The Worst Great Literary Work You'Ve Ever Read

[Florestan]

The European and the North American believe that a book which has been awarded any sort of prize must be good; the Argentine acknowledges the possibility that it might not be bad, in spite of the prize.

Ich bin ein Argentiner... 

[LKB]

Oh, yes, that is another novel that I've started reading twice, or even thrice, without ever finishing it. I guess it's one of the few instances in which the movie is better than the book.

Moby Dick is certainly a challenge, but for those who can bring themselves to persevere, it offers unique rewards. I completed it for the first time some thirty years ago, and Melville's imagery inspired me to began composing music for an opera ( which remains unfinished, much to my chagrin ).

[Karl Henning]

Oh, yes, that is another novel that I've started reading twice, or even thrice, without ever finishing it. I guess it's one of the few instances in which the movie is better than the book.

I'm a great fan of both the book and movie,  but an excellent friend of mine couldn't bear the book, so I get that it's not everyone's ducats. 

[Jo498]

Well, I think Kitty and Levin are much more interesting and likeable characters than Anna and Vronsky. 

Likeable and boring. I want drama in a book not wannabe idyll cutting grass with the peasants (while actually being aware that it is only pretension and one is not a peasant).

Honestly, though, I vastly prefer Turgenev over both Tolstoy and Dostoevsky. Besides being incomparably more humane and tolerant than both, he's also considerably shorter. 

I am not sure if I tried Fathers and Sons and never got into it or if I read it and mostly forgot it. There are plenty of good shorter prose pieces by Dostoevsky and Tolstoy; I have not read all of them. But when I was in my Dostoevsky phase in my 20s I read all the big ones and C & P, Karamasov and Idiot twice (usually with several years in between). Length is rarely a problem per se.

[Florestan]

I'm a great fan of both the book and movie,  but an excellent friend of mine couldn't bear the book, so I get that it's not everyone's ducats.

The theme is interesting and the story in itself compelling --- it's the digressions that I can't stand.

[Karl Henning]

The theme is interesting and the story in itself compelling --- it's the digressions that I can't stand.

I find them a feature, and not a bug ....

[Florestan]

Likeable and boring.

Ordinary life is boring --- and Heaven forfend that it should ever be otherwise.

I want drama in a book

Do you want the self-same drama in your own life too?

I am not sure if I tried Fathers and Sons and never got into it or if I read it and mostly forgot it.

FWIW, I rate it very highly.

[Florestan]

I find them a feature, and not a bug ....

De gustibus et coloribus non disputandum est.

[Karl Henning]

De gustibus et coloribus non disputandum est.

Just so.

[VonStupp]

Crime and Punishment is simply beyond High School students. It's a crime so to punish them.

Most of these are university students, although I believe Crime and Punishment is indeed for HS students to try and test out of University literature. I never gave the Dostoevsky a shot to know better.

VS

[Karl Henning]

Most of these are university students

Ah, I misunderstood, VS, though I think it a rare undergraduate who really grapples with it. Certainly, any HS student who scales that peak deserves to test out of University Lit. ; )

[Florestan]

Primum vivere deinde philosophari. 

[VonStupp]

Ah, I misunderstood, VS, though I think it a rare undergraduate who really grapples with it. Certainly, any HS student who scales that peak deserves to test out of University Lit. ; )

I truly admire students who really delve into literature; my personal love of Dickens comes from HS. For most nowadays it seems 'how can I know as much as I can without actually reading the book' is an all too familiar pattern I hear. Ah well...

For me, my 10th grade English teacher started us on Rudyard Kipling's Kim. None of us complained when he aborted it after a few days. Never had that happen before.
VS

[Florestan]

my personal love of Dickens

I too love Dickens.

[Karl Henning]

my personal love of Dickens comes from HS

True of an old schoolmate of mine, too, the culprit being David Copperfield ... so that he wound up pursuing a doctorate in Lit. I don't know how it was that I never read any Dickens in HS.

[VonStupp]

True of an old schoolmate of mine, too, the culprit being David Copperfield ... so that he wound up pursuing a doctorate in Lit. I don't know how it was that I never read any Dickens in HS.

Love David Copperfield. My wife will cry anytime she picks up A Tale of Two Cities (and too Les Miserables from Hugo, but that might be sheer length!)

VS

[Florestan]

True of an old schoolmate of mine, too, the culprit being David Copperfield ... so that he wound up pursuing a doctorate in Lit. I don't know how it was that I never read any Dickens in HS.

My very first Dickens love was Nicholas Nickleby.

[Karl Henning]

Love David Copperfield. My wife will cry anytime she picks up A Tale of Two Cities (and too Les Miserables from Hugo, but that might be sheer length!)

VS

I was pursuing my Master's by the time I read Copperfield. Love it unreservedly! I was in Tallinn, Estonia when I read Great Expectations. Love it, too!

[VonStupp]

I was pursuing my Master's by the time I read Copperfield. Love it unreservedly! I was in Tallinn, Estonia when I read Great Expectations. Love it, too!

I love engaging students in Great Expectations if I can, but I think many of them are daunted by the sheer number of characters.

I feel like I should pick this up in the Pickwick Club thread instead of Worst Great Literary Work that we are gushing over!

Cheers! VS

[Florestan]

Call me a philistine --- I vastly prefer Dickens to any Russian save Turgenev.