Why is this a literary classic? (not really a rant)

[ThrobbingEgo]

I found To Kill A Mockingbird to be just awful and boring as all hell. And Romeo and Juliet. I'm kind of hoping I don't have to read any more Shakespeare for the rest of my life.

Why not? Didn't like the language or the characters? You know, Romeo and Juliet is a play. It's better spoken, or live, than it is on paper. Did you at least watch the DiCaprio version? "Give me my long sword, ho!"

Hamlet's pretty fucking awesome. So is King Lear. I've heard good things about Othello too.

I saw someone reading a manga version of Hamlet somewhere. I'd be interested in reading that. "Swear by my sword."

The manga Hamlet has terrible art, at least the one I've perused does, there are three others I know of. Hopefully you'll strike gold if you ever read one of them, and if not, you've got a one in three chance of getting a good one next time! Or something like that.

I know. I was searching Amazon for the copy I saw, and it didn't look at all like it at all. What's with the white haired dude holding Yorik's skull?

The awesome edition had a dark cover and Hamlet was wearing a black Japanese school jacket. And he didn't have spiky white hair.

 

[OuroborosChoked]

Anyone read waiting for Godot and liked it? Rejoice my fellow crazies. It's one of those classics that most can't enjoy.

Love it! And Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead.

 

[ThrobbingEgo]

Anyone read waiting for Godot and liked it? Rejoice my fellow crazies. It's one of those classics that most can't enjoy.

Love it! And Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead.

...Were you in my English Literature class? Because that's freaky.

 

[Hot'n'steamy]

Things Fall Apart....ewwwwwww

Immense book.

Anyone read waiting for Godot and liked it? Rejoice my fellow crazies. It's one of those classics that most can't enjoy.

Love it! And Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead.

Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead = Best Tom Stoppard Playeva.

 

[ChromeAlchemist]

I thought that The Great Gatsby was terrible.

If any effort to make the characters likeable was made, I probably would have liked that book.

I hate to sound pompous, but that's the point of the book.

Meh, still.

 

[nick4118]

The reason Catcher in the Rye is a "Classic" is because of the writing not the story. If someone asked me what the plot was I'm not sure I could tell them. But I thought it was written really well.

 

[Fingerprint]

The classics are books that everyone wants to have read but no one wants to read.

-samuel clemens

Samuel Clemens has obviously never met my sister - she seems to be making it her life's mission to read all the 'classics'.

As for the OP - Jane Eyre is the worst piece of ill-conceived tripe I have had the mis-pleasure to read. The plot was cliched (someone please tell me how to get accents), the characters were unbelievable (with the possible exception of Rochester - but only possibly) and it was (too) slow paced - even for a classic - and badly written.

I know the book isn't aimed at the male audience but even so:
"Reader I married him"
Really...

 

[Largecow]

Anything Ayn Rand... mirite?

That woman can't write worth a damn... and she's so damned full of herself... you can just feel the self-congratulation on every dry, dull, monotonous, dragging page...

I couldn't agree more. I choose her for a project in an introductory humanities course a few years ago, it was an unfortunate mistake to say the very least. Luckily I read Anthem instead of Atlas Shrugged so time wasted was minimal.

I love pretty much all work by F. Scott Fitzgerald though. (Great Gatsby included )

 

[sallene]

War and Peace.


I got through it all, I get the whole deal with Tolstoy, but but I just never really got what all the fuss was about with this book. Its a decent enough read, but I dont know why its considered such a classic.

 

[Citrus]

I really, really hate Romeo and Juliet. It's not just because I hate Shakespeare; I genuinely enjoyed Macbeth and Henry V... but Romeo and Juliet was just a very bland read for me. The plot sucked, the characters sucked (save Mercutio) and the writing itself was not a pleasure to decipher as it is in some of Shakespeare's other plays.

Needless to say, I wish it wasn't the first play of his that I read.

 

[Internet Kraken]

Our Town

It's boring, dull, and unpleasant. Unfortunately, it also happened to be my English teachers favorite play/book.

 

[OuroborosChoked]

Anyone read waiting for Godot and liked it? Rejoice my fellow crazies. It's one of those classics that most can't enjoy.

Love it! And Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead.

...Were you in my English Literature class? Because that's freaky.

Nah, but the two plays have a lot of similarities. If you like one, chances are good you'll like the other.

 

[A random person]

Lord of the Flies
To Kill A Mockingbird
They weren't bad necessarily, I just found them rather bland. Plus, Lord of the Flies wasn't as brutal as everyone hailed it, especially compared to things they show on tv every day.

Thank you for the Lord of the Flies comment. It really wasn't brutal at all.
As for To Kill a Mockingbird, there was a good message in there somewhere, but it was lost in the dull setting (though that's more my dislike of the old south) and plot was none too exciting. One thing I did, though, when reading the sparknotes (don't actually read the books thanks to my tendency to spend an hour on a page, tend to lose focus or get too focused on a small section of text, trying to make absolute sure I didn't misread it. It tortures me, really) was imagine the court section like it was Phoenix Wright. Made it a hell of a lot more interesting.

Overall I don't like assigned reading (mostly for the problem I mentioned above), but Summer of the Swans wasn't good. Autism does not work that way. Wizard of Oz, on the other hand, was quite good.

 

[A random person]

I really, really hate Romeo and Juliet. It's not just because I hate Shakespeare; I genuinely enjoyed Macbeth and Henry V... but Romeo and Juliet was just a very bland read for me. The plot sucked, the characters sucked (save Mercutio) and the writing itself was not a pleasure to decipher as it is in some of Shakespeare's other plays.

Needless to say, I wish it wasn't the first play of his that I read.

It was fairly dull and incomprehensible for me too. The Dicaprio version we watched, though, was good once you got past the whole modern day California Shakespeare in the style of a teen drama with the original writing thing.

 

[HT_Black]

1984, George Orwell. I mean...what the heck? It has little plot, little point, little meaning, and little interest-provoking writings. Same goes with Animal farm; that wasn't as suicide-inducingly depressing, though: it trended more towards mild retardation.

Fahrenheit 451, however, was really good...Alongside breave new world, to be honest. That seemed like a pretty hot deal, right up there with Equilibrium and Bioshock.

 

[A random person]

I found To Kill A Mockingbird to be just awful and boring as all hell. And Romeo and Juliet. I'm kind of hoping I don't have to read any more Shakespeare for the rest of my life.

Why not? Didn't like the language or the characters? You know, Romeo and Juliet is a play. It's better spoken, or live, than it is on paper. Did you at least watch the DiCaprio version? "Give me my long sword, ho!"

Hamlet's pretty fucking awesome. So is King Lear. I've heard good things about Othello too.

I saw someone reading a manga version of Hamlet somewhere. I'd be interested in reading that. "Swear by my sword."

When I first heard of manga Hamlet I was quite amused, to say the least. I wondered what other books and plays could be adapted into manga. I'm not even going to cite an example of something that would be hilarious, any book typically read in english class adapted into manga would make me lol.

 

[Krakyn]

I thought that The Great Gatsby was terrible.

To Kill a Mockingbird.

These. God, I wanted to rake my eyes out with clothespins Jocasta-style.

 

[Zac_Dai]

The other one is "Pride and Prejudice" by Jane Austen. I suppose I'm a bit harsh on it, being the opposite of the target demographic, but it bored me to tears. It's supposed to be a tale of true romance and looking deeper into people to find themselves, and I suppose it was revolutionary when it was written. Problem is, it was written in the 19th century. I've seen the story too many times to be fresh, and outside of the "novelty", the book doesn't really have much going for it. The characters seem flat, with one-note personalities, and the plot moves way too slowly to hold my interest. However, that's just my opinion.

I really like Pride & Prejudice at least the BBC TV production of it with Colin Firth. Never read the book, don't see much point after watching it.

I actually thought it would be a boring chick flick but it really grabbed me. The story really is about pride and prejudice in high society at the time. Its not even that much about love.

At first Darcy feels that Elizabeth and her family is too low on the social ladder for him and his friend but realises his mistake for judging people to early.Elizabeth isn't much better, she only really begins to fall for him once she see how big his personal estate and wealth is. Her mother is constantly try to pimp her and her daughters off to wealthy men as well.

Obviously theres more to it than that but I don't actually consider it a boring romance novel really.

Hope that makes sense, its 2am here and hardly keep awake, time for bed.

 

[Fingerprint]

1984, George Orwell. I mean...what the heck? It has little plot, little point, little meaning, and little interest-provoking writings. Same goes with Animal farm; that wasn't as suicide-inducingly depressing, though: it trended more towards mild retardation.

Fahrenheit 452, however, was really good...Alongside brave new world, to be honest. That seemed like a pretty hot deal, right up there with Equilibrium and Bioshock.

I didn't care for Fahrenheit 452, I thought the writing wasn't great - way too many adjectives and I didn't feel it read well at all. I did enjoy Brave New World the idea was excellent and its a great contrast to 1984. Moving nicely on, 1984 was and still remains one of my favourite books, I like the setting, the characters, the writing style - the pace fits the tone of the book and I love the ending - though it is a really depressing thought to end on - but at the same time I feel its at least original (certainly in my experience anyway).

 

[mrpenguinismyhomeboy]

I thought To Kill a Mockingbird was terrible. Had an agonizing time reading that.