PDA

View Full Version : The bestestest-book-of-all-times you never read?


kuehnepips
10-04-2010, 08:15 PM
Absolutely top everything? Everyone recommended it? But ... you Must! Canon-this-canon-that?

Me ... Der Mann ohne Eigenschaften ...

I'm trying to read it since 1982 ...
Melville
10-04-2010, 10:45 PM
I can't think of anything fitting all those criteria, but of the canonical novels I haven't read, I think Dostoevsky's The Devils is the one I'm most likely to love. I think I'll like Pedro Paramo too.
Kurosawa Fan
10-04-2010, 10:58 PM
For me, it's Ulysses. I almost bought it again yesterday, as I have a hundred different times, but passed. One of these days I'll pull the trigger. And then it'll only be a few more years from then that I actually read it.
Ezee E
10-04-2010, 11:46 PM
Can't say there's a bad thing about Catcher in the Rye or 80629.
Benny Profane
10-05-2010, 12:21 AM
The Recognitions - Gaddis
Duncan
10-05-2010, 12:48 AM
It's probably 1984 (how have I not read that yet?) or something by Dostoevsky, Lowry (Hear Us Oh Lord From Heaven Thy Dwelling Place, maybe), Melville, Gaddis... I don't know.
D_Davis
10-05-2010, 03:46 PM
I think I'll like Pedro Paramo too.

It's excellent.
lovejuice
10-07-2010, 01:04 PM
charlotte's web. that book looks many kinds of awesome.
endingcredits
10-07-2010, 01:50 PM
O Finnegans Wake, one day, when I finally go completely mad, I will conquer you and angels will sing of my glory.
kuehnepips
10-07-2010, 02:26 PM
... Dostoevsky's The Devils ...

You'll love this madly.
Grouchy
10-07-2010, 06:21 PM
Pedro Paramo and El Llano en Llamas are both incredible. Juan Rulfo was a unique talent.

For me, it's either Borges with Ficciones or, if we have to pick a novel, Nabokov's Lolita.

I need to go back to reading.
Dead & Messed Up
10-08-2010, 10:12 PM
I haven't read a lot of the big ones. Ulysses, Watership Down, Moby Dick, Great Expectations, Atlas Shrugged, and the list goes on.
megladon8
10-08-2010, 10:39 PM
There are too many to list for me.

I'm terribly under-read when it comes to the classics (both modern and...er...classic).
Mysterious Dude
10-09-2010, 12:46 AM
According to my calculations, it's a tie between Pride and Prejudice and Ulysses. But I'm just gonna say Moby Dick.
Hugh_Grant
10-09-2010, 01:31 AM
Due to my occupation, this is a rather embarrassing topic for me. Let's just say that there are gaps in my American literature reading history. I've read a lot of short stories from some canonical authors, but there are some novels that I should have read by now, but I haven't.
Melville
10-09-2010, 07:45 AM
It's excellent.

You'll love this madly.
Excellent.


O Finnegans Wake, one day, when I finally go completely mad, I will conquer you and angels will sing of my glory.
Yeah, I should have included that too, along with a bunch of philosophy books (e.g., Hegel's Phenomenology of Spirit, Merleau-Ponty's Phenomenology of Perception, Hume's Treatise of Human Nature, Kierkegaard's Concluding Unscientific Postscript,...).
lovejuice
10-15-2010, 12:18 AM
Yeah, I should have included that too, along with a bunch of philosophy books (e.g., Hegel's Phenomenology of Spirit, Merleau-Ponty's Phenomenology of Perception, Hume's Treatise of Human Nature, Kierkegaard's Concluding Unscientific Postscript,...).
Being and Nothingness and Being and Time are staring me down from the shelf, asking when the hell I'm going to pick them up.