What is everyone's favorite classic?

I just finished reading Catcher in the Rye, The Great Gatsby, and The Little Prince.
I loved ALL of them!!! Next up: Fahrenheit 451. (Huge Bradbury fan!)

F 451 is awesome.

[._.]

What is everyone's favorite classic?

From the 19th century: Pride and Prejudice.

From the 20th century: To Kill a Mockingbird.

I have read both of these more times than I can count!

One year I vowed to read 52 classics. I didn't make it to 52 but I read quite a few.

Frankenstein was so much more than I ever though it would be. Excellent.
Robinson Crusoe was amazing. Great Expectations too.

I adore Jane Austen, my sister loves Thomas Hardy but if you read his be prepared to cry at some point...depressing as hell. Jude the Obscure...amazing but sooo sad!

Could you please help me understand what you liked about The Great Gatsby? I am still perplexed by that one.

OPH

F 451 is awesome.

My favorite banned book of all times. . .

Loved Persuasion . . . oh, that Captain Wentworth

csk

"You pierce my soul...I'm half agony half hope"

Swoon!

Fahrenheit 451, 1984, and Dracula are all good ones.

[._.]

Mine are:

Secret Garden, The Count of Monte Cristo, Little Women, Pride and Prejudice and Little Women.

lol...my son loves Yo Gabba Gabba and in my head you said that like DJ Lance Rock ...lol

I loved The Great Gatsby. Such a story of decadence and the inability to move beyond self absorbtion. It points out some interesting things about the perception or the reality of the nouveau riche depending on where you stand on the issue. I always walk away from reading it trying to decide what exactly Fitzgerald wanted me to decide. All pursuits in the book seem to lead to tragedy. Was it simply a portrait of the people Fitzgerald knew too well? Was it a true send up of the nouveau riche or the idea that America operates without a class structure? Was it a way to have his audience consider the morality of the American Dream or perhaps greed for love, for money, or for being one of the in crowd? I think I change my mind every time I read it.

As for other classics, I tend toward Louisa May Alcott (weird but my favorites are Eight Cousins and Rose in Bloom), William Dean Howells (The Rise of Silas Lapham), drama from The Restoration period (The Rover, The Way of the World, and A Bold Stroke for a Wife), Arthur Conan Doyle (anything Sherlock), and Jules Verne (Around the World in 80 Days and 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea). Well, I could go on but it seems like we're trying to limit our responses to just a few. :0)

I'm not a huge admirer of classics and haven't read either of these in about 30 years, but I did enjoy The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain and David Copperfield by Charles Dickens. I recently reread Of Mice and Men by John Steinbeck and enjoyed it too.

Amyrica

Modern classic: 'The History of Love' by Nicole Krauss.

"There are so many ways to be alive, but only one way to be dead."
― Nicole Krauss, The History of Love

I am a huge fan of Hardy and did a ton of papers on him in college (LOVED Jude the Obscure) and I also love anything Edith Wharton, pretty much anything Steinbeck with East of Eden an all time favorite.

Other favorite classics are The Jungle and An American Tragedy. I love Theodore Dreiser and also did lots of papers on him in college. If you are a fan of The Jungle and/or American Tragedy, you might try Frank Norris, he wrote McTeague and The Octopus, not many folks have read them and they are really great too

What I like about Gatsby: It is pretty much the only Fitzgerald that I do like. I like the decadent 20's setting and the whole doomed romance of it. Wanting what you can't have...the shallowness of Daisy fascinates me. I love the theme that money does not make you happy.

-Amanda from Seattle

also a side note, I never liked the Canterbury Tales until I took a class in college with this absolutely WONDERFUL professor who really made them come alive.
He was famous at UNC for Chaucer and all the English Majors would fight to get into his classes.
-Amanda from Seattle

The Grapes of Wrath, by Steinbeck - a must read.

Well, I myself am a growing writer, and for me F. Scott Fitzgerald's words and his luscious descriptions of well, anything was an amazing experience for me. And honestly, the story was rather sad for me...*spoilers* a man who tried for many years to become greater than he was so that he could win over someone he cared for, just to have everything fall apart very quickly and end up alone in the end?

But I must say, it's the writing style that made it.

Little Women! I also like The Good Earth. Oh, and Heidi.

Could you please help me understand what you liked about The Great Gatsby? I am still perplexed by that one.

Great Gatsby shows us a class of people we're probably not accustomed to, one where money allows them anything they want to the point of boredom. The writing style is pretty cool too.

The book I never 'got' was Catcher in the Rye. The biggest loser and phony was Holden, a simpering mess. I suspect those who love the book identify with him.

Thoughts?

~~Doublesaj~~

The biggest loser and phony was Holden, a simpering mess. I suspect those who love the book identify with him

That's why I still love the book today. As a typical, basketcase teenage girl, I wanted Holden to be my best friend, I could absolutely identify with him. As an adult, you read it from a different perspective, just as you view your own younger self much differently. I do believe if you never read it early in life, a lot of the "magic" of it is lost, because you don't get the blind emotional connection to Holden.

The book I never 'got' was Catcher in the Rye. The biggest loser and phony was Holden, a simpering mess. I suspect those who love the book identify with him.

I HATED, hated, HATED, hated this book! Did I mention HATE? Was forced to read it in high school . . . suddenly got a nasty taste in my mouth. . . . . augh!

csk

I absolutely LOVED Catcher in the Rye. Maybe because I identify with Holden's view of the world. There's a beauty in it, an honest truth. Stuck in-between being a child and being forced into adulthood, innocence fading...yet still lingering in the quiet desperation of the mind. Childhood is rich and vibrant and carefree (ideally), and adulthood is cold, hard, unforgiving...and that tug of war ended up tearing him apart.

Salinger himself was pretty much portrayed through Holden Caulfield, and it's probably because of that perspective of the world that led him to be a recluse.

I love all J D Salinger. ALL of Nine Stories is absolutely WONDERFUL. And Franny and Zooey is an all time favorite, which I just reread the other month and still love it. I connect with the female characters definitely more than Holden Caulfield, but I loved Catcher in the Rye too. I went through a whole stage of those angst books like Bell Jar and Catcher in the Rye, Looking for Mr Goodbar, Go Ask Alice, The Outsiders, etc.

As an adult, Nine Stories is the way to go. Uncle Wiggily in Connecticut, Down at the Dinghy, The Laughing Man, and A Perfect Day for Bananafish are fantastic!

-Amanda from Seattle

Two of my favorites are Jane Eyre and Steinbeck's East of Eden.

AC

A few years back, I made it a point to read one classic book a month from a "Top 100 Classics to Read Before You Die" list I found on-line. I read those 100 and am now on another Top Classics List to read.

There were some PAINFUL ONES ("Moby Dick," "Walden," "Frankenstein,' Wuthering Heights) and some that I just fell in love with.

"Grapes of Wrath" by Steinbeck. First time I read it, I cried at how great it was.
Most of Jane Austen's works, "Pride & Prejudice" being my #1, and "Sense and Sensibility" tied with "Emma" as my # 2. "Persuasion" too.
"Jane Eyre" (a Bronte I *liked*)

I read War and Peace. For reals. Not bad, when you take out the military stratagem and get to the meat of the matter; the people in the book. I read Chaucer (who's really funny and quite raunchy - I took a Chaucer class at UF and we had to read it in Middle English. I loved the class,) Dante, Dickens (so wonderful), Hemingway (meh) and Heller's "Catch-22" which had me rolling.

I'm a book nerd. :)

"The Good Earth" was very good. Really love Buck's writing.

I took Honors English in high school, which consisted of reading a classic a week...some I simply couldn't get through and somewhat gracefully fudged through discussions on (The Dead. left me dead bored) others I loved and have reread a few times (Grendel,Farenheit 451, Brave New World, Catch-22, Siddhartha, Candide, A Tale of Two Cities). Those are the ones that come quickly to mind.

and, for some strange reason even I can't explain, I own copies of "The Little Prince" in 4 languages. I only read one language. go figure.

To Kill a Mockingbird

Does A Wrinkle in Time count as a classic?