Books you are ashamed never to have read?

[Piggywaspushed]

I have an English degree and have taught English Lit A level for many years. I was a bookworm as a child and have a huge stockpile of books read and awaiting reading.

Partly , this thread arises form the fact that I have been dissatisfied with so many contemporary novels recently but partly, I am also a bit ashamed that there are books I feel I should have read!

I decided a few years ago to make my way through some of this shameful list but have only managed Pride and Prejudice (knew I wouldn't like it) and Great Expectations (read it for my son's GCSE which is more than he did...it's very long, isn't it?). I read The Handmaid's Tale out of obligation and shame last year. Underwhelmed.

Frankenstein and The Grapes of Wrath are on my bedside table (have been for about a year) and Middlemarch is on my Kindle. I will read Frankenstein before DS2's GCSE. I have never read Dracula either.

I went to school in Scotland so was reading a lot of Scottish classics in my defence and have read nearly every Hardy novel.

Anyone else like to admit what you haven't read bur should have??

Feel free to boast about what you have read too! (although not Ulysses or War and Peace because we all know that would be showing off and/or a lie!)

I've never read Tess of the Durbervilles, despite writing about it extensively in a uni essay! Thomas Hardy just depresses me so much - after Jude the Obscure and The Mayor of Casterbridge I just couldn't bring myself to actually read it

I've also had David Foster Wallace's The Pale King on my bedside table for about two years. Infinite Jest is my favourite novel but I can't quite bring myself to start The Pale King for some reason. Maybe because when I've read it there's no more DFW left to read, maybe because I'm worried I'll hate it due to it being an unfinished novel, I don't know. I'm determined to start it this year though.

I finally read my first Austen last year, Pride and Prejudice, and enjoyed it more than I'd expected to.
Never read any Tolstoy, Dostkoevsky, Joyce, Hardy or Dickens other than Oliver Twist and a Christmas Carol. I did read The Trial and Metamorphosis when in my early twenties though just so I could understand what people were on about when they described something as "Kafka-esque"

Yes, I did P and P in 2014 I think. Have Northanger Abbey on my list for this year.

Jane Austen isn't much to my taste.

Feeling a bit guilty now that the MN book group is reading North and South and I haven't done Gaskell either!

Felt better (and at the same time depressed!) at work yesterday when I mentioned I was reading Middlemarch and not one of my colleagues had read it and two of them hadn't heard of it!!! English teachers...

I have read several of Hardy's novels but somehow never felt any desire to read Tess. I know the plot now anyway.

I read 'North and South' for A level and enjoyed it in parts but haven't felt any desire to go back and have another go.
I haven't read Middlemarch and am not that keen on the idea of it. A friend was reading 'Adam Bede' last year and raving about it so I might give that a go this year.
I've not read any Tolstoy or Dostoevsky, I've not read 'Wuthering Heights' either.

I do enjoy reading Dickens, though. He is long winded in places but I enjoy them nonetheless.

I mentioned I was reading Middlemarch and not one of my colleagues had read it and two of them hadn't heard of it!!!

What??? Sorry to be judgemental but...that is actually quite shocking.

Yay: Humiliation as in Changing Places: I hope MauriceZapp joins.

Virginia Woolf said Middlemarch was the one of the few English novels written for grown up people, or some such. I think I agree with her.

For entry level Dickens I’d suggest Great Expectations or David Copperfield. I love Bleak House, great symbolic mystery story, and Our Mutual Friend, ditto symbolism, but both far too long as entry level.

My gaps: I cannot be doing with Henry James. An elephant in a small room looking for a pea was how he was described. The Ambassadors, yawn. Have I read every word? Prob not. And I’ve never managed to do anything other than skim Lord of the Rings.

Ulysses on the other hand is funny and moving, take it quickly . Imagine you’re in an Irish bar with the craic going on around you, it falls into place easily.

For Persuasion, one of my fave books ever, the first half before she gets to Lyme is really funny scenes to tell you how nice Anne is compared to her family and how deluded Captain Wentworth is. Great satire and irony, unkindness, Mrs Musgrave with her fat sighs, Mary with her headaches, the awful Elizabeth and Sir Walter, but it’s Lyme where it really gets going in plot terms. And yes, I think it does pass the Bechdel test, Anne and her ill friend talk about a lot of things other than men.

I did English and the great unreadable for me is Sidney’s Arcadia.

And the House with a Green Shutters is soooo depressing. Sunset song...oh god...

It is depressing orlanda : that's why I like it, and Hardy . Love a bit of vicarious depression!
And yes allegretto indeed it is....

Aargh, they, Jude and Lear drive me to despair...

Just heard Hardy's Far from the madding crowd it has such a modern voice, I love that book and wished now I had use Bathsheba as my DD name

orlanda you won't be unduly surprised to hear I love Lear too!

Piggy, no, I’m not... funny, that... bet you prefer wuthering heights to Jane Eyre too..

Ha! Hate both of them!!

If you forced me to choose I'd go for Jane Eyre though. I like the Madwoman in The Attic bed burning stuff!

I've been trying to read a few that I was ashamed of not having read. Namely 'To Kill a Mockingbird' and 'Lord of the Flies', both of which I loved and 'The Great Gatsby', which was a bit of a slog, but OK. I'm a big fan of George Eliot, but have never read 'The Mill on the Floss', so that is definitely one for my list.

I loved Mill On The Floss so you'll like that I think.

Don't like Gatsby much but the other two were life changers for me as a teenager,

I am about to embark on the thread. I love these threads, but first

OP Frankenstein and Dracula are fantastic. Totally fabulous.

I will admit to having never read any George Orwell but feel I should have. I do own some of his books and have come across times when I could have on my university reading lists etc but just haven't.

Agree with Mercedes re 'Frankenstein' and 'Dracula'. Wonderful books. No film, reworking or ridiculous spin-off has ever come close to portraying their originality and genius.

Oh Cedars Adam Bede was magnificent. But I love depressing tales - I have only read one Hardy (Tess - I will never be over it and didnt 'know') and Zola but I love them with all my heart.

Mercedes Animal Farm is wonderful too!

It made my 13 year old cry today ... bless him

Oh. I have a number of large history tomes to read this year but the plan is to alternate with a classic so I may well finally get to Orwell.

I also had never read Ishiguro until last year but loved Never Let Me Go.

It made my 13 year old cry today

Poor old Boxer...

I (skim) read Northanger Abbey at school and decided some years later that I really ought to read more. I have had the complete works of Jane Austin sitting on my shelf for over 10 years gathering dust.

Madness as I love any Austin films/tv series and have watched them over and over.

Countless others remain unread.

BUT! the great thing about not having read stuff is the joy of reading it!

I finally read Frankenstein a couple of years ago and would now place it in my top 10. Amazing, amazing book.

So many books, so little time.

Update! Finished Middlemarch!!

Hoorah!!

My gaps: I cannot be doing with Henry James. An elephant in a small room looking for a pea was how he was described. The Ambassadors, yawn. Have I read every word? Prob not.

Snap. I'm allergic to Henry James's overblown pompous prose and that description of him is the best I've seen in a long time.