One of these days

From Loretta:

      I’ve been answering a lot of questions lately.  But no, the police have not asked me to assist them in their inquiries.  My alumni organization, which is putting together some kind of directory or nostalgia album or something sent out questionnaire.  One question was, “What’s your favorite memory of Clark?”  My answer:  “I don’t remember.”
      Like many others, I was really too immature at age 18 for college, so the early years were not only a blur but a waste:  time squandered.  On the other hand, I learned some things, which we can put into the Life Lessons category.  After leaving school a few times and going back a few times, I finally settled down and became a model student.  That last year I remember somewhat.  This enabled me to answer the question, “Who was your favorite faculty member?”
       He was an English professor who specialized in what I thought of as the Really Old Stuff:  Medieval literature, Old Norse Sagas, Chaucer, and Shakespeare,.  He also taught a course in Tragedy.  Except for Shakespeare, these did not constitute my favorite areas of English literature.  Give me a choice between tragedy and comedy and I will always choose comedy.  Old Norse Sagas, for those of you who have not encountered any, are usually tragic.  Lots of fighting and killing and revenge.  But I thought the world of this professor, and would take any class he taught.
      Meanwhile, my favorite subject--the English novel of the 18th-19th centuries, somehow got lost in that Life Lessons part of my education.  I really don’t remember what happened then--it was the Vietnam era and I think we shut down the school at one point--but I somehow managed not to read at least half the novels in the syllabus.  Same goes for American Literature.
      In short, I was not always the nerd I am today.
       I was thinking about this not long ago when I answered a questionnaire from Waterstones, in connection with my Carsington books, which recently started to appear in the UK from Piatkus Books.  One question stirred up the ghosts of my squandered youth:
      Q:  Which classic have you always meant to read and never got round to it?
       A:  Tobias Smollet’s The Expedition of Humphrey Clinker.
      I got that answer right away, because, after college, I set out to read nearly all the books I should have read while in college.  I discovered that the author of Moby Dick had a sense of humor, and the book wasn’t a boring fish story as I had supposed.  Lawrence Sterne’s Tristram Shandy turned out to be crazy and funny, strangely modern.  George Eliot wasn’t a bore but an insightful and witty writer with a keen understanding of human psychology.  I also discovered that I still didn’t like Thomas Hardy but at least I understood why.
      There were other Important Books not on the syllabus, that others had read and I hadn’t.  Look Homeward Angel was a revelation to me, when I finally got around to it.  Little by little, in the years since college, I’ve filled in the gaps in my Must Be Read list.
      The one book on my shelves I have still somehow not managed to read--or even open--in the last two or three hundred years, is The Expedition of Humphrey Clinker.  I still have the copy I bought in college.  It gazes at me reproachfully from the shelf.
      I keep meaning to read it, but something else comes along.  It never makes it to the top of the TBR list, though I’m sure it ought to, and will probably give me ideas for one of my stories.
      But there it is, the one reminder of my careless youth.
      Maybe it needs to be there, as a reminder.
      Or maybe I’ll read it next, right after I finish the two books about Venice.
      It’s not the only book I’ve always meant to read but never got around to.  There’s Ulysses, too.  But, frankly, I don’t think that’s going to happen.  It doesn’t matter how beautiful the writing is.  I no longer have the patience for modern literature impossible to figure out without the aid of several volumes of critical explication and a college professor.  Smollett has a much better chance.
      What about you?  We all have TBR piles, but is there one of those Great Books waiting sadly on your bookshelf for you to choose it at last?
      Have you a classic or classics you always meant to read and never got round to?
      

Comments

[shscott21]

Just as Youth is Wasted on the Young, so College is Really Wasted on Youthful Ninnies. When I think back on all the classes skipped, or worse yet, classes taken because some long-forgotten love-object was taking them too....ah, better not to go there.

So which classics will probably never make it out of the TBR list for me? The 19th century Russians. I have no trouble at all sorting through the endless trials of the Pallisers, I've sailed through the complete zillion-page edition of Tom Jones with ease, Henry James, Edith Wharton, William Dean Howells, and yes, even Thomas Hardy (even the weird ones like "The Woodlanders") are like so many notches on my reading-belt, but I just stop dead at the sight of War and Peace or Anna Karenina.

No rational reason, just no interest: literary pigheadedness at its finest. Oink.

Susan/Miranda

[RevMelinda]

I have to sheepishly admit that I have never read a whole novel written by Charles Dickens. I have started them many times: A Tale of Two Cities, David Copperfield, Our Mutual Friend, Oliver Twist, Great Expectations--I always get about 20 pages in and lose heart. I don't know what it is--the writing is great, the characters interesting--and I love the screen adaptations--but I've never made it through a whole book. What is wrong with me?

[Susan Wilbanks]

I'm embarrassed to say I've never read THE ADVENTURES OF HUCKLEBERRY FINN. Of course, I've been embarrassed about it for years, yet that hasn't quite compelled me to pick it up on one of my near-weekly visits to my local library.

I also feel like I really ought to read WAR AND PEACE, but it feels like such a massive undertaking that I haven't yet actually done so.

[Kalen Hughes]

Hmmmmmm. I’ve never read Wuthering Heights, nor anything by Smollet. I think my “next great endeavor” is going to tackling the 18th century novels that my characters would certainly have been familiar with. Ah, justified geekdom. *grin*

And my take on Dickens (who I have never enjoyed reading) is that because he wrote serials, they are simply DESPERATELY in need of serious editing. I get so tired of reading the same info over and over and over . . . even the editions that are supposedly edited could still use some serious paring down IMO.

[Elaine McCarthy]

If only my TBR's would fit on a list! I have an embarrassing number of shelves crammed with stuff that looked great in the bookstore, yet somehow was never interesting enough to actually read. And of course guilt keeps me from simply getting rid of it. I paid Good Money for those books, and by golly I'm going to read them someday. Honest I am.

As for War and Peace... that I HAVE read... 3 times! It's a wonderful book, Susan. Particularly if you give yourself permission to skim/skip through the chapters that drone on about General Kutusov and/or Napoleon. Now that I've read what Loretta says about Moby Dick, I'll have to give it another try. I think I read it in high school, but I don't remember anything about it.

Funny how some books leave so little trace in the brain. Take Passage to India; I've read it 2-3 times (not because I love it so much, obviously), yet I couldn't tell you a thing about it. Same for The Good Soldier. I remember liking it, but don't have a CLUE what it was about. V. strange.

[Elaine McCarthy]

Re Karen's comment about Dickens being in need of editing: Did you know that Robert Graves did exactly that to David Copperfield? He published it as "The Real David Copperfield." Strewth!

[Lois]

Well, I still have four Jane Austens to read. . . Emma, Sense and Sensibility, Persuation and Mansfield Part. Yep, I love P&P, but I also loved Northanger Abbey too. :)

Lois

[LorettaChase]

Oh, dear, I'd forgotten about War & Peace. That's another one. I had difficulties with Russians, too. As to Dickens, I eat up every last word, again and again, re-reading him when I could be reading Smollett. Only proving that what's a reading joy to one is drudgery to another. But that's what's interesting to learn: what others do and don't find inviting.

[Linda]

Oh my, Loretta, I was in college during Vietnam too. As an English major I had to read all the CLASSICS. Blech! Loved some, hated some, and American writers were my favorites. But I could never get through Ulysses. Don't think I'll ever try it again either. LOL I can't imagine re-reading any of them though.

[Janga]

I think James Joyce is one of the wonders of Western literature, and Ulysses truly "inexhaustible to meditation" (if I may mix periods), but I too have never finished War and Peace--and probably never will. I have read Moby Dick several times, but I horrified my American lit prof in grad school when I suggested that there should be two versions of MD--one as is and one "without all the whaling stuff."

[margaret]

I am crazy for Dickens, familiar with nearly the entire oeuvre with a sole exception (I think). For some unknown reason I've never cracked Dombey & Son.

It's not even deliberate, just that I never seem to "get round to it," aka other priorities.

[Kalen Hughes]

Have you Moby Dick fans heard MC Lars's song "Ahab"? He's a Stanford grad and rapper. It's quite a combo. He's got one about Poe's Raven, too.

Lyrics Here:
http://www.azlyrics.com/lyrics/mclars/ahab.html

[Maggie Robinson]

I had to prompt my aging mind with a visit to several "classic literature" sites. I was amazed at the number of books/authors I know I've read (but could not remember a thing about). I know for sure I've never read Balzac but have always found quotations by him interesting. However, it's highly doubtful I'll ever read anything by him in this lifetime.

I was looking through a box in the basement the other day and came across term papers I wrote in college. Evidentally I used to be a whole lot smarter then than I am now, cause I couldn't understand a thing I wrote as I compared Zola to Thomas Mann for some reason. There's just no way I could put myself through that kind of critical thinking again.

[susan sarah]

What a great question, Loretta.

I did read some of the Russians in college, partly because of the lit classes I took, and because I hung around with a guy who was half Russian, and had inherited some angsty literary genes--so we read, wrote, discussed, and angsted. And I learned to love Russian folktales and illustrations along the way, which turned out to be much more interesting to me than Anna K. and her many troubles.

The books I wish I had read, or keep meaning to read, fall into two categories. I read like a fiend in high school and college and through my twenties, being a lit major for a while, as well as dabbling in art and history. And many times I've read one or two books by an author whose voice and brilliance, or whatever, I wanted more of--and though I always meant to read more of their work, somehow I never got around to it. I'd love to read all of Twain, for example, or all of Austen, or all of Dickens...but life doesn't always allot enough reading time.

Then there are the more contemporary novels that I keep meaning to read, and may even earnestly and eagerly begin, but never finish--like some Pulitzer Prize and Booker Prize novels--will I ever finish A Confederacy of Dunces, for instance?....While I love reading good lit'ry, even artsy writing, the stories are not always my cuppa, even if the voices are compelling. Alas, there are more half-read books on my shelves than I should admit....

~Susan Sarah

[Jane George]

I've never read Salinger's Catcher in the Rye. And it's not like it's length is intimidating or anything!

I guess every time I think about it, (not all that often), I fear I've missed my approriate age window. Hmmm.

[LorettaChase]

The things you learn when you ask a question...
Loved the Moby Dick rap.
RevMelinda, maybe if you started with The Pickwick Papers...? I don't know. As the answers have shown, it's not always something one can explain logically.
Margaret, I've read Dombey and Son but it's low on the re-read list. I'm not sure why, either. It's as wonderful as the others: "Dombey sat in the corner of the darkened room in the great armchair by the bedside, and Son lay tucked up warm in a little basket bedstead, carefully disposed on a low settee immediately in front of the fire and close to it, as if his constitution were analogous to that of a muffin, and it was essential to toast him brown while he was very new."
And I do think there are some books I should have read then because I'm not going to read them now.
Huckleberry Finn is one I did finally get back to. The first part is so good and the second part is so...disturbing.

[Susan/DC]

In my teens and 20s I too was a book fiend and read lots and lots of classic 19th C literature -- all of Dickens (even "Barnaby Rudge"), all of Austen, most of Tolstoy, Hawthorne, etc. What I haven't been able to read are the 20th C classics, Saul Bellow and Norman Mailer and all the rest of those muscular, bellicose, oh-so-male authors. I know I should read them. However, I've this mental image of guys sitting around drinking and smoking cigarettes and feeling superior to women and not understanding why women don't want to hang around them for long. I know this is totally unfair when I haven't read their books, and I'm perfectly willing to be enlightened, but their stuff just doesn't appeal.

[Anna Campbell]

There are two half-finished books on my bookcase that I always view with shame. Pilgrim's Progress and The Red and the Black by Stendhal. One day! And War and Peace was an amazing read. I think it collects a really bad rap when it gets cast into the too grim to be contemplated basket. It's not at all. It's actually incredibly romantic (if tragically so).

[Laura Vivanco]

Funny how some books leave so little trace in the brain.

I know. War and Peace has left a dim impression of the vastness of Russia and the smallness of human beings, jostled by Important Events and yet each with his or her huge and important emotions that most of the other tiny, ant-like humans, who have their own Important Emotions and concerns, are barely aware of. When I think of Proust I have a vague sense of becoming completely absorbed in an almost trance-like state where things happen, but nothing really changes.

There are lots of books I haven't read, but nowadays I refuse to read anything without a happy ending, because it would make me miserable, and that rules out most of them. Still, there are so many that I have read in the past, and so many books in my future that I can't feel bad about the ones that got away (couldn't resist a fishing metaphor since whaling was mentioned).

[merry]

laura, like you, I like most of my reading now to have a happy ending. I'm more interested in genre literature than so called "serious" literature because "serious" literature is often descriptions of family dysfunction, and that's my work. (I'm a psychotherapist)

I also seem to have lost patience with many male voices. Susan said it well" What I haven't been able to read are the 20th C classics, Saul Bellow and Norman Mailer and all the rest of those muscular, bellicose, oh-so-male authors." I, also, tend to not like, not finish, or not read what are considered the american classics written by men, of that era. The earlier writers work better: I enjoy Mark Twain.

English writers also somehow work better for me. I read lots of serious literature, and loved it, when I was a teen and in my early twenties. Liked Dickens, loved some of the Russian novels, but, of course, Jane Austen was my favorite. Started Moll Flanders recently, -- I don't think I'm going to finish it. I dont' think he really gets what motivates women. Haven't read much Virginia Wolf and probably will not (oh how embarrassing it is to admit that)

I grew up with parents who are artists and had the usual reverence for "high art", which I found myself questioning. I don't reject high art, but I like folk art- Russian box decorations, ceramics, etc.

And so it goes for literature. I find these days I often prefer genre literature. Of course, many of the writers who have survived and whose works are considered classics were the genre writers of their time. I have found women's voices that I enjoy in mysteries and romances and am happy that romances are starting to get scholarly attention.
Merry

[M Tanaka]

I am so relieved to read that others have many books that they haven't read and other books that they have read but don't remember. I am not alone! I have shelves of books to be read-- and I love the new mysteries and romance novels instead. Hmm.

[LorettaChase]

Susan/DC, I've had a similar reaction to those excessively MALE authors, too. And yes, these days genre books have a much stronger pull. I want a good story, and a happy ending or at least a satisfying one (though I do prefer happy), and I like the bad guys to get what's coming to them.

[Patricia Rice]

Just back from San Diego and skimming through the blog and simply could not resist this question, even though it's been nicely answered above. I'm with Maggie of the blank brain. I have entire bookshelves of Good Literature I know I've read and can barely recall except in some cases as to whether I'd read it again or would rather die first.

In my youth, I had No Life, so I merrily read through the Russians, eventually got through some of Dickens once I recovered from the high school trauma of Great Expectations, and lapped up everything English except Trollope, which taught me I could put a book down and walk away if bored enough. I've tasted all the Great Male Authors sufficiently to know what they're about and found them as boring in most cases as some of the Great Female Authors like Eliot.

I have come to the conclusion that I like dramatic novels. Yes, I can perfectly understand Ulysses and mutter right through it with the best of them, but I want Things to Happen. And people to laugh and weep. My intelligence may be Classic, but my taste is pure plebian.

[Francois]

Crikey Loretta, Vietnam? I have been misled by your youthful picture.

Seeing as I pass through Rochester everyday it is practically criminal not to have read Dickens. It is nice to think of having some good books left though, rather than spending your old age re-reading things.

Mostly I rush through good books but sometimes I drag it out as long as possible and save the next ones for a special occasion. Umberto Eco has to be read slowly.