Admit it - what's the classic book that everyone raves about but you despise?

[EverySingleStar]

I probably have more than one but The Great Gatsby is definitely up there. shudder violently Shall add more later

Oh Gawd, Lord of the Rings.

There we are, there's my answer to OP; "Lord of the Rings".

How anyone can dislike To Kill A Mockingbird is beyond me.

I don't like Hardy at all, have tried many times and given up.

Hardy is the only english author that makes me homesick. And his england was disappearing as he wrote about it, which is rather sad, really.

I love Catcher in teh Rye. I am not a prepubescent boy.

Ulysses. I got to p 350something. I will never return.

Yes, I tried Ulyssedess once, in a poncey phase.

I loved it too dogonpoints.

I am willing to admit that Hardy has merit - I just didn't like them.

I've never yet completed a Hardy oh the shame.

Also didn't like LotR - first book was ok but the second book went on and bloody on about scenery until I just wanted to die.

LOTR is pretty specialised stuff though, isn't it. Not many people can read interminable chapters about orcs.

Oh god, I'd forgotten LOTR! Read my way through nearly all 3 volumes and suddenly realised I didn't give a $hit about any of it, closed book 3 about 10 pages from the end and I've never looked back there either. (And I think the films are b o o o o o o o r i n g too.

LOTR is good if you just skip the scenery.

The Bell Jar - Sylvia Plath ( is that classed as a classic?) absolutely diabolical depressing crap. Only published cos of who she was married to.

LOTR didn't do it for me but I LOVED Lord of the Flies. I could read that over and over.

I've just starts the Handmaid's Tale and am loving it, also the Nevil Shute On the Beach was amazing.
The book I hate with all my heart body and soul is Frankenstein... blurgh, the book really shouldn't be so dull but it just is!

Sense and Sensibility - shudder

James Joyce's Ulyssess UNREADABLE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

lots of classics i've lerned to 'admire' without actually liking.
however, would rather stick hot pins in my eyes than read

moby dick
les miserables
le morte d'arthur
gabriel garcia marques
will self (not a true classic, but often revered, but you need more than one degree in english to actually understand him)

if you don't get austen, i think you;re missing the point of just how much she is taking the p* but still enjoying the society she's in.

and as for LOT f*ing R. There's a ring you can stick it in. Crap writing, ridiculous bloody story, boring characters, sterotypical settings. I could go on. It makes me hurl. Literally. Though, to be fair, that is prob cos I was about 1 week preg when watching the second film. To this day, I can't look an orc in the face without the bile rising ...

Bruce chatwin - songlines. Whhhaaatttt? and i tried to read when i still felt i had a brain at uni.

The Hobbit - was the 1st book that I never stuck to my guns and finished reading. Just bored me stiff, so put it down and never picked up again!

The unbearable lightness of being. Tosh.

i enjoy the pain of shouting no as someone disses a book i love

i see some of my all time faves on here
and some honkers too

Agree with the unbearable Unbearable Lightness of Being.
Also Salmon Rushdie - v. diff to read.
Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance - 'fraid I just don't get it and my mums a yoga teacher and everything.
The Hobbit - also never finished

oooh look, I killed the thread

Love Jane Austen, the Woman in White, but Middlemarch...but I'm askeered of the Russian novelists and after ploughing through One Hundred Years of Solitude, I whimper at the thought of ever reading magic realism again.

is 1984 in this category? Hours of my life I'll never get back!