Confess your literary ignorance

[bimble]

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.

lucky you - loads to look forward to.

 

[Pickman's model]

Why?

because they're unmitigated tripe

 

[Epona]

never read sherlock holmes?

Although I am not the person you were talking to -

I'm not a massive fan of Conan Doyle, let's just say that our world views (Conan Doyle's and mine) do not have much crossover and leave it at that.

 

[bimble]

because they're unmitigated tripe

Which you know, because you've never read a word of one.

 

[Epona]

I can't stand Jane Austen either btw.

 

[Pickman's model]

ive seen some Basil Rathbone ones - does that count?

but you haven't read e.g. a study in scarlet: nor, by other authors, frankenstein, dracula, the beetle, the three impostors, heart of darkness, the nether world, kim, white stains, the green helmet, my fight for irish freedom, guerrilla days in ireland, any james connolly...

 

[Pickman's model]

Which you know, because you've never read a word of one.

i notice you're not disputing it but simply asking how i know it.

 

[bimble]

i notice you're not disputing it but simply asking how i know it.

I dispute this. I love jane Austen. She is very funny.

 

[ska invita]

but you haven't read e.g. a study in scarlet: nor, by other authors, frankenstein, dracula, the beetle, the three impostors, heart of darkness, the nether world, kim, white stains, the green helmet, my fight for irish freedom, guerrilla days in ireland, any james connolly...

I will keep an open mind and put them on my bucket list
white stains?
green helmet?
*snigger

 

[Pickman's model]

I dispute this. I love jane Austen. She is very funny.

i see she's your favourite.

 

[Pickman's model]

I will keep an open mind and put them on my bucket list

tbh i would sooner read jane austen than a lot of stuff written after 1945, e.g. salman rushdie. rushdie should have had a fatwa for writing such a turgid novel.

 

[Epona]

tbh i would sooner read jane austen than a lot of stuff written after 1945, e.g. salman rushdie. rushdie should have had a fatwa for writing such a turgid novel.

I wouldn't go quite that far, but you do have a fairly valid point.

 

[bimble]

i see she's your favourite.

She's in my top 2 Victorian women novelists for sure.

 

[Spymaster]

Which you know, because you've never read a word of one.

I've never read a JA novel either but I know what most of them are about and would rather sauté my testicles.

 

[Pickman's model]

I will keep an open mind and put them on my bucket list
white stains?
green helmet?
*snigger

the green helmet - yeats
white stains - crowley

if you like 'white stains' you might also enjoy 'snowdrops from a curate's garden'

 

[bimble]

I've never read a JA novel either but I know what most of them are about and would rather sauté my testicles.

I think you ought to do that then.

 

[Pickman's model]

She's in my top 2 Victorian women novelists for sure.

yes. jane austen died in 1817. queen victoria was born in 1819 and ascended the throne in 1837. it is therefore anachronistick to describe austen as a victorian novelist when she was writing in the regency period.

 

[bimble]

I reckon Pickman would really enjoy jane Austen, she's an absolute master of the snide humorous put-down.

 

[Pickman's model]

I reckon Pickman would really enjoy jane Austen, she's an absolute master of the snide humorous put-down.

she may be but i'll never know because i'm never going to read her. anyway i expect lenin a better putdowner than austen with his accusations of windbaggery and so on

 

[Plumdaff]

I dispute this. I love jane Austen. She is very funny.

And acutely observes and amusingly critical of class and social mores. I find her a much more enjoyable read than many later 19th century novelists.

That said, never finished a Dickens.
No Pynchon, Updike or Roth.
Only ever read one graphic novel.

 

[bimble]

Dickens is rubbish.

 

[SpookyFrank]

Compared to Jane Austen, Charles Dickens looks like...well Charles Dickens. And Jane Austen looks like the purveyor of tiresome shite that she is.

 

[bimble]

 

[ringo]

Pride And Prejudice is brilliant writing. Funny, sharp and incisive; puncturing pomposity and social mores all over the shop. I expected to hate it but laughed out loud and was hugely impressed. A thousand soap operas have aped it, it gets right to the heart of society's hypocrisy and foolishness.

 

[JimW]

I'm ignorant about loads but am reading Middlemarch after seeing it top some best book list and it is great in a dated bourgeois way.

 

[Epona]

Compared to Jane Austen, Charles Dickens looks like...well Charles Dickens. And Jane Austen looks like the purveyor of tiresome shite that she is.

Ugh, I'm not a big fan of Dickens either.

 

[Orang Utan]

Dickens is rubbish.

How dare you.

 

[Steel Icarus]

No Dickend other than what I was made to at school
Great Gatsby I managed about three pages (and was still on the first sentence iirc)
No Bronte, Austen, anything much before 1930 tbh and virtually nothing by 20th century British writers

 

[bimble]

Compared to Jane Austen, Charles Dickens looks like...well Charles Dickens. And Jane Austen looks like the purveyor of tiresome shite that she is.

Compared to JA Dickens looks like a turgid humorless buffoon who just deals in the dullest of 2 dimensional stereotypes.

 

[Spymaster]

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.

... anything much before 1930 tbh ...

Hasn't everyone read The Jungle Book, and Kim?