Classic books that were not fun to read

[cantthinkofanything]

Feel free to add to this list

My Antonia
Of Human Bondage
Jane Eyre
Ethan Frome
The Good Earth

[leemajors]

Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin before I found out he made most of it up, then it was pretty damn entertaining.

[CubanSucks]

pretentious tbh

[Drachen]

East of Eden

[CosmicCowboy]

A Tale of Two Cities

[Kai]

Pretty much anything I was forced to read in high school. I automatically hated them.

[desflood]

Lord Jim and Moby Dick.

[thispego]

the great gatsby

[Cant_Be_Faded]

Whawhaat
Gatsby was good as far as high school readings go

1M2AUYYKfxk

[Blake]

Canterbury Tales

[Blake]

The Bible before I found out most of it was made up. Then I found it to be pretty damn entertaining.

[leemajors]

Whawhaat
Gatsby was good as far as high school readings go

1M2AUYYKfxk

So is a Tale of Two Cities imo, but I like Dickens.

[DeadlyDynasty]

Canterbury Tales

/thread.

Olde English is a bitch........unless you're drinking it.

[Drachen]

Pretty much anything I was forced to read in high school. I automatically hated them.

My freshman english teacher required a book called "dandelion wine" as summer reading between 8th and 9th grade. When we got to class in August the first thing she did was introduce herself and the second thing she did was apologize for making us read that. She said a friend (another teacher) recommended it and described it much better than it actually was. She put it on a whim onto her summer reading list then when she read it realized the mistake she made. Since it was before freshman year she had no way of contacting us to let us know how bad it was and to not read it... LOL
She didn't live that down.

[DeadlyDynasty]

btw...the most brutal read you'll ever come across is Finnegan's Wake...I gave up on it a couple pages in, and I'm a big Joyce fan.

[CosmicCowboy]

Lord of the Flies

[cantthinkofanything]

Lord of the Flies

Seriously? That was near the top of my "like" list.

[Drachen]

Lord of the Flies

Wow, I liked this book too. To each his own I guess.

[leemajors]

My freshman english teacher required a book called "dandelion wine" as summer reading between 8th and 9th grade. When we got to class in August the first thing she did was introduce herself and the second thing she did was apologize for making us read that. She said a friend (another teacher) recommended it and described it much better than it actually was. She put it on a whim onto her summer reading list then when she read it realized the mistake she made. Since it was before freshman year she had no way of contacting us to let us know how bad it was and to not read it... LOL
She didn't live that down.

pretty good Ray Bradbury book tbh.

[Drachen]

I am not going to say I liked it, but I thought that she went way farther with the apology than she needed to. It wasn't epically bad or anything.

[JoeChalupa]

Seriously? That was near the top of my "like" list.

Mine too.

[CosmicCowboy]

I thought it was pretentious bullshit.

[CubanSucks]

Lord of the Flies


I thought it was pretentious bullshit.

what the hell is your problem? Not only are you wrong but you used my word. Don't use my word you pretentious turd

[spurs_fan_in_exile]

Grapes of Wrath.

And add me to the list of folk who actually liked Lord of the Flies.

[CosmicCowboy]

Oh, it had action and blood, I'll give you that. It's just that the english teachers and analysts tried to read so much more into it than was probably originally intended.

Kind of like over analyzing Old Man and the Sea. Jesus? REEEEEEEEELY?

Maybe you guys didn't have to go through the analytical shit I had to do...I was in this very limited enriched class from Freshman on (pretty much college level) and we had to write papers on every book we read and the symbolisms, allegories, etc.

[leemajors]

Oh, it had action and blood, I'll give you that. It's just that the english teachers and analysts tried to read so much more into it than was probably originally intended.

Kind of like over analyzing Old Man and the Sea. Jesus? REEEEEEEEELY?

Maybe you guys didn't have to go through the analytical shit I had to do...I was in this very limited enriched class (pretty much college level) and we had to write papers on every book we read and the symbolisms, allegories, etc.

Felt the same way in college about As I Lay Dying, except the professor was kind enough to include his own published book on the book in the reading list. I hated that guy.

[CosmicCowboy]

This is the kind of crap i had to write papers on.

http://www.shmoop.com/lord-of-the-flies/symbolism-imagery.html

[leemajors]

books being "taught" like that instead of stressing personal connections to themes and stories to promote understanding is just puzzling. it sure made a lot of my friends less willing to read books outside of them being assigned.

[ploto]

I liked almost everything listed here. I reread Tale of Two Cities just a couple of months ago; loved Jane Eyre and Ethan Frome. Great Gatsby is an easy read.

For me:
Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man -- Great book but hard to read.

[CosmicCowboy]

books being "taught" like that instead of stressing personal connections to themes and stories to promote understanding is just puzzling. it sure made a lot of my friends less willing to read books outside of them being assigned.

Oh, I was a voracious reader as a kid. All across the spectrum. I had read virtually every book in my elementary school library by the 6th grade. Do elementary schools still have hard cover libraries? By high school I had already read most of the required reading material (I had older sisters and would read the books they were assigned when they were done with them) but maybe that is why I resented the analysis so much. It's like these PHD English geeks had to justify their existence by trying to read second and third levels of meaning into some of these books instead of just taking them at face value and just wallowing in and enjoying gloriously phrased sentences and mental pictures painted.

[leemajors]

Oh, I was a voracious reader as a kid. All across the spectrum. I had read virtually every book in my elementary school library by the 6th grade. Do elementary schools still have hard cover libraries? By high school I had already read most of the required reading material (I had older sisters and would read the books they were assigned when they were done with them) but maybe that is why I resented the analysis so much. It's like these PHD English geeks had to justify their existence by trying to read second and third levels of meaning into some of these books instead of just taking them at face value and just wallowing in and enjoying gloriously phrased sentences and mental pictures painted.

My daughter's school has one, they rely heavily on donated books though and can only check out one at a time (i think). I take her to the public library every few days too.

[IronMaxipad]

The Scarlet Letter

[leemajors]

The Scarlet Letter

I liked that one a lot, and loved his other stuff too - esp Young Goodman Brown.

[CosmicCowboy]

The Scarlet Letter

I think I popped my first wood trying to imagine knocking up Hester.

[mrsmaalox]

The only novels I could ever read are the Classics. Jane Eyre, Little Women, The Importance of Being Earnest, Pride and Prejudice, Sense and Sensibility, Vanity Fair, Wuthering Heights; much more partial to the "girly" stuff, than HG Wells, Jack London, or James Fennimore Cooper.

The brevity of Steinbeck was attractive, but they were always the most difficult for me because the stories are sooo depressing :(

[DeadlyDynasty]

I liked almost everything listed here. I reread Tale of Two Cities just a couple of months ago; loved Jane Eyre and Ethan Frome. Great Gatsby is an easy read.

For me:
Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man -- Great book but hard to read.

Portrait is one of my all-time faves...Ulysses as well.


Young Goodman Brown.

:tu

[DeadlyDynasty]

The only novels I could ever read are the Classics. Jane Eyre, Little Women, The Importance of Being Earnest, Pride and Prejudice, Sense and Sensibility, Vanity Fair, Wuthering Heights; much more partial to the "girly" stuff, than HG Wells, Jack London, or James Fennimore Cooper.

The brevity of Steinbeck was attractive, but they were always the most difficult for me because the stories are sooo depressing :(

:lolI hated almost all of those, but for some reason always liked Wuthering Heights

[Dex]

Liked:
Great Gatsby
Of Mice and Men
Scarlet Letter
To Kill a Mockingbird
Lord of the Flies
Animal Farm
Fahrenheit 451
Anthem
Macbeth
Wuthering Heights
Catcher in the Rye (not school assigned, but have read it several times)

Hated:
Old Man and the Sea
Tale of two Cities
Canterbury Tales
Grapes of Wrath
King Lear
Importance of Being Earnest
Cyrano de Bergerac

[leemajors]

:lolI hated almost all of those, but for some reason always liked Wuthering Heights

Wuthering Heights is pretty badass, I read it in college and did not think I would like it going in. I also like Austen though.

[DeadlyDynasty]

Good call on MacBeth...fav Shakespeare work,

[leemajors]

The only novels I could ever read are the Classics. Jane Eyre, Little Women, The Importance of Being Earnest, Pride and Prejudice, Sense and Sensibility, Vanity Fair, Wuthering Heights; much more partial to the "girly" stuff, than HG Wells, Jack London, or James Fennimore Cooper.

The brevity of Steinbeck was attractive, but they were always the most difficult for me because the stories are sooo depressing :(

Cup of Gold isn't terribly depressing, but it was his first.

[Venti Quattro]

War and Peace

[NASpurs]

Don't know if it's a classic but One Hundred Years of Solitude pisses me off.

[ploto]

Good call on MacBeth...fav Shakespeare work,

Hamlet

[marini martini]

Red Bag of Courage

Scarlet Letter

Iliad and the Odyssey

As You Like It

Tale of Two Cities

Most of Shakespeare

Tale of Two Cities

[Venti Quattro]

Red Bag of Courage

Scarlet Letter

Iliad and the Odyssey

As You Like It

Tale of Two Cities

Most of Shakespeare

Tale of Two Cities

You certainly didn't like Tale of Two Cities. :lol :lol :lol

[marini martini]

Hated it!:lol

[mouse]

http://assetebooks.com/resources/The%20Origin%20of%20Species.gif

[Capt Bringdown]

Crime and Punishment
Grapes of Wrath

I don't need a book to tell me life sucks. That being said, Thomas Hardy is one of my favorites. Maybe it has to do with artistry.

[Das Texan]

i fucking hated the scarlet letter.

also didnt understand why the fuck house on mango street was required reading, other than the author was hispanic and i was going to school in san antonio.

one book i truly enjoyed that i had to read during summer in high school was a bell for adano and the chosen.

also loved gone with the wind for some odd reason.

also didnt really get a farewell to arms, but that was also probably cause i was a dumb high school kid who didnt want to read and only wanted to spend time trying to chase women at the time....

[The Reckoning]

jane eyre worst book ever

scarlet letter sucked too

[The Reckoning]

walt whitman sucked too. john whittier threw leaves of grass in the fireplace when he read it...but his poems sucked too.


anyone who writes one big poem about a piece of grass and then pumps out another edition of it every year to make money is a fraud.

[FuzzyLumpkins]

It's been mentioned but Moby Dick and the New Testament. Old Testament is a fun read otoh. Most of it anyway. Read Dante and liked it which surprised me because i did not expect i would like verse especialy translated verse so now i am going to try some Jules Verne and see how that goes.

Favorite book of fiction I was required to read during my education was Brave New World.

[Fpoonsie]

Great Expectations.

Still don't know why that book get so much love, but part of my hatred may stem from the fact that I'd never seen a longer novel in my life before reading it. I already dreaded it before opening up to tha first page.

[100%duncan]

:lmao Little Prince :lmao

[leemajors]

Great Expectations.

Still don't know why that book get so much love, but part of my hatred may stem from the fact that I'd never seen a longer novel in my life before reading it. I already dreaded it before opening up to tha first page.

try Bleak House then :lmao

[Spurminator]

I stopped reading The Old Man and the Sea 30 pages in and decided I would take whatever grade I got on the test. I got a B.

Also hated The Iliad as a 9th grader, but I may go back and read that at some point.

[ploto]

try Bleak House then :lmao

Or Middlemarch

[MannyIsGod]

Lord of the Flies

Loved that book.

[TE]

Loved that book.

:tu

[Cant_Be_Faded]

Basically everyone thinks britih works sucked, American works ruled

[Chachachango]

LOL I hated reading those books in English class. I would daydream about ass and tits on days were we had to read them. I don't know how I passed the assignments. House on Mango street was poop and Scarlett Letter was a bitch. That one I really had to force myself to read for English AP class. The only books I ever really liked were Night by Elie Wiesel, Where the Red Fern Grows, and Number the Stars.

[manufor3]

The Odyssey... terribly boring

[DeadlyDynasty]

LOL I hated reading those books in English class. I would daydream about ass and tits on days were we had to read them. I don't know how I passed the assignments. House on Mango street was poop and Scarlett Letter was a bitch. That one I really had to force myself to read for English AP class. The only books I ever really liked were Night by Elie Wiesel, Where the Red Fern Grows, and Number the Stars.

lol Where the Red Fern Grows. We read that in class in 4th grade and girls were literally sobbing. It was awkward

[SpursNextRomanEmpire]

Don't know if it's a classic but One Hundred Years of Solitude pisses me off.

:nope

Got damn, that is the best book I've ever read.