We don’t talk much about adult classics here at Stacked, but I’m always interested by readers’ reactions to them. When I’m struggling to find common reading ground with other adults, asking them their opinion on Austen or Faulkner will often elicit some interesting discussion. As an English major in college, I read my fair share of the classics; I’ve only recently embraced the fact that I’m free to despise many of them (and I do).
This post is dedicated to sharing my antipathy. (I’ll include a hefty dose of classics I did like for some balance.) I apologize in advance if I excoriate your favorite. Feel free to tell me how wrong I am in the comments.
Absalom, Absalom by William Faulkner
Really, I could list the entire Faulkner canon here, but let’s not be greedy. I don’t take exception to the content or plot. Instead, it’s Faulkner’s style I dislike so much. Paragraphs and punctuation are two of writing’s greatest inventions. Completely eschewing them isn’t an effective stylistic choice, it’s a mess.
The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald
It’s amazing how such a short book can manage to be so dull. I could never bring myself to care about Gatsby, much less be interested in any aspect of his life.
A Tale of Two Cities by Charles Dickens
This is a strange one for me to dislike, since the plot is actually pretty interesting and quite moving. Dickens’ style is just not my cup of tea.
Wuthering Heights by Emily Bronte
I don’t hate this one as actively as the others, but it’s pretty high on the list. Peopled with an astonishing number of characters I just want to strangle, I found it neither romantic (which is fine – it’s not necessary supposed to be) nor compelling. I did find it bloated and tedious, though.
And now for a change of pace, a few classics I really love:
Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte
Perhaps this is an obvious one, but I love this book. My love for it didn’t crystallize until I re-read it in a college class and we talked at length about the “Reader, I married him” line. I love its exciting plot, how Jane grows to love such an imperfect – and arguably not very good – man, and most of all, how she comes into her own as an individual.
The Color Purple by Alice Walker
I’ve never before or since read a book as simultaneously horrible and hopeful as this one.
Frankenstein by Mary Shelley
Reading this one as an established SFF fan was really illuminating – I loved seeing how Shelley used the tropes I had always taken for granted. The fact that she wrote it at age 18 was inspiring, too.
Which classics do you love/hate?
I love To Kill A Mockingbird. The Color Purple is wonderful as well. However, my sister raved about The Scarlet Letter which I absolutely detested. I also loved Roots.
Moby Dick is one of my favorites! And I love Leaves of Grass. And The Metamorphosis.
On the other end though…I've never been able to get into Virginia Woolf, and I never got into Faulkner either.
I was an AP English teacher prior to heading to library school, so there are many classics I *appreciate* rather than like as well as many that I love or loathe. Here's some of mine:
Love: JANE EYRE, WUTHERING HEIGHTS, TURN OF THE SCREW, TO KILL A MOCKINGBIRD, OF MICE AND MEN, INVISIBLE MAN, 1984, almost anything by Shakespeare (see Loathe list below…), Flannery O'Conner's short stories, A DOLL'S HOUSE, THE AWAKENING, THE SUN ALSO RISES (the only Hemingway novel I actually like), THEIR EYES WERE WATCHING GOD, LOLITA, THE PICTURE OF DORIAN GREY, LE PETIT PRINCE, and too many poets to name.
Loathe: anything by Herman Melville, THE SCARLET LETTER, JULIUS CAESAR, FRANKENSTEIN (I always want to like it, but I just don't…I do like those Kenneth Oppel YA origin stories, though), LORD OF THE FLIES, and HUCK FINN (as much as I love Twain, i've just never enjoyed this book).
Appreciate: THE GREAT GATSBY, AS I LAY DYING, BRAVE NEW WORLD, HEART OF DARKNESS, HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES, GREAT EXPECTATIONS, all of Jane Austen (I might get shunned by the library crowd for this, but I like her books better as movie adaptations), and DRACULA.
I tried to not force my kids to read something I didn't at least have some appreciation (and usually love) for…the only time I had to break that was when I taught sophomores one year and the district mandated that we read JULIUS CAESAR. It was a terrible few weeks as we slogged along–although that play does have one of the coolest lines ever, "Yon Cassius has a lean and hungry look."
I'm the same way with TWO CITIES – in theory, it's great, but I have a lot of trouble reading Dickens' writing style.
With you on Falkner. In my twenties, W. Somerset Maugham (esp. OF HUMAN BONDAGE) was my favorite writer but when I try to reread, some of the books feel wordy and long. Fun topic 🙂
Middlemarch I love, and Wuthering Heights I absolutely hate, despite loving Emily Brontë.
I faked a book report my in my HS freshman English class because I couldn't bring myself to finish Wuthering Heights. I also have yet to find a Dickens book I can enjoy and HATE Bartleby the Scrivner by Melville.
My loves include the Austen canon, Evelyn Waugh, Hemingway, Middlemarch, A Room with a View, Their Eyes Were Watching God, and To Kill a Mockingbird.
aw I really enjoyed Bartleby the Scrivner! Agree with the dislike of Wuthering Heights and the love of Austen though!
Love As I Lay Dying, Pride and Prejudice, Great Expectations, Shakespeare. Hated Red Badge of Courage and Moby Dick. I never finished the last 25 or so pages of Moby Dick. And I won't. You can't make me.
Love: Jane Eyre, anything Austen, Anna Karenina, Brothers Karamazov, East of Eden.
Loathe: Wuthering Heights, Heart of Darkness, The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, Treasure Island, The Jungle, Candide.
I love A Tale of Two Cities – I find that Dickens has a great dry humor. I also like Jane Austen, Virginia Woolf, The Scarlet Letter, Moll Flanders, Homer, quite a bit of Shakespeare, Candide, Tom Sawyer/Huck Finn, Kidnapped, Treasure Island, A Raisin in the Sun.
I hate Thomas Hardy, Bartleby the Scrivner, The Great Gatsby, The Little Prince, A Christmas Carol.
Hated being forced of read Lord of the Flies in school but loved anything by Hawthorne and A Take of Two Cities is one of my fave classics (gotta love Madame DeFarge)
It's not so much that I hate Ulysses, but I just don't get it. I mean I've read it twice and I still don't understand it.