Books everyone thinks are great but you hated (and vice versa)

[rubbershoes]

Just remembered . . . I never finished fear and loathing on las Vegas. Bit weird for me not to make it through a bad autobiography (though I suppose it doesn't quite count?). I honestly can't remember why I didn't finish, but it can't be a good sign.

It strikes me as the type of book you have to read when you're young. At 25, I loved it. At 45, I'd probably have thought it was self-indulgent tosh if I hadn't read it before

 

[frogwoman]

Some books I'm actually scared to read again because I don't think I'll like them as much as how I remember them.

 

[krtek a houby]

There's a Wocket in My Pocket used to freak me out a bit as a kid, but later in life I adored the illustrations.

 

[ATOMIC SUPLEX]

It strikes me as the type of book you have to read when you're young. At 25, I loved it. At 45, I'd probably have thought it was self-indulgent tosh if I hadn't read it before

I loved hitchhikers httg as a youth and even in my 20s. Thought they were all masterworks. I read some of it to my daughter when she was young, but had to give up . . . It was soooo bad. Just lame and embarrassing.

 

[Me76]

Don Quixote. Vaguely interesting premise but so repetitive. I forced myself to finish part 1 but couldn't go further.

 

[polly]

Don Quixote. Vaguely interesting premise but so repetitive. I forced myself to finish part 1 but couldn't go further.

Isn't it known for being the book no one ever finishes reading? I think you're in good company

 

[DotCommunist]

See I didn't hate Moby Dick which is meant to be another of those ones people rarely finish, I was pretty intrigued but nothing massive happens for so long I sacked it off before the ship had sailed. Went with the TV adaptation with Patrick Stewart as Ahab (well recommended).

 

[frogwoman]

See I didn't hate Moby Dick which is meant to be another of those ones people rarely finish, I was pretty intrigued but nothing massive happens for so long I sacked it off before the ship had sailed. Went with the TV adaptation with Patrick Stewart as Ahab (well recommended).

Isn't there a scene with exploding whale semen or blubber or something? Someone told me this the other night in the pub.

 

[polly]

See I didn't hate Moby Dick which is meant to be another of those ones people rarely finish, I was pretty intrigued but nothing massive happens for so long I sacked it off before the ship had sailed. Went with the TV adaptation with Patrick Stewart as Ahab (well recommended).

I haven't read Don Quixote but I thought that was the general consensus about it - not hatred, just a sense of your life being finite and better spent doing something else

 

[DotCommunist]

Isn't there a scene with exploding whale semen or blubber or something? Someone told me this the other night in the pub.

I didn't make it to that bit in the book but the quote is notorious.

Squeeze! squeeze! squeeze! all the morning long; I squeezed that sperm till I myself almost melted into it; I squeezed that sperm till a strange sort of insanity came over me; and I found myself unwittingly squeezing my co-laborers' hands in it, mistaking their hands for the gentle globules. Such an abounding, affectionate, friendly, loving feeling did this avocation beget; that at last I was continually squeezing their hands, and looking up into their eyes sentimentally; as much as to say,--Oh! my dear fellow beings, why should we longer cherish any social acerbities, or know the slightest ill-humor or envy! Come; let us squeeze hands all round; nay, let us all squeeze ourselves into each other; let us squeeze ourselves universally into the very milk and sperm of kindness.

Would that I could keep squeezing that sperm for ever! For now, since by many prolonged, repeated experiences, I have perceived that in all cases man must eventually lower, or at least shift, his conceit of attainable felicity; not placing it anywhere in the intellect or the fancy; but in the wife, the heart, the bed, the table, the saddle, the fireside, the country; now that I have perceived all this, I am ready to squeeze case eternally. In thoughts of the visions of the night, I saw long rows of angels in paradise, each with his hands in a jar of spermaceti.

 

[frogwoman]

I didn't make it to that bit in the book but the quote is notorious.

Wtf? I've never attempted reading it tbh. It does sound like there's a number of chapters that are completely batshit.

 

[Brainaddict]

I loved hitchhikers httg as a youth and even in my 20s. Thought they were all masterworks. I read some of it to my daughter when she was young, but had to give up . . . It was soooo bad. Just lame and embarrassing.

I can kind of still enjoy those books for nostalgia reasons but I've stopped recommending them to others. They aren't good books, they just captured an irreverence towards many establishment things (religions, governments, science, philosophy) that seemed exciting at the time and now looks rather weak compared to satire that has happened since. Also the romance bits are unbearable.

 

[DotCommunist]

Wtf? I've never attempted reading it tbh. It does sound like there's a number of chapters that are completely batshit.

its very dense and the prose is, well, as you see it. Thats why it takes so long to tell even the smallest things. Patrick Stewart is made for the role of Ahab though. Chews the scenery so much he's practically eating the whole boat.

 

[Poot]

I haven't read Don Quixote but I thought that was the general consensus about it - not hatred, just a sense of your life being finite and better spent doing something else

I got the abridged audiobook recently and that was plenty. I got the humour of it, it was relatively good fun and the reader was actually very good, but I wouldn't have wanted the whole thing, or even half of it. It's a bit samey.

 

[Gromit]

Rebecca, Daphne du Maurier.

Just took way too long to get going. Couldn't relate to any of it.

 

[hitmouse]

I didn't make it to that bit in the book but the quote is notorious.

Yeah, I've never read it, but have heard about that quote. I have read Melville's short story Cock-A-Doodle-Doo!, which is just full of stuff like:

Oh, noble cock !

Plain as cock could speak, it said, "Let the world and all aboard of it go to pot. Do you be jolly, and never say die! What's the world compared to you? What is it, anyhow, but a lump of loam? Do you be jolly!"

Oh, noble cock!

"But my dear and glorious cock," mused I, upon second thought, "one can't so easily send this world to pot; one can't so easily be jolly with civil-processes in his hat or hand."

Hark! the crow again. Plain as cock could speak, it said: "Hang the process, and hang the fellow that sent it! If you have not land or cash, go and thrash the fellow, and tell him you never mean to pay him. Be jolly!"

Now this was the way—through the imperative intimations of the cock—that I came to clap the added mortgage on my estate; paid all my debts by fusing them into this one added bond and mortgage. Thus made at ease again, I renewed my search for the noble cock...

"My friend," said I, "do you know of any gentleman hereabouts who owns an extraordinary cock?"

The twinkle glittered quite plain in the wood-sawyer's eye.

"I know of no gentleman" he replied, "who has what might well be called an extraordinary cock."

Oh, thought I, this Merrymusk is not the man to enlighten me. I am afraid I shall never discover this extraordinary cock...

I stood awhile admiring the cock, and wondering at the man. At last I felt a redoubled admiration of the one, and a redoubled deference for the other.

And so on. As Melville short stories go, it's not quite up there with Bartleby.

 

[frogwoman]

Yeah, I've never read it, but have heard about that quote. I have read Melville's short story Cock-A-Doodle-Doo!, which is just full of stuff like:

And so on. As Melville short stories go, it's not quite up there with Bartleby.

I thought cock was generally meant to mean rooster back then (or a male animal like cock Robin or something)?

 

[Chz]

I thought cock was generally meant to mean rooster back then (or a male animal like cock Robin or something)?

Is that not still what it means? I may have to re-evaluate some of the bogside poetry I've been admiring.

 

[frogwoman]

Is that not still what it means? I may have to re-evaluate some of the bogside poetry I've been admiring.

yeah i mean that the original readers might not have perceived any innuendo in it.

 

[SpookyFrank]

Rebecca, Daphne du Maurier.

Just took way too long to get going. Couldn't relate to any of it.

Jamaica Inn and The Scapegoat are both superb thrillers with just about zero fat on them. Not attempted Rebecca though.

 

[A380]

Isn't there a scene with exploding whale semen or blubber or something? Someone told me this the other night in the pub.

Isn’t that from Jane Austin? Sense and cetacean semen or similar?

 

[furluxor]

I loved hitchhikers httg as a youth and even in my 20s. Thought they were all masterworks. I read some of it to my daughter when she was young, but had to give up . . . It was soooo bad. Just lame and embarrassing.

I read the first one this year and it felt very weak - dad jokes and slapstick with very few good moments (I liked the dolphins). Some of my friends who are big fans of Hitchhiker's Guide couldn't wait for me to read it and I felt so uncomfortable telling them that I didn't like it.

 

[JimW]

I thought cock was generally meant to mean rooster back then (or a male animal like cock Robin or something)?

Rooster was apparently coined in the US just because they didn't want to say cock.

 

[hitmouse]

I thought cock was generally meant to mean rooster back then (or a male animal like cock Robin or something)?

Dunno, I'm not an expert on the history of the word. But fwiw wikipedia says:

Cock is a common English slang word for the human penis.[1][2] It is asserted to have been in use as early as 1450...
Two instances of the use of "cock" in the works of William Shakespeare are thought to be double entendres for the phallic sense, one being in the 1594 play The Taming of the Shrew, where Petruchio describes his crest as "a combless cock", and another in the 1599 play, Henry VI, Part 2, where a character named "Pistol" declares, "Pistol's cock is up".

I mean, I would think it must've been less widely used in the 19th century for Melville to be able to write that story, but dunno.

Jamaica Inn and The Scapegoat are both superb thrillers with just about zero fat on them. Not attempted Rebecca though.

Rebecca is excellent imo. My Cousin Rachel also really worth a read especially for people who've read and enjoyed Rebecca.

 

[JimW]

Cite for the euphemistic origin of rooster: Was "rooster" originally an AmE or a BrE term?

 

[Dystopiary]

Rebecca is excellent imo. My Cousin Rachel also really worth a read especially for people who've read and enjoyed Rebecca.

I preferred My Cousin Rachel to Rebecca. Hoping to read more DdM once I've got through some of the books I've got lined up to read (a lot).

Spoiler: My Cousin Rachel spoiler

I honestly thought that she was innocent. I reckon she was easy to judge harshly by the standards of behaviour expected of women in those days. Either way, Philip wasn't half a whiny little wanker.

 

[Yuwipi Woman]

I know this is probably unpopular, but The Handmaid's Tale. I've loved some of her other works, but Handmaid's Tale seems to lack depth. This is one of the rare cases where I like the tv show more.