just intrigued by your comment.

Yes, my favorite ornithorhynchian, the whole shooting match, and Leviticus is a barn-burner compared to Chronicles. So far I've learned about geneology, public health codes and statutes, ethnocentrism, blood & gore, and how to build some really big, glittery, houses of worship.

With some classics I just burn through them and retain little. Others are so fascinating I"ll concurrently read several plot summaries, study guides and literary criticisms. The Bible has parts that are real snoozers as well as books that are really beautiful. So, I'm doing both.

I'm reading three books that I'd consider "classics" at the moment-

The Vicomte of Bragelonne, which I've been wanting to read for ages and the local bookstore finally got a copy of.
Musashi, classic Japanese adventure. Sadly, it had a pretty awful translator and I'm having a hard time muddling through it.
and The Social Contract, which gives me headaches, so I'm going pretty slowly.

I've been a sci-fi fantasy reader for most of my life, but I'm trying to expand my horizons a little.

Concurrent with listening to The Bible (for personal edification and because of its basis for so many literary references, Kplatypus), I am reading Dead Souls.

Book of Job from the Bible and Brothers Karamazow by Dostojevski. Love them both.

I really love Heart of Darkness. It was a strange reading experience for me because I had trouble remembering why I liked it as soon as I finished it. In fact I had trouble recalling most of the story. Weird isn't it? Hasn't happened with any other books, I think that I just became so involved with the book that afterwards it was like waking up from a dream.

There are a lot of posts about LTers abosolutely hating Heart of Darkness. I'm with you Perkin, I liked it. I thought it was fairly accessible. I even tolerated Nostromo, which got off to a real, slow, start. Conrad is not easy.

David Copperfield by Charles Dickens.
Just started.

Re: Heart of Darkness and people hating it

The edition I have is one of those Critical Editions with a bunch of related essays at the back along with the standard notes and such. Usually I ignore all of that (a privilege I allow myself after spending years as a lit major) but for some reason I read these. What I found interesting was what different perspectives people had on the book. Personally, I loved it and didn't find it so much actively racist (one of the big complaints) as passively ignorant. You know? I mean, it is very racist in the sense that the characters say a lot of really terrible things about the African people, but they say them not out of knowledge but out of fear and ignorance. To me, that glimpse into what it might have been like to venture into a completely foreign and unknown land was completely worth it.

Nostromo, on the other hand, I haven't quite managed to get into yet. I've tried a couple of time and will defeat it one of these days. I did read Lord Jim, which I thought was okay.

On the Bible*, Sandydog, color me impressed. I'm all for knowing the Bible since, as you said, it factors into so many other works, not to mention its impact on history. I've even read, oh, probably 75% of it over the years. The few times I tried to just go straight through, however- yikes. Abandoned book alert. If you're on Chronicles though, at least you've got some fun ones coming up- I always enjoyed the prophets myself.

PS: M 130 had me laughing out loud. Great description of the early books.

*I love using the touchstone for the Bible because it leads not to the Christian Testament but to the Cake Bible. Good to know LT's priorities!

Does anyone besides me think the true Heart of Darkness was in the whited sepulchre in Brussels (or wherever Marlowe went to take the job) with the woman in black knitting like Madame LaFarge (I think) in A Tale of Two Cities? Knitting disaster.

I love this novel.

>137 kjellika: kjellika ~ David Copperfield is a very fine novel. But it will probably feel like 'light reading' after War and Peace and Middlemarch! :D

Yes, I think I'll need some 'light reading' now. But as I'm Norwegian and am reading an English edition of the novel, it might cause some difficulties.
The language seems rather easy to understand, with some (ancient?) curiosities, though.

What do you English readers - and readers with different first languages - think about the language in this novel?

>141 kjellika: kjellika ~ English is my native tongue but I almost always need my dictionary at hand while reading Dickens. I usually write words in a notebook as I go along, then look them up later. I prefer Dickens' writing style to that of George Eliot however :). Also, it helps to have something like a Penguin or Oxford World Classics edition with notes/footnotes.

I've got an edition from The Penguin English Library (paperback) with some notes at the end, and a rather long introduction by Trevor Blount.

I've started reading Elizabeth Gaskell's Wives and Daughters. I love this book already!

I'm reading Sense and Sensibility. It's fantastic so far!

I FINALY finished Dead Souls. Funny, but I really wish Gogol had finished it.

I'm reading North and South and I'm loving it.

I've (re) started The Histories by Herodotus.

And I'm STILL listening to The Bible. The one about cakes (Kplatypus, you noted that "preferred" LT touchstone) is probably less than 66 books long!

I am in the middle of reading Plato's The Republic.

My summer reading list so far:

H - Peloponnesian War by Thucydides
D - Everyman
H - The Prince by Machiavelli

P - Sonnets of Shakespeare

D - Doctor Faustus by Marlowe
D - Richard III by Shakespeare
D - Midsummer Nights Dream by Shakespeare
D- Hamlet by Shakespeare

D - Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead
D - Tartuffe by Moliere

4(balzac) I'm just about to start some of Guy de Maupassant's stories. I was wondering the same thing, but I'd say they "count" as classics.

Can you recommend a translation? Or did you read them in French....

I just picked up Brideshead Revisited. I saw the trailer for the new movie with Emma Thompson, and it intrigued me. Has anyone else read it?

I just finished Moby Dick (It was a really beautiful hardback book too - so much fun to read). I love classics, and am so glad I found this group!

I recently read Walden and Civil Disobedience and Dead Souls by Nikolai Gogol. Earlier this year I read Don Quixote, Arrowsmith by Sinclair Lewis, Beowulf, Death Comes for the Archbishop by Willa Cather, For Whom the Bell Tolls, The Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, and The Picture of Dorian Gray, and I reread Candide and The Wonderful Wizard of Oz. I really enjoyed most of these books, although Don Quixote was a bit of a long slog. I didn't love Walden or the The Picture of Dorian Gray, but I'm glad that I have read them. I also read and mostly hated Celestial Railroad and Other Stories by Nathaniel Hawthorne. I was surprised, because I have always liked The Scarlet Letter.

I just finished rereading Golding's Lord of the Flies, which is one of my favorites, and now I'm onto The Red Pony by Steinbeck

He's becoming one of my favorite authors so my opinion is very well biased, but I'm amazed by any book that can take me completely out of the city into a world that is overtly natural and simple. I'm only a portion of the way through, but already I find myself (a complicated city dweller) yearning for the simple life: a farm, land, and a few kids to keep me busy. The story is beautifully written and in my opinion, better than Of Mice and Men.

>151 SilverTome: - Brideshead Revisited is probably Waugh's worst novel (even he didn't like it that much when he re-read to write an introduction) but it is enjoyable in that 'good bad book' way.

Re Dead Souls - Gogol wrote most of the second part of the series and then burnt it just before his death, claiming that the devil told him to destroy his work.

>153 carlystember: - Steinbeck is one of my favorite authors!

>154 Jargoneer: - I know, it is such a sad story, apparently he was heavily influenced by an extreme religious fanatic/guru. I have read many reviews of what a masterpiece Dead Souls is, but I have to admit that I didn't find the remaining pieces that arresting. The various characterizations of rural Russians were nice, but not amazing. I'd like to read some of his other works.

155: Do by all means read the short stories of Gogol in the new Pevear Volokhonsky translation, and the play the Inspector General. (It was made into a funny movie, too). The russian peasant stories are wonderful. I think they are called something like Evenings on the farm in the two volume paperback edition.(Avonden op Dikanjka).

The Nose and the Overcoat are like Kafka if he were funny. They are masterpieces, imo.

The satire in Dead souls is powerful to me, and the translation by Bernard Guilbert Gurney is my favorite. The idea of getting rich by buying a list of dead people is totally amazing. What ugliness the wealthy have built on in so many places.

The tragedy that he burned his manuscripts and starved himself to death does not obviate the fact that he was the great powerful influence on all the following russian novelists. One of them said "We all come out of Gogol's Overcoat".

< 156 - Thank you for the advice. I acquire almost all of my books by wandering in used book stores, which are highly enjoyable but tend to have erratic selections. Dead Souls was the first book by Gogol I had run across, but I will certainly keep my eyes open for more. I certainly wouldn't hold a little late-life religious insanity against anyone, many of our beloved Russian novelists seem to have suffered similar afflictions.

As for the novel itself, I tend to prefer novels that are, at least, composed either of the stories of very realistic characters or of allegorical tales using less full-fleshed characters. So it isn't that the satirical characterizations in Dead Souls aren't insightful, but to me they seem lacking since they are divorced from the philosophical framework that Gogol intended for them. Most of the characters do not seem intended to represent real, complex people but rather classes of people - the "miser", the "efficient landlord", the "boisterous layabout", the "dreamy lover", etc. They aren't three dimensional enough to support themselves, and the meaning that would have supported them is gone due to the incomplete nature of the text. Chichikov himself is the obvious exception of course, but there is too much mystery about him for him to completely carry the novel. That is all just my opinion of course.

157: I think at the time, the realistic naturalistic novel had not yet been born in Russia, and Gogol's goal was political. I think he wanted to see the end of serfdom. The Inspector General was a satire on his society, also.
You will find, in the stories, the realistic characters you look for, and in the Nose and the Overcoat, all the allegory you could wish for. They are surreal. Look also for Taras Bulba about cossacks.
The "late life religious insanity" deprived us all of more masterpieces. It was a great tragedy.

I'm rereading the Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. I had a modern book ready to go, but this week's Time Magazine featured Mark Twain and I figured that "Huckleberry Finn" would make a good summer read.

Virgil's Georgics in Latin (with an occasional look at the English)
Kristin Lavransdatter for the group read
The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes

I've been re-reading some of my favorites for Halloween-The Legend of Sleepy Hollow , The Devil and Daniel Webster and Young Goodman Brown among them.

>161 mstrust: I just reread Irving and Hawthorne too! Must be the season!

Thoses stories do put you in the mood. Love that creepy New England feeling that these authors did so well.

I'm reading Orlando by Virginia Woolf. An LT group ('I prefer men to cauliflowers')read:

http://www.librarything.com/groups/prefermentocauliflo

and
rereading Sult (Hunger) by Knut Hamsun

I liked Orlando, a lot more than the sloowwwerrr Mrs. Dalloway and To the Lighthouse.

I'm just finishing up on that wacky Pulitzer winner, A Confederacy of Dunces. Not a classic (yet).

As for true classics, I'm back to reading Herodotus. Maybe this time I'll be able to get past Egypt!

I'm starting Fagles's Iliad. So far so good!

I switched to (I mean I'm concurrently reading) Vanity Fair.

"I'm starting Fagles's Iliad. So far so good!"

I hope you'll let us know how it's going from time to time.

>168 criels: Loved book 14. I'm really enjoying it, to my surprise.... All the blood and gore is actually amusing, not disgusting.

Finished Orlando and Sult, and I'm currently reading Poisson d'or by J.M.G. Le Clezio (this year's Nobel Prize). Promising.
Next classic on my list is (probably) The Trial by Franz Kafka. Group read?

Just finished The Count of Monte Cristo and Pride and Prejudice for the millionth time. Currently reading Mysteries of Udolpho and then I'm moving onto The Hunchback of Notre-dame.

I am reading The Peloponnesian War by Thucydides. I am reading the Landmark edition with all of its great notes, and I am reading the Will Durant text based on Thucydides' account. Pretty good!

Wasps by Aristofanes.
Makes me laugh. :)

Halfway through The Trial. cf. #170.
Some kind of terrifying, but very interesting. I don't know yet how to interpret this story, and I'm not sure if I ever will. Perhaps that's the most exciting part of the read. :) ;( ??????????

I finished Vanity Fair some time ago, am still reading Herodotus in small doses, and have started The Master and Margarita.

I'm about to read Pilgrim's Progress, which somehow I've never read.

With my classical book club I'm working through the list of novels in Susan Wise Bauer's book The Well Educated Mind. We are currently reading Anna Karenina.

I'm reading Mansfield Park by Austen and A Study in Scarlet by Doyle.

planning to read Bleak House by Dickens...

I'm reading Death in Venice and other Thomas Mann short stories.

I'm reading Nicholas Nickelby by Dickens..

Hi everybody, I'm reading The Fountainhead by Ayn Rand, which is a Penguin Modern Classic. I'd never heard of the book or the author, but it is quickly becoming one of my favorite books.

Has anyone read Life and Fate by V. Grossmann? I want to read it so others' opinion s are welcome.

Pieter, NL

Sandydog1....if you like Thomas Mann, I highly recommend The Magic Mountain

I'm reading 1984 by George Orwell. I read this book back in 1984 as a class assignment and saw a very well done play done by the local community college. I really enjoyed it then so I'm hoping my tastes haven't changed to much since then. :0)

Pere Goriot by Balzac as part of LTs Group Reads--Literature.

I am currently reading For Whom the Bell Tolls and really enjoying it - it may be just a differering perspective as I've gotten older - it has been awhile since I read Hemmingway -- but this is striking me as head and shoulders above his other novels.

Thanks saibaby79, The Magic Mountain is on my mountainous TBR list. My intellect and energy level is challenged by Mann's sentences. I really enjoyed an audio performance by Paul Hecht. I'll look for the audiobook.

I really enjoy and better understand, classics, stream-of-conciousness novels, etc., on audio.

Finished Pere Goriot by Balzac, I highly recommend this classic. I just started Count of Monte Crisco by Alexandre Dumas, so far a real pleasurable read, love Dumas's writing style.

>182 Eenoog: Eenoog -- I'm glad you are enjoying Fountainhead it was a memorable book for me in High school - ten years after reading the book I met "Roark" in Person; we got married and are living happily ever-after! He is an architect and very stubborn!

I'm reading The Vicar of Wakefield now, an 18th century "sentimental novel."

I finally finished Mansfield Park. It took so long because a friend and I were reading it together, but I started it first, then she had to catch up, then I had to catch up...sigh... it seemed to go forever. I did enjoy it but not because of the heroine, Fanny Price. I much preferred her surly Aunt Norris.

I am reading Leo Tolstoy's Resurrection right now..
finished part 1 yesterday..

I am reading Middlemarch by George Eliot. It is taking me a while to read it - especially the first volume. I am in volume II now, and have gotten used to the writing style so the speed is picking up a bit. For me the first part was slow and took some work understanding many of the characters. Now that most of that is done - on with the story! I am enjoying it much more.

>192 bumblesby: tames

Middlemarch is one of my all times favorite. Interesting to read it with the group 'Group Reads - Literature' (I know you are a member) last year. Did you participate then? You could check the threads (The novel is divided into several threads to avoid spoilers).
Happy reading!

I'm reading The Custom of the Country by Edith Wharton..
What a character Undine is...

I'm still reading Old Goriot.

I'm reading Dracula by Bram Stoker. Surprisingly enjoyable. Composed of journal entries, letters, and the like, from different characters' points of view.

I'm trying to read Ulysses for the first time. It's like Mrs. Dalloway on acid.

I'm halfway through The Diary of A Nobody. It's fastpaced and very funny.

The Mayor of Casterbridge by Thomas Hardy. Fascinating, especially when viewed in comparison with Victor Hugo's Les Miserables. I will be posting a review when I'm finished, probably tomorrow or Thursday. (EDIT: Now posted. See my profile page!)

I'm reading Evelina by Frances Burney and I'm liking it a lot! And as somebody earlier posted, I would like to tackle War and Peace some time, and I am about to start in Odyssea - though that is frightening me for some reason - I'm not sure I will be able to get through it, though I managed Iliad - with quite some difficulty... (and the additional disappointment of discovering after having read hundreds of pages that the last 50 are mysteriously missing in my copy - no Trojan horse for me...)

About half way through The Odyssey, with the story recast in dialogue form by Simon Armitage. Really well done!

I just finished Edith Wharton's The Children which, while having some disturbing lolitaish components, was an easy enjoyable read. The ending, while satisfying, seemed to be in the same vein as Age of Innocence

Ulysses as Mrs. Dalloway on acid. I like that.

I just started reading William M. Thackeray's Vanity Fair and so far..I really like it

I finally finished Ulysses. I "read" a very large portion using an audio version (the Recorded Books edition). That made it quite palatable.

I took a break from classics and knocked off Falling Man. I'm now reading that poignant, disturbing peace movement classic Johnny Got His Gun. I'll be back into the classic classics really soon, I'm sure.

I am reading The Woman in White by Wilkie Collins. So far, I like the mix of romance and mystery with a twist of Gothic. I'm really enjoying it and looking forward to the rest.

I'm still into the psuedo-classics. I fnished Catch 22 and am currently reading A Passage to India.

I'm thoroughly enjoying Frankenstein by Mary Shelley. Her monster is way more compelling than the one found in cartoons!

I just finished another almost-classic: Siddartha.

I too was very surprised upon reading Frankenstein. It wasn't anything like the early movies, nor was it very Mel Brooks-ian, for that matter.

I read Frankenstein this year and was unprepared for such a "learned" monster. It was an interesting but not compelling read.

I just finished Moby Dick and, while I knew there was going to be alot about whaling, I did not expect such a lack of story narrative and characterization. As I've said, after reading the novel I feel I don't know much about Ishmael or Ahab but I could probably cut the head off a sperm whale.

I just finished Oscar Wilde's The Importance of Being Earnest. There are some really great lines in there, but I couldn't relate to the characters at all. See my complete review at http://www.librarything.com/work/2721190/reviews/50462528.

I'm reading The House of the Seven Gables, The Island of Dr. Moreau and The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. I'm starting my October reads early because I have so many.

Just joined this group.

Currently I'm reading Les trois mousquetaires with only about 130 pages left to go.

Earlier this year I read Vingt-Quatre heures de la vie d'une femme, Le comte de Monte-Cristo, tome 2 (having read the 1st volume last year) and Amok.

I'm reading The Ambassadors by Henry James right now..

I just finished Wells' The Invisible Man. Thoughts at http://www.librarything.com/work/21214/reviews/52865719

Finished reading The Playboy of the Western World by J.M.Synge. The best book I've read this year! My review,

http://www.librarything.com/work/150060/reviews/51715323

Or on my 50 Book Challenge thread,

http://www.librarything.com/topic/72408

Now I’m in the mood for more classic plays and I’m also keen on making a dent in my TBR pile. I think I’ll read a Restoration comedy this time, The Way of the World by William Congreve.

I've started The Brothers Karamazov, but things are getting busy. I hope to finish it before 2010!

Hello everyone. I've started, for the third time, Bellow's The Adventures of Augie March. Anyone else out there read it? Something has prevented me from finishing it the first two times . . . It has always gotten such good reviews I suspect I need to push through something inside me that might be holding me back . . . I love the task of figuring it out! Comments, anyone, on Augie?

I, too, have started "Augie" 3 or 4 times.

I have a battered paperback of it, stacked with other pb s more because of their similar size than because of any subject similarity.

Donʻt know why I have found it unreadable. I didnʻt know that it "has always gotten...good reviews". I thought it was pretty much forgotten, even among fans of Saul Bellow. (I admire him but am not exactly a fan.)

The best book by him of those that I have read? --Iʻm still undecided, but I incline toward Mr. Sammlerʻs Planet. The most interesting to me personally is The Deanʻs December, because I was a dean, though not in the U.S., when I read it.

Technical (and trivial) note on 218:

I susect that the reason why Touchstones could not pick up Mr. Sammlers Planet amd
The Deans December was that they both had an apostrophe, which Touchstones (and Search?) seem to have trouble handling.

I ran a test here: write them WITHOUT the apostrophe, and Touchstone does pick them up, even inserting the apostrophe.

Finished reading the classic mystery, The Circular Staircase yesterday. It was a strictly mediocre experience for me.

Now I’m reading another classic, A Passage to India by E. M. Forster for my Monthly Author Reads Group.

Dipping into Vanity Fair. The Easton edition I am reading has lots of great illustrations.

Finished A Passage to India. Wrote a rather long review of it.

I'll be starting a short story collection by the same author called The Celestial Omnibus and Other Stories today.

Just finished Victor Hugo's Le dernier jour d'un condamne. Genius! Wrote a review here

Porua,

Thanks for that wonderful review of A Passage to India!

# 224 You are most welcome, Sandydog1! I'm glad you enjoyed it!

I'm reading Pudd'nhead Wilson as my introduction to Mark Twain. It's quite amusing, but the plot flies all over the place.

For non-fiction, I'm working my way through the Harvard Classics. The Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin was just wonderful. The man had an excellent sense of humor. I've now moved on to the rather somber Journal of John Woolman. It's slower going but very thought provoking.

For poetry, I'm working on a collection of Emily Dickinson poems. Final Harvest.

Finished reading The Celestial Omnibus and Other Stories by E. M. Forster. My review at,

http://www.librarything.com/work/3032497/reviews/53581103

Going to start The Innocence of Father Brown by G. K. Chesterton today. This book has been on my TBR pile for waaay to long!

Porua: nice review. It makes me want to track down and read the book. I haven't read any Forster, but he's on my TBR stack.

I have finished Pudd'nhead Wilson, and am now moving on to The Hunchback of Notre Dame by Victor Hugo. This will be the first of the French authors I'll have read. Hope it's good.

#228 Thank you, nymith! Glad you enjoyed my review.

I finally finished The Brothers Karamazov and hope to finish that classic classic, The Histories by year's end.

Have just finished Bakerʻs The Anthologist

More the kind of pleasure you get from reading a good essayist than from reading a questionable novelist. I love the style of this one; it is one of the closest Iʻve seen to using ordinary conversational style in a serious novel -- in his direct talk to the reader as well as in dialogue.

You even get the feeling that the plot, what there is of it, is just a flimsy structure to build the "essays" around. Which is a very 18th century way of writing: it was basically the structure of Voltaire, S. Johnson (in Rasselas), and Goldsmith.

conitnuing 231:

What I took out from the library when returning The Anthologist was all non-fiction:

Ash and Lakeʻs Bizarre Books, Lewis Yablonskys George Raft, and George Eliots (Non-fiction, Essays and Miscellanea).

I've been working my way through Swann's Way and have about 100 pages to go. I know I'll continue on after this volume.

To sandydog:

{Just curiosity: -- Whose Histories? Herodotus's?

Yes, Herodotus. I've been reading it on and off, for almost 2 years now. I don't know what the issue is, his prose is just so, so old-fashioned.

Maybe somebody like Christopher Moore could do a translation. ;)

(Sorry, touchstones, ie, The Landmark Herodotus, still aren't working for me)

Okay, this might sound a bit lame, but I'm dropping everything to read A Christmas Carol while the season is at its peak.

Sandydog1: by Christopher Moore, do you mean the guy who wrote Fluke? I'm currently reading that book, and the prose is certainly not old-fashioned. :)

A bad joke. I'm just finding Herodotus a bit dry right now, that's all.

I was just saying that a Christopher Moore or maybe a Douglas Adams could spice up a Herodotus translation.

To SandyDog1

Thanks.
Yes, the translation I read of Herodotus was kind of stodgy (Rawlinson, I think). I was a sophomore in college taking elementary Greek, so I was only able to compare it occasionally with the original.

A dialogue I remember was where a priestess tells a Spartan warrior that he is not allowed in a temple, because no of Dorian blood is allowed there. His answer: "All', O gune, ego ouk eimi Dorieus, alla Akhaios! (Well, woman, I'm NOT Dorian, I'm ACHAEAN!) " I think the translation's version was: "Nay, Lady, no Dorian am I, but an Achaean." (Has the sense, but not the style and spirit of the original.)
Our professor of language was an archaeologist, Sterling Dow, and at the end of the term he asked for suggestions for a Greek text that might be read the next year in place of the often dreary classic Anabasis by Xenophon. I suggested the Hellenica of the same author. (Not accepted). Dow's own suggestion was Herodotus, but with the caveat that it would be only if he could find an edition that translated H. into Attic (Athenian) Greek. (H. lived in a Dorian city, but Dorians had few writers and readers, so he wrote in the Ionian dialect.)

Thanks for your comments!

I read whatever is handy (I'm finishing Herodotus with a Harry Carter translation; it's the Heritage Press version - a visually beautiful book), so I'm often unaware of the importance of the translator's craft.

It seems important for ancient Greek texts (there's a lot of LT commentary about Illiad and Odyssey translations) as well for 19th century Russian novels.

I'm currently reading Moby Dick (finally) and enjoying it thoroughly. I didn't realise there would be such an amount of detail about the whaling fishery in the book but I find Melville's obvious enthusiasm for it compelling. Perhaps I now understand, however, why some people are driven a little crazy by Moby Dick. It's everything you ever wanted to know about sperm whales but were afraid to ask!
It's not a difficult book as I have heard some people say but it is unusual. The descriptions of the ocean are beautiful and I like the universality of the work where Native Americans, Americans, Europeans, Africans and Pacific Islanders live and work side by side. Melville seems enlightened for his time, probably due to his time spent at sea.
I also like the gothic creepiness of Ahab's obsession, though this plays a much smaller part in the book's story than I had been led to believe.

I'm currently really loving Victor Hugo's "Les Miserables". I had my doubts because I saw the musical a few years ago and thought it too depressing, but the book is great. The character development is wonderful.

I'm sorry, but this thread has been going on for way too long. I mean it was started in January 2007. That was three years ago! So, if it's o.k. with everyone I'd like to start a new thread here,

http://www.librarything.com/topic/81019