I am an Anglophile. I have read every Dickens, every Wilkie Collins, every Jane Austen, Conan-Doyle, Thackery and Wilde. I love me 'dem Brits.
And a girlfriend and I were talking about American Literature and I realize I have read practically none… Never bothered with To Kill A Mockingbird or Catcher in the Rye. I can’t recall any Mark Twain although I did read everything Edgar Allen Poe wrote (he is almost Gothically British, in a sense).
Since I know there is no way I will be able to get through the entire canon of American Literature, help me devise a Top Five list of American must-reads. I can’t stay away from my Pepys for too long, but feel I should sample a little of what is best from the States.
Well, I would definitely replace the Salinger with a Faulkner or Hemingway and it would be nice to find space for Lolita somewhere, but I doubt many lists will deviate too much from these.
not a HS English teacher, but i think the best bet for making an “essential” list would be to be diverse with the historical periods, and focus on books that are quintessentially American.
Crucible (note: it’s a play, not a novel. if you’re inclined towards reading a novel then i’ll agree with proudlydefiant’s suggestion of The Scarlett letter)
Tom Sawyer
Moby Dick
Great Gatsby
Grapes of Wrath
am i in the minority in thinking that tom sawyer is a superior novel to huck finn?
I haven’t read all of these, but so far as I understand, this should be a more fun and more variegated list of books than what ProudlyDefiant suggested.
And yes I realize that this is far more than 5, but it seems best to pick 5 that sound interesting to you, than 5 that are simply ranked as the most literary.
I don’t know what the Top 5 would be, but I would say that it must include Huckleberry Finn and To Kill a Mockingbird (though I could maybe see Tom Sawyer instead of Huck).
From the suggestions made by others, I think I’d round out the five with The Scarlet Letter, Last of the Mohicans, and, if we absolutely must have a Steinbeck, The Grapes of Wrath.
That’s a tough call, really, boiling it down to five ‘American’ novels.
I’d be tempted, and with I believe some justification, to leave the Hawthorne and Melville out because they’re essentially British novels written by Americans. That is, they’re novels written in a style and at a time prior to the establishment of a true ‘American’ literary scene. Sort of how some folks like to place the birth of American literature with Twain. I’m not sure I’d go that far but I think there’s an argument there.
Things I’d want to include would be things that give an indication of a time and place and people truly American and provide some insight. To that end I’d go with
The Great Gatsby
Tom Sawyer
The Jungle
To Kill A Mockingbird
Of Mice and Men
Feh, ask me tomorrow I’ll give you a different list. Maybe Bonfire of the Vanities or something.
I now do remember reading* The Great Gatsby* and* The Scarlet Letter *in High School. and I was in an Honors program so I don’t know why I didn’t read To Kill A Mockingbird or any Twain that I can recall (or was it that forgettable for me?!?!)
I have read all of Rand and get into a rut of re-reading either Fountainhead or Shrugged every three or four years. I embraced Ray Bradbury as I segued out of the Nancy Drew and Laura Ingalls Wilder books so I consider him covered.
I am narrowing this down that I should probably read Harper Lee, Mark Twain, Hemingway, and… Salinger? Faulkner? Melville? Steinbeck?
Well, I am at least seeing that I will probably be reading more than five books (and interspersing my Pepys in between. Gosh, I love Pepys…)
<terrible heathen>To Kill A Mockingbird is a good read. It’s fundamentally a children’s book, I think, and while Lee is certainly a talented writer, I’m never quite comfortable lumping it in with true works of genius.
Add some Vonnegut to your list - I’d start with Cat’s Cradle there. And if you’re interested in science fiction, you can’t go wrong with Asimov (not great literature, but sure as hell important).
Similarly, dig into some Heinlein. I couldn’t possibly pick a sane number of books to recommend, but if you want a prime example of the sense of wonder and excitement that apparently sprang up post-WWII in America, read some of his juvenile/YA works. They’re not great literature, but they’re tremendous fun, and certainly helped shape a generation.
I’ve been struggling with Faulkner, myself. My first introduction wasn’t until college, and I started with Go Down, Moses, which I think is a little bit too intense to start with. I’d start out with A Fable or Absalom, Absalom! - but that’s just me. I’d definitely rate Faulkner as one of, if not the most intellectually challenging American novelists.
Read Moby Dick. Don’t feel bad if you end up skipping a page here and there, unless you’re super interested in whaling. It’s truly a great book but does suffer a bit from bloat.
Huck Finn is great, but Twain really shines in his short stories and essays. Absolutely anything he wrote is worth your time.
[ol]
[li]Hucklebery Finn - I would consider this one essential. [/li][li]Slaughterhouse Five, Cat’s Cradle or Breakfast of Champions. Just pick one but read some Vonnegut. [/li][li]The Sound and the Fury - William Faulkner[/li][li]The World According To Garp - John Irving[/li][li]The Complete Stories - Flannery O’Conner[/li][/ol]
I don’t know that I would bother with Salinger. If you had asked for 10 suggestions instead of 5 I would have included Steinbeck, Hawthorne and Melville.
I read a whole bunch of Science Fiction in my youth; up until my 25th year or so. Lots of Heinlein, Asimov, Clarke, Bradbury, and then Niven and LeGuin, Harlan and Philip K. Dick. I was hanging out with LASFS folks and attending WorldCon and whatnot.
It all shut down after a particularly bad episode with David Brin and Orson Scott Card. The whole community was a tremendous turn-off and I changed my reading habits tremendously.
Ironically, I am reading my first fantasy novel now in over 20 years at the insistence of a friend (art-related Memory and Dream by Charles deLint) and hating it. But I promised I would read it and I’m about 20 pages to end so I will definitely be picking up something new to start this evening.
I have both The Alienist and Instance of the Fingerpost beckoning, but that is still outside the the theme of this particular thread.
A Fable? That’s an interesting choice - can I ask why that one? (Not arguing with its inclusion - I haven’t read it despite an effort or two, but it doesn’t seem to be commonly viewed as one of his more seminal works.)