To roll my eyes when someone says their favourite book is a classic

[Eyeroller100]

I'm an avid reader and I'm always looking for new books to read so I often ask people what their favourite books are. AIBU to roll my eyes every time someone mentions one of the classics.

I know people do love them and they may well be their faves, but I am quite skeptical as if they are saying it to make themselves sound better.

I've tried reading a lot of classics and I just can't get into them at all! They are pure effort

What distinguishes someone reading a book “ostentatiously” on the tube from someone just reading a book on the tube?

Books I can and have read many times are: Middlemarch and other George Elliot, Vanity Fair, all Charlotte Bronte and Jane Austen, Anna Karenina, War & Peace, Rebecca, To Kill a Mocking Bird, The Remains of the Day, Longitude, Como Agua Para Chocolate.
I’ve really enjoyed reading books like Girl on a Train, but don’t think I’ll revisit them many times. A lot of book club books I read I enjoy reading, but they don’t “stick” with me the way those above do.
Don’t assume people are lying, Most classics are considered such because of the breadth and longevity of their appeal. Of
course there will be books that should be there on merit but fashion and fate means they fell by the wayside, equally we won’t all respond the same way to any of them (I’m not keen on Dickens, - I’d take a David Lean film over the novel any day!) I don’t know if anyone has read Galsworthy? I haven’t, but I think in my grandparents day it was assumed he’d be one of the classics but he’s rather fallen off like Walter Scott who was a literary rock star in his day.

RoseWhiteTips I don't think it is "widespread" to "reel off a list" of classics. Who could be bothered to learn a list of titles of books they hadn't read. Or are you saying they have read them but didn't like them but pretend they are their favorites?

I saw a television programme featuring Sue Perkins once. She was asking people their favourite books. When someone asked her what hers was, she did this fake tormented sigh and (paraphrasing) said it was an extremely long boring book about a man who had committed a crime and his worry over his actions and blah blah. So patronising. I actually cringed at the television!

A classic! But I do think she had read it, not just reeled it off. I still believed her even though she came across as thinking she was superior for having a "classic" as a favourite.

Reading ostentatiously is when one sits holding up the latest Harry Potter whilst reading so that those around can appreciate something or other. For the life of me, I don’t know what. Adults read books for adults not books for children, surely?! Lol

It’s a bit like Meghan Merkel showing off her engagement ring in pics!

I read Harry Potter and laugh at supercilious people who sniff. Get over yourself is my advice to those people. Why should you care what other people read and relax with?

RoseWhiteTips - Harry Potter is spectacualr in so many ways and according to the stats from my library, is still doing very, very well.

Of course it isn't flawless but it's pretty fucking close as far as children's literature goes. It will stand the test of time.

It did particularly well as it was first released as the appropriateness of the storylines kept pace with the children reading them. If you read them from around Year 5 (at the same time as Harry et al were moving to a new school) then you were likely getting an eye for the opposite sex just as the characters were.

The stories are quite timeless too. Magic doesn't appear old as technology changes. It's about good vs evil, friendships and school. It's all eminently relatable and the books are classics.

My favourite books are what I would imagine the OP calls classics, I remember vividly the first time I read them, can picture where I was when I read them, remember the opening lines of the book and do re-read them every so often. If someone asked me to list my favourite books those are the ones I would list. If someone asked me what book genres I read on a day to day/general basis I would answer differently.

Classics covers such a wide range of book style and genre it is absurd to dismiss them all as 'pure effort'. One classic book which a huge number of people cite as their favourite (and has been mentioned on here) is a book I absolutely detest.

WH was the first book I picked off the shelves at my new school.

I devoured it in a couple of days. I loved the descriptions of the moors, I loved the gothic nature, I loved a book without a happy ending.

Even now as an adult I find new things in it each time I read it.

I do think books we study lose that appeal though. We studied Jane Eyre and whilst I still enjoy it, it doesn't give me the thrill WH does each time.

My is...black beauty! Ok its a classic childrens story but its still a classic

That's really disappointing about sue Perkins :(

Well.. I would have agreed with you Jacques until I saw a woman reading a 50 Shades slipped inside a cover, but with the cover hanging off, so you could clearly see the book. I couldn't make up my mind if she was trying to obscure it or if it was a double bluff

But I would find it very, very hard to like anyone who judged someone for reading a book!

If I hold a book up when reading it’s to get it at the right distance from my eyes as I’m too vain/disorganised to wear glasses.

I adore books for children....especially beautifully illustrated ones. I love art and follow one or two artists who produce stuff for children's books. Jackie Morris for example.

Maybe ask them what their favourite authors are, rather than one book? You may get different answers. If I had to choose one book I might choose Pride and Prejudice, but if I could name an author I would probably say Georgette Heyer or D.E. Stevenson or Josephine Tey or Janet Evanovich or Dick Francis or Donna Leon or Milly Johnson or one of my favourite children's authors (depending on my mood).

I started a book club because I wanted to read authors that I might not choose myself - it's been great for getting suggestions of new things to read and we've loved some that we would not otherwise have tried - things like "The Red Tent" by Anita Diamant

YABU and suffering from terrible reverse snobbery. My favourite novel of all time is Middlemarch, and my second choice Persuasion. If you asked me, I'd tell you. I'd be pretty unimpressed if you didn't believe me. (I hate Hardy, and have very mixed feelings about Dickens. But Eliot and Austen would go with me to a desert island, and go everywhere with me on my Kindle.)

There are some books that I would probably be a bit if someone told me it was their favourite, Like 50 shades of grey, because it's just so badly written, lacking decent plot etc. But each to their own.

I probably wouldn't be very close friends with someone like that, purely because most of my friends enjoy similar things to me, as with most things!

I had a ex who used to force himself to read erudite books and spout off about them. It made him look like a try hard dick head.
But then he was a try hard dick head!

Adults read books for adults not books for children, surely?! Lol

Adults don't say "lol" surely.....

I read actual books in public because I have only fairly recently got a kindle.

Tess of the D'Urbervilles is a really exciting classics read... and a Tale of 2 Cities, The man in the Iron mask - and a few of the "modern classics" Brave New World, All Quiet on the Western Front -

they just seem so much more "meaningful" than chick lit and mystery novels, the words used have a richer, mellow mellifluous quality that take you on the journey deeper into the tale.

I don’t know anyone who would read crap like 50 shades of grey and claim they love a classic book.

I do! I'll read anything and everything, the complete works of Shakespeare, Chaucer, Old French lays, Jilly Cooper bonk-busters 50 Shades (all 3!), John Grisham thrillers, early 20th C. American novels (Henry James, Edith Wharton) and lots more.

One of my professors at Cambridge said that being able to take pleasure in reading is a wonderful thing, and nobody has the right to arbitrate others' taste.

Frasier, it’s not so much reeling them off verbally I had in mind but, for instance, university entrants listing such books in the “Hobbies and Interests” section of the application form. That sort of thing.

OMG I forgot to say Perfume a dark and brilliant book!

I loved the Harry Potter books when they came out and have read them several times over. Great escapism and easy reading. My favourite book ever is The Hobbit, I love fantasy themed books such as those by David Gemmell. Never been a big fan of the ‘classics’ and certainly wouldn’t judge someone based on their book preference. What does annoy me though is people who read self help books and then spend their time preaching and pushing it on you like a friend of mine who won’t shut up about ‘The Secret’ and how is will change my life

Nobody would know what I am reading. As I have a Kindle...well used and well loved. Therefore I can read books for adults or books for children and nobody would know.

I would still be judged if course...by those who think Kindles are the work of th devil.

So if a Cambridge professor decrees it - you win with the trump card! Awesome.

I admit to being one of those who look slightly askance at adults reading children's books. Yes, they may be well written, but they're written for children and the way emotions and relationships are depicted (for example) reflects that.