This month’s question from The Classics Club is finally an easy question! Seriously for once they’ve asked a question I readily have answers for!
Which classic work has caused you to become a master in avoidance? It’s not necessarily because you’re intimidated but maybe there are works out there that just cause you to have the Dracula reaction: cape-covered arm up in front of face with a step back reaction?
Prior to starting the Classics Club I would’ve spouted any number of the Russian novels (Doctor Zhivago, War and Peace and Anna Karenina to name a few), but I’ve read those already. I think for me the final big hurdles will be actually finishing an unabridged Don Quixote (Part 1 & Part 2), making it through a Steinbeck (I put The Grapes of Wrath on my 30 x 30 list so this WILL be done this year) and James Joyce’s Ulysses. We’ll see when these readings occur, I’m not afraid so much as I am wary of them!
I think you’ll find that Grapes of Wrath is less intimidating than you think it is. Don Quixote and Ulysses certainly intimidate me though!
I don’t really find Steinbeck intimidating, I just don’t really like his writing! For some reason the over description has always stood in my way, hopefully this time I’ll make it through 😀
Sometimes finding an audiobook with a great narrator can make a big difference when you aren’t really feeling the writing style, especially in novels with a lot of accented language and colloquialisms.
I’m no a big fan of audiobooks as I read so fast but I might have to try it for some of those times I don’t know I’ll ever get to!
Grapes of Wrath is one of my favorite novels and I’ve read it at least three times now. I have Don Quixote on my shelf…maybe next year.
Oh that makes me a little more excited to read that Steinbeck.
I am not just avoiding but downright refusing to read Ulysses or Don Quixote you’re braver than me.
Haahaa. Fair enough. I’m mostly interested in Quixote because I’ve read part of it in Spanish in high school and an abridged version in college so it’s more curiosity than anything else.