"Great" Books that in Truth Are Tedious
Troy Senik's post on David Brooks's latest column got me thinking about The Great Gatsby. Okay, let me explain that.
Troy said Brooks had written a thoughtful and provocative piece, which of course he hadn't because he's David Brooks and is incapable of doing so. But this insistence by so many smart people that David Brooks is worth reading reminded me how everyone says The Great Gatsby is this fantastic novel. I read it in high school and thought it was dull and unenlightening. Then, in my late twenties, I thought, "Hey, everyone says it's great, and I was just an idiot high school kid, so maybe I was missing something." So I read it again, and it was still dull and unenlightening. My wife, who's a much more astute literary critic than I, had the exact same experience, which is one of the many reasons I love her. I mean, almost nothing happens (he hits someone with a car, right?) to people it's very hard to care about, and then . . . there's not even an "and then." That's it -- almost nothing happens to unsympathetic people. Oh, and there are fancy parties.
Anyway, any other nominations for supposedly great books that actually [edited]? (Can we say "[edited]" on Ricochet? I hope so.)
Editor's note: Ricochet seeks to return our standards of gentility to the year 1957. We therefore discourage the use of the edited word. When it doubt, ask "Would June Cleaver feel ill at ease were I to say this?" You may also ask whether you would use the phrase before the Queen Mother. No other member of the Royal Family may be used as a reliable guide, alas.
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Comments:
Dec '10
Re: "Great" Books that in Truth Are Tedious
Catcher in the Rye
Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man
Jul '10
Re: "Great" Books that in Truth Are Tedious
Anything by James Joyce.
Anything by Thomas Pynchon.
Anything by Alice Walker
Anything by Maya Angelou
Moby Dick
Re: "Great" Books that in Truth Are Tedious
I loved Gatsby but I do recall a wise critic saying something about how Fitzgerald's books were frequently both awful and great. You don't read him for the plot but for those achingly beautiful paragraphs interspersed throughout the work.
But, then again, I rather enjoy anything by Joyce, too.
I have noticed I'm one of the only people in my circle who doesn't recognize the genius of Zadie Smith ...
Aug '10
Re: "Great" Books that in Truth Are Tedious
Brave New World by Aldous Huxley
The author paints for the reader a picture of a utopian society, by any objective standard. He then tells the reader that it's really a dystopian society, without ever explaining why.
"There's no war, no crime, no famine, no unhappiness, etc. But trust me, it's a really bad place and you wouldn't want to live there. No, really!"
Edited on June 29, 2011 at 9:54pmJun '10
Re: "Great" Books that in Truth Are Tedious
Kenneth: Anything by James Joyce.
Anything by Thomas Pynchon.
Anything by Alice Walker
Anything by Maya Angelou
Moby Dick · Jun 29 at 11:29am
Ditto except for Moby Dick, which I liked when I finally read it nearly six decades into my life.
Here are a few more:
Anything by D. H. Lawrence
Anything by Virginia Woolf
Anything by Philip Roth
Anything by Updike/De Lillo/Barth
Absalom Absalom (and I like Faulkner--but this is the worst example imaginable of self-indulgent writing by an otherwise great writer).
May '11
Re: "Great" Books that in Truth Are Tedious
I will now become the most hated person on Ricochet. Atlas Shrugged. The dialogue was overdramatic more suited for a cheesy soap opera than a serious philisophical story. Unrealistic storyline. Society will change its collectivist culture based on a high minded speech that lasts 3 hours? Immoral. How can one rightly justify the deaths of a trainload of people because they were all collectivists. Great concept for a book too bad it had to be written by a "hack" like Ayn Rand. Feel free to bring the hate!!
Oct '10
Re: "Great" Books that in Truth Are Tedious
Misthiocracy: Brave New World by Aldous Huxley
The author paints for the reader a picture of a utopian society, by any objective standard. He then tells the reader that it's really a dystopian society, without ever explaining why.
I agree about Huxley, but not because of the setting, which I think is important for HS students to read about. It's the cardboard characters, stilted dialogue, and trivial moral decisions that I dislike. There is no tragedy in dystopias because there are no human beings. 1984 is similarly flawed; I've never finished it.
I've defended Fitzgerald elsewhere on Ricochet. I'm tempted to offer a defense of Joyce--even if you think Ulysses is self-indulgent, Portrait elegantly combines bildungsroman, social observation, dialect, irony, humor, literary criticism, and aesthetic philosophy. It might still be my favorite novel. Still, as Hume says, no disputing matters of taste.
Angelou, Pynchon, Walker, and Barth don't even meet the criterion for the thread.
Aug '10
Re: "Great" Books that in Truth Are Tedious
Whew, I worried I was the only person who thought Gatsby was vastly overrated.
I'll toss in a half-hearted defense of Pynchon. Some of his writing is wonderfully surreal; some of his characters manage to be relatable while still being utterly bizarre; some of his plots strike a great balance between misplaced paranoia and believable conspiracy theories. But I'd rather go blind for two weeks than have to read Gravity's Rainbow again.
Re: "Great" Books that in Truth Are Tedious
War and Peace. Not great. And disappointing to realize that after you've devoted the time to read nearly 1500 pages.
Re: "Great" Books that in Truth Are Tedious
Fitzgerald's This Side of Paradise was also awful. To be fair, he wrote it when he was 22, and how many 22-year olds are capable of writing great books with so little experience under their belts?
Jul '10
Re: "Great" Books that in Truth Are Tedious
J. D. Fitzpatrick
Misthiocracy: Brave New World by Aldous Huxley
T
Angelou, Pynchon, Walker, and Barth don't even meet the criterion for the thread. · Jun 29 at 2:29pm
Sadly, they do. Pynchon and Angelou were both nominated for the Pulitzer Prize (Angelou was also nominated for the Nobel Prize). And Alice Walker, of course, actually won the Pulitzer.
May '10
Re: "Great" Books that in Truth Are Tedious
It doesn't hold a candle to Anna Karenina, I'll grant you. But it's still pretty great. You just have to skip over all the long tedious passages full of philosophical fatalism. And ignore the paeans to Masonry.
May '10
Re: "Great" Books that in Truth Are Tedious
I re-read it last week. A bleak, depressing story. Skilled writing, though.
Jul '10
Re: "Great" Books that in Truth Are Tedious
Kenneth
J. D. Fitzpatrick
Misthiocracy: Brave New World by Aldous Huxley
T
Angelou, Pynchon, Walker, and Barth don't even meet the criterion for the thread. · Jun 29 at 2:29pm
Sadly, they do. Pynchon and Angelou were both nominated for the Pulitzer Prize (Angelou was also nominated for the Nobel Prize). And Alice Walker, of course, actually won the Pulitzer. · Jun 29 at 3:36pm
Yes. But what did they do of merit?
May '10
Re: "Great" Books that in Truth Are Tedious
Tender is the Night is very beautifully done, though horrible in its subject matter. Fitzgerald is good at capturing the angst and moral vacuity haunting that "lost generation".
May '10
Re: "Great" Books that in Truth Are Tedious
The Fountainhead was so risibly bad that I wouldn't dream of picking up Atlas Shrugged.
Apr '11
Re: "Great" Books that in Truth Are Tedious
I have to second Mark Twain on Fenimore Cooper's literary offenses; man, did I hate reading The Last of the Mohicans and I was actually looking forward to it! Not sure what Eco's reputation would be in this regard but having quite enjoyed The Name of the Rose, I slogged through Foucault's Pendulum to no avail. I felt sorry for the paper. Ever since, a book only gets 100 pages from me. It used to be a point of pride to finish what I'd started, but now, I feel my time can be better spent.
Does anyone have any strong felling about Bleak House.
Edited on June 30, 2011 at 12:58amApr '11
Re: "Great" Books that in Truth Are Tedious
For me:
Anything by Kurt Vonnegut. At least he's a fast read.
I think anyone who gets through Galt's speech should get a medal. There are great concepts in the book, coupled with some terrible concepts about personal interaction.
I was okay with "The Great Gatsby," really. Though I prefer "The Beautiful and the Damned."
May '11
Re: "Great" Books that in Truth Are Tedious
AmishDude: Catcher in the Rye
Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man · Jun 29 at 11:23am
The 16 year old in me still loves Catcher in the Rye and Led Zeppelin. My dad gave it to me to read when I was 16 so it has sentimental value. It was the first book I read that had profanity. If I read it today it would probably dissapoint me greatly. Led Zeppelin still rocks!
Oct '10
Re: "Great" Books that in Truth Are Tedious
Faulkner is terrible. Ditto Joyce. I like a page (let alone a paragraph) to have at least one period. Call me shallow.
I love F. Scott Fitzgerald’s short story collections. “Diamond as big as the Ritz” is a fun, lyrical story with a great twist. I agree that Great Gatsby is a horrendous read.
Thomas Hardy seems to have great critical acclaim, but I just can’t get past 20 pages in any of his novels.
After reading Jonah Goldberg’s column praising Dune, and seeing this post, I feel that I can go into the realm of science fiction. Asimov’s Foundation series or anything written by Robert A. Heinlein, are just ponderous tripe.
I am convinced that nobody outside of Sweden has actually finished The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, or any of Stieg Larsson’s sequels. The daily life minutiae and pedantic diatribes are excruciating. I lasted 50 pages.