The Classics

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Brothers karamazov is wonderful

Really? So explain to me what the Grand Inquisitor was all about. It was like hitting a brick wall

[Anonymous]

I really enjoyed Middlemarch recently. I read Silas Marner years ago and always wanted to read more George Eliot but like others kept turning to shorter options. Once I started I was smitten and happy to go along for the journey. The dialogue was amusing and clever. I found the characters very relatable and the relationships felt authentic.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I really enjoyed Middlemarch recently. I read Silas Marner years ago and always wanted to read more George Eliot but like others kept turning to shorter options. Once I started I was smitten and happy to go along for the journey. The dialogue was amusing and clever. I found the characters very relatable and the relationships felt authentic.

Middlemarch is so good!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I really enjoyed Middlemarch recently. I read Silas Marner years ago and always wanted to read more George Eliot but like others kept turning to shorter options. Once I started I was smitten and happy to go along for the journey. The dialogue was amusing and clever. I found the characters very relatable and the relationships felt authentic.

Middlemarch is so good!

Middlemarch is that book I’ve started a million times and never finish because I get bored.

[Anonymous]

Evelina by Frances Burney is an absolute riot. It’s almost a parody of a novel of manners. I wish more people would read it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Evelina by Frances Burney is an absolute riot. It’s almost a parody of a novel of manners. I wish more people would read it.

Love her books. Austen fans will enjoy seeing the influences that Burney had on Austen’s writing.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Evelina by Frances Burney is an absolute riot. It’s almost a parody of a novel of manners. I wish more people would read it.

Love her books. Austen fans will enjoy seeing the influences that Burney had on Austen’s writing.

I'm putting her books on my list!

I'm also about to re-read Faulkner's Absalom, Absalom!, which is one of my very favorites. The final lines rip my heart out every time.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Evelina by Frances Burney is an absolute riot. It’s almost a parody of a novel of manners. I wish more people would read it.

I loved it too! Agree that it would be a good match for Jane Austen fans.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Evelina by Frances Burney is an absolute riot. It’s almost a parody of a novel of manners. I wish more people would read it.

I loved it too! Agree that it would be a good match for Jane Austen fans.

Did the two of you read Cecilia? Is it good?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Evelina by Frances Burney is an absolute riot. It’s almost a parody of a novel of manners. I wish more people would read it.

I loved it too! Agree that it would be a good match for Jane Austen fans.

Did the two of you read Cecilia? Is it good?

I’ve read Evelina, Cecilia, and Camilla and liked them in that order. I thought Evelina was the best, but maybe because I read it first so it felt fresh.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Evelina by Frances Burney is an absolute riot. It’s almost a parody of a novel of manners. I wish more people would read it.

Love her books. Austen fans will enjoy seeing the influences that Burney had on Austen’s writing.

I'm putting her books on my list!

I'm also about to re-read Faulkner's Absalom, Absalom!, which is one of my very favorites. The final lines rip my heart out every time.

Love Faulkner. I recently read The Saddest Words - a nonfiction dive that tries to put Faulkner into a modern day context. A mix of literary critique, civil war and reconstruction history, biography, and the modern day mess we're in. Really fascinating if you’ve read a lot of Faulkner’s work.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Evelina by Frances Burney is an absolute riot. It’s almost a parody of a novel of manners. I wish more people would read it.

I loved it too! Agree that it would be a good match for Jane Austen fans.

Did the two of you read Cecilia? Is it good?

I’ve read Evelina, Cecilia, and Camilla and liked them in that order. I thought Evelina was the best, but maybe because I read it first so it felt fresh.

I like Cecilia, but I’ll never love it (and reread it) like Evelina.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I love Trollope, too.

Not too long ago I finally read War and Peace, and it is stunning. Just so good. I don’t always love the Russians (I recently tired to read The Brothers Karamazov and couldn’t get into it) but War and Peace is outstanding.

That’s on my reading “bucket list.” I read Anna Karenina this past year, and thoroughly enjoyed it. It took a few months for me to read, but I did it. I now have Crime and Punishment on my bedside table, but I keep putting it aside for quicker reads. I do love immersing myself in richly detailed long-ago worlds.

My favorite Russian classics are:
Anna Karenina by Tolstoy
War and Peace by Tolstoy
Crime and Punishment by Dostoevsky
The Master and Margarita by Bulgakov
Dead Souls by Gogol
Life and Fate by Vasily Grossman

I had a hard time with Doctor Zhivago, though I think it's because it was a Pevear and Volokhonsky translation. I read their Anna Karenina as a reread and absolutely hated how they did it.

I also had a hard time with Brothers Karamazov, but I may have been too young - in my 20s.

What other Russians should I try?

Master and Margarita by Mikhail Bulgakov

[Anonymous]

Alexandre Dumas has a collection of classics that I love going back to.
Then there's Treasure Island and Don Quixote.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Evelina by Frances Burney is an absolute riot. It’s almost a parody of a novel of manners. I wish more people would read it.

I loved it too! Agree that it would be a good match for Jane Austen fans.

Did the two of you read Cecilia? Is it good?

I’ve read Evelina, Cecilia, and Camilla and liked them in that order. I thought Evelina was the best, but maybe because I read it first so it felt fresh.

I like Cecilia, but I’ll never love it (and reread it) like Evelina.

DP. I read Cecilia a while back but can’t remember much about it, if that’s any indication. Evelina has stayed with me. If you’re going to start on these, I’d start with Evelina and then, if you like it, move on to Cecilia.