Confess your literary ignorance

[Orang Utan]

I've never read To Kill A Mockingbird
I've never read any Philip Roth, John Updike or William Faulkner.
I've not read a word of Don Quixote
I've never read any Mark Twain, Herman Melville, Ernest Hemingway or Victor Hugo.

 

[chilango]

I've burnt a book on two seperate occasions.

 

[Orang Utan]

I've burnt a book on two seperate occasions.

Which books?
i burnt my Gideon Bible in the school grounds when I was 14 or 15

 

[chilango]

A David Icke book at a party full of hippies.

A Tom Clancy when I couldn't get my stove to work 5000m up a mountain.

 

[mauvais]

A Tom Clancy when I couldn't get my stove to work 5000m up a mountain.

It's what he would have wanted.

That, WWIII with Russia and another Republican president. But mostly your operational stove.

 

[laptop]

I've never read any big fat Russian novel. Too hard to keep track when there are three times as many names as characters, I've heard.

 

[JimW]

I've never read any big fat Russian novel. Too hard to keep track when there are three times as many names as characters, I've heard.

A Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich is mercifully short. Like reading Farmer Giles of Ham instead of LoTR

 

[Pickman's model]

I've burnt a book on two seperate occasions.

i burned two books on one occasion

 

[Pickman's model]

Which books?
i burnt my Gideon Bible in the school grounds when I was 14 or 15

burned brighton rock and long short and tall in cemetery after finishing my gcses

 

[Pickman's model]

never read and never will read any jane austen

 

[laptop]

A Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich is mercifully short. Like reading Farmer Giles of Ham instead of LoTR

(And I have read it.)
Big Fat Novels, you know who you are.

 

[ska invita]

I find it impossible to read anything written before about 1940.... Ive never read a book to the end from before 1940 - in most cases Ive stopped on the first page.

 

[Orang Utan]

I find it impossible to read anything written before about 1940.... Ive never read a book to the end from before 1940 - in most cases Ive stopped on the first page.

Why that magical date?

 

[ska invita]

Why that magical date?

everything before feels antiquated and written in a language and or logic that makes my eye lids droop - post WW2 seems to be the birth of a new modren era that I can relate to, in both style and content

 

[ska invita]

I've never read any big fat Russian novel. Too hard to keep track when there are three times as many names as characters, I've heard.

same. the best Ive done is Gorky's Mother - got a third into that...its an easy read tbf.

Also anything with loads of characters is instant switch off for me. I remember this with my attempts to read Rushdie's Midnight Children and 100 years of Solitude and also Arundhati Roy's God of Small Things <all classic books supposedly, but my brain just cant handle all these multiple characters and massive family trees

 

[ringo]

I love 20th Century fiction, particularly from the deep south and what generally falls into the legacy of Faulkner's The Sound And The Fury, but the only time I tried to read it about 20 years ago I found it very hard going and gave up on it. Keep meaning to try again, maybe this year

 

[ringo]

I find it impossible to read anything written before about 1940.... Ive never read a book to the end from before 1940 - in most cases Ive stopped on the first page.

There are some real corkers though, Bram Stoker's Dracula remains one of the finest novels ever written. Crime & Punishment is very readable, both are equally gripping.

I made a decision about the same time I joined in the reading challenge in 2012 to throw away all of my literary prejudices, of which I had quite a few. I'd given up on sci-fi, fantasy, didn't bother with old stuff, avoided epic family dramas, thought I didn't like magic realism etc. As soon as I started reading outside my, by then, narrow field of interest, I discovered a whole new world of books that opened my eyes to all sorts of things. Going for Pulitzer/Booker prize winners and the classics was a great starting point.

I started to do it more with music after that too, instead of narrowing myself down to a small period of Jamaican music as I'd done for many years, and that's been really refreshing too. I need to do it with every aspect of my life I think.

 

[ska invita]

One of the oldest books Ive read to the end is Walk on The Wild Side, which almost fits in to that deep south thing - I thought it was older but its from 1956, but still a definite step back in time though, and filled with that old drawl and slang - may as well be poetry

 

[Orang Utan]

You should read some Jack London, ska invita

 

[ringo]

One of the oldest books Ive read to the end is Walk on The Wild Side, which almost fits in to that deep south thing - I thought it was older but its from 1956, but still a definite step back in time though, and filled with that old drawl and slang - may as well be poetry

Cheers, that looks right up my street

 

[ska invita]

There are some real corkers though, Bram Stoker's Dracula remains one of the finest novels ever written. Crime & Punishment is very readable, both are equally gripping.

I made a decision about the same time I joined in the reading challenge in 2012 to throw away all of my literary prejudices, of which I had quite a few. I'd given up on sci-fi, fantasy, didn't bother with old stuff, avoided epic family dramas, thought I didn't like magic realism etc. As soon as I started reading outside my, by then, narrow field of interest, I discovered a whole new world of books that opened my eyes to all sorts of things. Going for Pulitzer/Booker prize winners and the classics was a great starting point.

I started to do it more with music after that too, instead of narrowing myself down to a small period of Jamaican music as I'd done for many years, and that's been really refreshing too. I need to do it with every aspect of my life I think.

Good move! Happy new year Ringo

With literature its not out of trying though - its just puts me to sleep. I think the Russians might be a way in - it translates into what feels like modern prose in English - maybe something to do with the Russian language, or the unpretentiousness of Russian writers

 

[ska invita]

You should read some Jack London, ska invita

Dont tell me what to do



(Ill give it a try, thanks )

 

[ringo]

Good move! Happy new year Ringo

And to you mate

 

[Spymaster]

I've never read any Shakespear. Every time I've tried I've thought it bollocks after a couple of pages.

 

[Orang Utan]

Good move! Happy new year Ringo

With literature its not out of trying though - its just puts me to sleep. I think the Russians might be a way in - it translates into what feels like modern prose in English - maybe something to do with the Russian language, or the unpretentiousness of Russian writers

It depends very much on the translation. Avoid Constance Garnett.

 

[Pickman's model]

I find it impossible to read anything written before about 1940.... Ive never read a book to the end from before 1940 - in most cases Ive stopped on the first page.

never read sherlock holmes?

 

[ska invita]

Cheers, that looks right up my street

I only have one more tip from my literary ignorance:
I have this on the shelf but not tried it yet - from the 30s USA - Bukowski rates it very very highly as an early US classic written with the modern tightness and seeming simplicity, or something....I havent read it so dont know... I like Bukowskis attitude to writing and language so it appeals to me ... hard times in depression era LA....

 

[Spymaster]

I've never read any big fat Russian novel. Too hard to keep track when there are three times as many names as characters, I've heard.

It's taken me about 30 years to get quarter of the way through volume 1 of War and Peace.

 

[ska invita]

never read sherlock holmes?

ive seen some Basil Rathbone ones - does that count?

 

[bimble]

never read and never will read any jane austen

Why?