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Original poster

Books which you couldn't understand when you were younger but now 'get' totally

40 replies

Pruners · 24/03/2009 23:11

Message withdrawn

OP posts:
MrsPurple · 24/03/2009 23:13

To Kill a Mocking Bird
Jane Eyre
Any book I was forced to read at school, have read because I wanted to since and understood at my leisure

Babbity · 24/03/2009 23:16

I read To Kill a Mockingbird far far too young, and I didn't get it at all.

Forced to read Pride & Prejudice at 14 and hated it/couldn't see the point. It's now a huge favourite - but as a serious teenager, the subtleties and dry humour of Austen was totally lost on me. (barrel of laughs, I was)

LadyGlencoraPalliser · 24/03/2009 23:17

The Great Gatsby.
When I was a teenager I thought it was sad and romantic.
As an adult I realised that it is utterly bleak and hopeless.

The Weather in the Street by Rosamund Lehmann. Ditto.

g4grapes · 24/03/2009 23:25

Have to agree with Handmaids Tale.

I think anything you were forced to read at school and then revisit as an adult tends to mean more, although I don't think I could ever feel quite that way about Far From The Madding Crowd! Apologies to Thomas Hardy fans!

MinnieMummy · 28/03/2009 13:46

Not that I entirely didn't get it, but the first time I read 'Catcher in the Rye' I missed something absolutely huge about the main character (don't want to spoil it for those who haven't read it) and what he was actually going through. Seemed bloomin obvious the next time!

Again different interpretation of 'The Bell Jar' the older I got.

MissM · 30/03/2009 12:40

I'm the same, totally didn't get Catcher in the Rye until I read it at again my book club last year, almost 20 years after I read it the first time. I was sold it as an amazing book for teens, read it at 15 and couldn't make head or tail of it. Then at 35 I went 'Ohhhhhhh', and found it amazing.

minesacheeseandpicklesandwich · 30/03/2009 12:46

MissM I'm half way through Catcher In The Rye - can you explain the 'ohhhhh' to me please?

MissM · 30/03/2009 12:50

No, for reasons that MinnieMummy says - I don't want to spoil it! (Hint: re-read the beginning again).

procrastinatingparent · 30/03/2009 12:50
MissM · 30/03/2009 12:51

Oh no, now I've set up all this anticipation and you still might not get it!

procrastinatingparent · 30/03/2009 13:01

Just realised I don't have a copy! Off to the library ...

minesacheeseandpicklesandwich · 30/03/2009 15:17

OooooK, guess I'll carry on then... Though I have to say, right now it is one of the most tedious reads I have ever started. Normally I'd get through a book that size in a day or two - I've been reading it since Christmas!!

minesacheeseandpicklesandwich · 30/03/2009 15:22

BTW, back to the OP, Great Expectations was the one for me - totally put me off Dickens until I had to read something of his during my PGCE. Now I have a couple of others of his I'm going to get stuck into once I'm on ML (next week, scarey trousers time).

squilly · 30/03/2009 16:19

I hated Lord of the Rings. I'd read the Hobbit and loved it, but couldn't get into this 'new' book. Now, though I've read it two or three times and I love it.

mrsbabookaloo · 30/03/2009 16:25

V interesting re catcher in the rye: hated it as a teenager and have never re-visited it, despite loving all of Salinger's other books. Will give it another go.

PheasantPlucker · 30/03/2009 16:26

Evelyn Waugh's Scoop

Jux · 30/03/2009 16:56

The Owl Service - first read it when I was 8ish, had no idea what was going on! Scared me silly anyway.

g4grapes · 30/03/2009 23:42

Still don't really appreciate Lord of the Rings, sorry!

Once you have some life experience behind you, you relate to different characters, and react to situations differently.

I didn't like Goodnight Mr Tom, and re read it just before I had DD1, and wept buckets. That might have been the hormones though......

g4grapes · 30/03/2009 23:43

Try re reading the "childrens" books you read when you were younger. Most work on several different levels.

Babbity · 30/03/2009 23:45

.. yet another MNer dusting off The Catcher in the Rye... thanks for that.

LauriefairycakeeatsCupid · 30/03/2009 23:47

I Capture the Castle - got it a little when young, now love it.

MinnieMummy · 31/03/2009 09:20

Oooh, hope you Catcher in the Rye re-readers do like it second time around - keep us posted! FWIW I would put it in my top 5 now. No pressure...!

MissM · 31/03/2009 10:13

Yes, I'd put it in my top 5 now too. Totally got it, and found echoes of it in loads of books I read afterwards. Kept coming back to it - it really played on in my mind. Weird, as at 15 I went 'Huh?' and buried it at the back of my bookshelf (along with Tess of the D'Urbervilles which I must also re-read).

BonsoirAnna · 31/03/2009 10:15

Babar

Babbity · 01/04/2009 19:24

Thank you so much MN booklovers - for the nudge to reread Catcher in the Rye. I finished it today and I quite agree. It was like reading a completely different book - I just didn't have the maturity to "get it" when I read it at school (I was maybe 16 or so). This time I loved it; wonderful, touching, sad. Just wanted to give HC a big hug (but he'd have called me a phoney).