Read the Classics?

[audreyh1]

I read a lot of nonfiction, but I have downloaded and read or reread several classics on my Kindle (for free). My favourite was The Country Doctor (translated from the French) by Honore de Balzac, and my least favourite was Middlemarch, by George Eliot. I thought that was horribly overwritten. I also find Dickens too flowery. Tastes have changed since the 19th century.

Middlemarch made an excruciatingly boring TV miniseries as well.

I plan to read some Dumas.

I really enjoyed the high school reading assignments.

 

[athena53]

My mother really tried to get me interested in Dickens. It just didn't take. I found "Great Expectations" boring. In general, I've read classics in English only when required to as part of a class and of those I've read, only Hardy's "Tess of the d'Urbervilles" stands out. OTOH, I've read Hugo's "Les Miserables", Balzac's "Memoires de deux Jeunes Filles Mariees" and de Beauvior's "Tous les Hommes sont Mortels" on my own in the original French and loved them. I liked The Canterbury Tales in original Middle English, too.


I read a lot; much of it is light mysteries, but I try to read a good, substantial biography like Massie's "Catherine the Great" or a translation of a book written by a non-American every time I get a bunch at the library.

 

[Goonie]

I got my start reading Golden Books and then Dr. Seuss in my earliest years. Then I started reading books like Black Beauty and that sort of thing. But then in junior high, they started to "make" us read, and that kind of ruined it for me. I had always enjoyed reading classic lit up until that point, because I read it because I wanted to. Once it was forced on me, and I was required to read specific books, I rebelled against it.

But once I hit HS, for the most part, we were given the opportunity to read whatever we chose to, and do our reports and such on those choices. I did take a few classes that had required reading lists, but taking those classes was of my choosing, because I knew that the required reading was mostly all classics, by either American authors or English authors. And that bring the case, I regained the enjoyment of reading again. A large portion of my classmates hated the books that we had to read, but I thought they were great!

I love classics, and have a lot of them in my personal library. I enjoy pulling one off of the shelf and rereading it again. The best deal that I ever got was about 30 years ago at a major bookseller, where I picked up a beautiful 16 or 18 volume set of nicely bound and imprinted classics, for less than $1 each! I also enjoy good old westerns by the likes of Louis Lamour.

A good book exercises the imagination, and keeps the gray-matter strong.

 

[GravitySucks]

I like to take one from the Classics rack and one from the western or SciFi rack at the library.
Other than Dickens and Poe I don't enjoy pre 19th century prose very much. Hemingway, Fitzgerald, Vonnegut are on my list as classics.

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[Walt34]

Some but not very much. I did like some of Mark Twain's stories. We were forced to read Great Expectations and that was excruciatingly boring. Wow, I hated that one!

 

[RonBoyd]

Oh, come on. There are plenty of 20th Century writers that are "Classics" -- James Michener, Mickey Spillane, Stephen King, Grace Metalious, Tony Morrison, Jacqueline Susann, etc... to name but a few.

 

[freebird5825]

I attended parochial school for 12 years, so I had plenty of classics back then. I took American Lit 100 in college as a distribution requirement for my BS.

I actually read Bullfinch's Mythology when I was in 8th grade. It took me a while but I loved the stories. My teachers couldn't believe it.

I used to take what I called "junk food" reading (in comparison to the constant techie stuff in my c*reer) on the flights across country on TDY. I could almost polish off half of a 200+ page book for a flight to San Diego. I liked Danielle Steel books.

I haven't read much lately since FIRE. No particular reason. I've gone in phases all my life ranging from voracious reading to who cares ?

 

[splitwdw]

Not much of a "classics" reader but do like Poe, Alcott, TA Daly, OW Holmes, Emerson. I have a library that was left to me by my husband's grandfather. It's full of wonderful books like "Rookie Rhymes by the Men of the 1st & 2nd Provisional Training Regiment-1917", "Our Cruise", written & illustrated by Chas A Kilwinski, USN, painter, second class, USS Vicksburg-1910, "A Meteorological Account of the Weather in Philadelphia from Jan. 1, 1790 to Jan. 1, 1847" by Charles Peirce and many other books from the mid to late 1800's and early 1900's. No one on my husbands side of the family was interested in the books except me.

 

[pb4uski]

I think that I prefer to read rather than watch/listen as when I open webpages on Yahoo with video I usually pause the video and just read the text. I can read a lot faster that the video.

 

[RonBoyd]

I think that I prefer to read rather than watch/listen as when I open webpages on Yahoo with video I usually pause the video and just read the text. I can read a lot faster that the video.

Not the same thing. Non-fiction is way different than fiction. Your experience is more related to impatience than to a dislike of reading -- you are skimming through the text not "reading" in the true (the OP's) sense of the word. I, too, have the tendency to a "just get to the point" attitude when reading/watching such material. I doubt that you would be able to say the same thing about a "Star Wars" movie - preferring to pause the video and read the transcript.

My contention stands... reading is hard and not natural.

 

[G8tr]

In the OP, I used "classics" as before TV for a reason.

I was there, "before TV", and other than listening to radio adventure stories like Little Orphan Annie, the only way that was available to venture outside my little world, was to "be read to" or early on at age 7 to become a "reader".

I shall forever be thankful for my 2nd grade teacher, who taught a love of reading, and a very large part of my misspent youth and young adulthood was spent in reading... often from 2 to 5 books a week. Many books read under the covers with a flashlight, when I was supposed to be sleeping.

It was a time when experience was created in imagination. Nothing to go by but a few illustrations in the book. Reading The Brothers Karamazov was not only a reading, but an emotional experience, and reading that at age 10 or so was very formative.

In reviewing lists of "best classics", makes me wonder how I could have possibly read so many. Virtually all of Poe, Dickens, Mellville, and literally hundreds of others.

About 10 years ago, while doing a lot of biking, turned from reading to listening to books on tape, and now, with eyes that tire easily, have gone back to this. Librivox, for the most part, and auto reads of Gutenberg (though not really satisfactory).
Local resale
Before TV... forced imagination. A happy part of life.

Have you considered checking out audio books from your local library? Likewise, there is also the Overdrive media console app for tablets and smart phones that allows you to check out audio and video materials for free.


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[rodi]

I've read about half the authors you listed - and tried some of the others - but couldn't get past the first few paragraphs.

Some authors you listed are very entertaining, easy reads (Twain, Dickens, Orwell), others are harder (Melville, Homer).

I would toss Hemingway and Fitzgerald in your list. Perhaps even Kafka.

Some I've read more than once (most Twain, several Dickens, most Hemingway) - others once was enough. (Huxley).

 

[mystang52]

I took a great course in college - "The Bible as Literature." This course covered the Bible in a historical context, and provided background for the basis of the major stories.
Just recently I started reading the Bible again. I am not at all religious but merely reading it in that same historical-context fashion. Admittedly, I skim quite a bit.
Simultaneously, I'm currently reading Milton's "Paradise Lost." Not an easy read, but it is getting easier now that I've gotten used to the [old English?] language format.

 

[ItDontMeanAThing]

I've loved to read since I was young. A career that meant I was always reading squashed recreational reading, with I restarted after retirement. Tried some Classics because I hadn't read any since required in school, and can't imagine a life of not trying new things.

Poe short stories were a mixed bag. Moby Dick (I'm half way through) is fascinating. I'll reread The Great Gatsby every year until either I'm no longer stopped in my reading tracks by the writing quality or my eyes give out. Does Raymond Chandler's work count as Classics? Damn, he's funny.

 

[mjbaker8]

Worth the effort: Don Quixote, War and Peace, and Count of Monte Cristo. Unlike other, modern works of fiction or non-fiction, these stories stick with you years after reading them.

It's very rewarding to draw connections in how characters interacted in these period pieces - not unlike ourselves today.

 

[2017ish]

The question comes from pure curiosity. I don't believe my kids (now in mid fifties) have ever spent much time reading the Classics,....

Names like Dickens, Tolstoy, Homer, Orwell, Rand, Huxley, Hawthorne, Dostoyevski, Shakespeare, Twain, Marx, Doyle, Melville... and any of the thousands of authors generally acknowledged to have had a lasting impact on literature.

A matter of? early education, social upbringing, neighborhood, intellect, family tradition... or just the way it happened....the list goes on forever.

So, either way... Whether you read older literature, (the main question), current literature, or read very little... Why? or Why not?

I am your childrens' age. My sons were born 1988-1992. They had Lord of the Rings read aloud to them by age five (with voices), and were reading it themselves before their teens.... Durant belongs on that list--sons read portions of the story of civilization growing up, as well as "Heroes of History." They also read at least some Twain, Huxley, Rand, Orwell, Homer, Dickens, Shakespeare, and Doyle before leaving for college. (Excluding what they read in school)

Everyone on your list has landed in my kindle courtesy of Gutenberg, or been retrieved from my library, within the past year or two.

OTOH, I doubt either of my parents read any of these authors outside of school assignments, and I know for a fact that none of my siblings have.

Our sons continue to read for fun. Genetics or culture, who knows? But some of us just can't avoid reading. DW jokes (??) that I am unable to avoid reading the ingredients on a cereal box if it is within my field of vision on the table. Just the way it is.

 

[imoldernu]

I am your childrens' age. My sons were born 1988-1992. They had Lord of the Rings read aloud to them by age five (with voices), and were reading it themselves before their teens.... Durant belongs on that list--sons read portions of the story of civilization growing up, as well as "Heroes of History." They also read at least some Twain, Huxley, Rand, Orwell, Homer, Dickens, Shakespeare, and Doyle before leaving for college. (Excluding what they read in school)

Everyone on your list has landed in my kindle courtesy of Gutenberg, or been retrieved from my library, within the past year or two.

OTOH, I doubt either of my parents read any of these authors outside of school assignments, and I know for a fact that none of my siblings have.

Our sons continue to read for fun. Genetics or culture, who knows? But some of us just can't avoid reading. DW jokes (??) that I am unable to avoid reading the ingredients on a cereal box if it is within my field of vision on the table. Just the way it is.

Yes!
At the very heart of the question. I don't know the answer. The cereal box analogy really hits home.

My first inclination was to blame TV for limiting the imagination and thought process that reading requires, but that doesn't account for those who DO read.
My second guess had to do with intellect... that curiosity lies in the grey matter, and that the selectivity of reading to satisfy this need is a natural cause and effect process.

Now, I'm inclined to believe that neither is correct, but that the affinity for reading classics is much more complicated.

So... reading classics, vs. reading for the purpose of self betterment,self satisfaction, or entertainment... an open question for me. My grandson is extraordinarily intelligent, and reads at an almost alarming rate... (we call him The Sponge), but virtually none of this is from the classics.

 

[2017ish]

Yes!
....

So... reading classics, vs. reading for the purpose of self betterment,self satisfaction, or entertainment... an open question for me. My grandson is extraordinarily intelligent, and reads at an almost alarming rate... (we call him The Sponge), but virtually none of this is from the classics.

I don't know that I would put reading classics in a different class than "just" reading. Outside of work, I read mostly nonfiction, still a good amount of speculative fiction, some revisiting of the classics (fiction and nonfiction), and the occasional modern, mainstream fiction. I'd analogize it to drinking wine. Sometimes you want a well aged bottle of Cabernet that takes a bit of patience to enjoy (the classics, John Foster Wallace, or Cryptonomicon), sometimes you want a fruity pinot (most of my econ/history/politics), and sometimes you want a cold beer (most speculative fiction).

PS--If I recall correctly, the grandson is in the boarding school at Aurora? Good place for someone like him. Our eldest was set to go there, but we moved to another state before the start of his sophomore year, which deprived him of that particular experience.

 

[Gazingus]

I read Flaubert's "Madame Bovary" in two days at Christmas while DW and her sisters played board games and screamed laughter. The title character was despicable, but Flaubert's descriptions of human nature and actions were spot-on and timeless.

Currently reading Voltaire's "Candide"; it's hilarious! I own the Easton Press collection of 100 Greatest Books, but I haven't gotten very far with Homer or the philosophy crowd. I prefer a story.

 

[Walt34]

Worth the effort: Don Quixote, War and Peace, and Count of Monte Cristo. Unlike other, modern works of fiction or non-fiction, these stories stick with you years after reading them.

I guess it depends on the individual. I started on War and Peace when I was ~55, struggled through until about the 1/3 or 1/2 mark and couldn't keep my eyes open any longer. Dreadfully dull.

Yes, it is regarded as a classic. I have no idea why. It certainly didn't speak to me.

 

[Ally]

Our family reads the classics and did as children, too. My son's favorite books as a teen were Moby Dick and The Complete Works of Shakespeare. My daughter and I love Jane Austen, Thomas Hardy, Victor Hugo, Edith Wharton and more. My 12 year old granddaughter reads all the time and many are classics. In fact, I was startled when she quoted Shakespeare at Christmas. I asked her where she got that from and she said "From Mom's Shakespeare book" But I think we are way out of the norm. We talk about these books among each other, but not with friends so much.


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[urn2bfree]

There are some studies that supposedly show correlation of empathy with those who read fiction...not sure where cause and effect if any fit in there...I just finished an extremely difficult "classic" and am glad that I experienced it, but boy was it tough. the book is pretty long. The vocabulary had me consulting a dictionary almost every other page for a while. There is a ton of French that was completely over my non French speaking head, and the subject matter was very creepy and uncomfortable. But it was moving and funny and sad and emotionally compelling which is all you can ask of a book...what was the book? Lolita
I need a light hearted brainless book now to cleanse my palate...


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[Ally]

I read Lolita many years ago and I still think about it from time to time.


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[HFWR]

Read a fair amount of Poe, and Twain, and a few others, but two words describe my experience with "the classics": Cliff's Notes...

Read "The Slaughterhouse Five" in college; still don't know wtf it was about, but it was what I envision a flashback to be like...


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[Ed_The_Gypsy]

Have lost interest in most fiction, even classics, but may pick that back up when I have nothing else to do. I expect to be fairly well occupied for a time after I am tossed in the dustbin on 15 Jan.