# A classic read only by you **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [September 19, 2005, 12:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-classic-read-only-by-you/322292 "2005-09-19T00:37:16Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 6
**Author:** ![Sal\_Ammoniac](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/8dc957/32.png) [@Sal\_Ammoniac](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sal_Ammoniac)\ **Post date:** [September 21, 2005, 1:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-classic-read-only-by-you/322292/101 "2005-09-21T13:10:32Z")
Yep, put me down for _Pilgrim’s Progress_. I actually kind of liked it. Ditto for _Middlemarch_. Proust, on the other hand… I read about half of one book, and thought to myself, “Are these not some of the stupidest characters ever created?” Obviously this is a minority opinion. Okay, here’s another one: _Dangerous Liaisons,_ by Laclos. Or how about _Philosophy in the Boudoir_ by the Marquis de Sade? It’s a classic of its own very narrow genre. ---
**Author:** ![CBCD](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/9fc348/32.png) [@CBCD](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CBCD)\ **Post date:** [September 21, 2005, 1:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-classic-read-only-by-you/322292/102 "2005-09-21T13:46:42Z")
Gosh, we could have a fun game. 1. I post an unread classic that I’ve read. 2. The next person who has read that very same obscure classic then posts an obscure classic he or she has read, etc. For example, I post Middlemarch. Sal Ammoniac has read Middlemarch, so he can post a book of his choice, and he chooses Dangerous Liasons. Next poster must have read Dangerous Liasons, and posts Bartleby the Scrivener. And so it goes until we all realize _we need to get out more_. ---
**Author:** ![Maeglin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/8baadc/32.png) [@Maeglin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Maeglin)\ **Post date:** [September 21, 2005, 2:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-classic-read-only-by-you/322292/103 "2005-09-21T14:20:43Z")
> [@CBCD](#): > > Gosh, we could have a fun game. > > 1. I post an unread classic that I’ve read. > 2. The next person who has read that very same obscure classic then posts an obscure classic he or she has read, etc. > > For example, I post Middlemarch. > Sal Ammoniac has read Middlemarch, so he can post a book of his choice, and he chooses Dangerous Liasons. > Next poster must have read Dangerous Liasons, and posts Bartleby the Scrivener. > > And so it goes until we all realize _we need to get out more_. Sounds enjoyable. I’d rather not go through the exercise of posting everything I have read that others mentioned or the languages that I have read them in. Let’s start with something classical but uncommonly read. _The Metamorphoses_, or _The Golden Ass_ of Apuleius. N.B. If you have just read the Cupid & Psyche episode but have not read the entire work, it doesn’t count. 😉 ---
**Author:** ![CalMeacham](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/calmeacham/32/35_2.png) [@CalMeacham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CalMeacham)\ **Post date:** [September 21, 2005, 2:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-classic-read-only-by-you/322292/104 "2005-09-21T14:23:52Z")
I’ve read the entire **Golden Ass** od Apuleius. Who’s read **The Epic of Gilgamesh** (any translation)? ---
**Author:** ![Clothahump](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/51bf81/32.png) [@Clothahump](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Clothahump)\ **Post date:** [September 21, 2005, 2:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-classic-read-only-by-you/322292/105 "2005-09-21T14:34:49Z")
For many years, I cherished having the magazine in which Wonder Warthog made his initial appearance. Every time I mention him, I get blank looks. Fearless, Fighting, Foulmouthed Wonder Warthog was a fun read. Anybody else ever read WW? ---
**Author:** ![twickster](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/ec9cab/32.png) [@twickster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/twickster)\ **Post date:** [September 21, 2005, 2:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-classic-read-only-by-you/322292/106 "2005-09-21T14:35:25Z")
Fun game – recommend a new thread – which I’d start, but, believe it or not, I’m at work and busy. I’ve read Gilgamesh and will do … “Morte D’Arthur.” (Only because the fact that I had helped for a Final Jeopardy in my game show past.) ---
**Author:** ![Knorf](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/58956e/32.png) [@Knorf](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Knorf)\ **Post date:** [September 21, 2005, 2:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-classic-read-only-by-you/322292/107 "2005-09-21T14:45:35Z")
> [@zagloba](#): > > Another one I seldom encounter other readers of is Twain’s _Roughing It_, a semi-fictional account of his first trip West and his early days in the Nevada silver mining region. A neglected gem, IMO. I’ve had the same experience, and agree that it is a gem, and a damn funny gem at that. For those for whom Twain means only a vague memory of _Tom Sawyer_ and Huckleberry Finn\*, I always recommend _Roughing It._ It’s one of the books I’ve given most often as a gift. My nomination is _Drums Along the Mohawk_ by Walter D. Edmonds. Sure it was made into a famous movie staring Henry Fonda, and supposedly has “classic status,” but hell if I don’t run into very few people who have actually read it. ---
**Author:** ![Knorf](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/58956e/32.png) [@Knorf](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Knorf)\ **Post date:** [September 21, 2005, 2:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-classic-read-only-by-you/322292/108 "2005-09-21T14:46:48Z")
> [@Gangster Octopus](#): > > Has anyone else read Graham Greene’s _The Power and the Glory_? (I assume so, but have never met anyone else who has.) _Raises hand._ I liked it, too. Read back in high school. ---
**Author:** ![zweisamkeit](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/zweisamkeit/32/4360_2.png) [@zweisamkeit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/zweisamkeit)\ **Post date:** [September 21, 2005, 2:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-classic-read-only-by-you/322292/109 "2005-09-21T14:54:05Z")
> [@Hung Mung](#): > > While buying books for high school I picked up an anthology of Greek plays. I don’t really know anyone who’s read Antigone, Medea, etc., but I’m sure someone I know has. > Book of the New Sun, Gene Wolfe. > Mists of Avalon, Marion Bradley > Basically anything by Asimov > Galapagos, Cat’s Cradle & Breakfast of Champions, Vonnegut > Catch-22, Heller > Starship Troopers & Stranger in a Strange Land, Heinlein > Principia Discordia (obviously) & Illuminatus! > East of Eden, Steinbeck > American Gods, Neverwhere & Stardust, Neil Gaiman Some of these I hesitate to call “classics”. _The Mists of Avalon_ (which I have read and really enjoyed) was written just in 1982. Is that enough time to really determine if it will have staying power and become a classic? If so, I add Garcia Marquez’ _Love in the Time of Cholera_ and _Chronicle of a Death Foretold_ (HIGHLY recommend that second one), in addition to the obvious _One Hundred Years of Solitude_. ---
**Author:** ![CBCD](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/9fc348/32.png) [@CBCD](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CBCD)\ **Post date:** [September 21, 2005, 3:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-classic-read-only-by-you/322292/110 "2005-09-21T15:19:15Z")
> [@zweisamkeit](#): > > Some of these I hesitate to call “classics”. _The Mists of Avalon_ (which I have read and really enjoyed) was written just in 1982. Is that enough time to really determine if it will have staying power and become a classic? > > If so, I add Garcia Marquez’ _Love in the Time of Cholera_ and _Chronicle of a Death Foretold_ (HIGHLY recommend that second one), in addition to the obvious _One Hundred Years of Solitude_. In defense of **Hung Mung** , he’s a teenager. An adult’s list and a teenager’s lists will be different. ---
**Author:** ![Lumpy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lumpy/32/446_2.png) [@Lumpy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lumpy)\ **Post date:** [September 21, 2005, 3:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-classic-read-only-by-you/322292/111 "2005-09-21T15:24:47Z")
> [@Clothahump](#): > > For many years, I cherished having the magazine in which Wonder Warthog made his initial appearance. Every time I mention him, I get blank looks. Fearless, Fighting, Foulmouthed Wonder Warthog was a fun read. > > Anybody else ever read WW? Yep. For those who’ve never heard of him, Wonder Warthog was an “underground” comic character by Gilbert Shelton, who also brought us The Fabulous Furry Freak Brothers. Considering that WW is no more foul-mouthed or obscene than half of what Dark Horse comics prints these days, it’s a shame he was relegated to the underground comics ghetto. Before his time I guess. ---
**Author:** ![The\_Scrivener](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/eada6e/32.png) [@The\_Scrivener](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Scrivener)\ **Post date:** [September 21, 2005, 4:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-classic-read-only-by-you/322292/112 "2005-09-21T16:18:15Z")
> [@CalMeacham](#): > > My suggestion – the works of Lucian, esopecially the Penguin translation. If you haven’t read it, it’s worth it. A Roman humorist and satirist who could have written yesterday (if you make a few changes in names). And his piece on Alexander the Wonder Worker is a bit of parapsychological debumking that could’ve been done by CSICOP. :smack: Y’know, I usually vet a thread pretty thoroughly before posting but didn’t bother this time, being too rushed to read it, too lazy to search it, and too overconfident of the novelty of plugging _Lucian_ to feel compelled to do either. Props to **CalMeacham** and thanks for the heads-up on the Penguin edition. ---
**Author:** ![gaucho](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/c67d28/32.png) [@gaucho](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gaucho)\ **Post date:** [September 21, 2005, 5:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-classic-read-only-by-you/322292/113 "2005-09-21T17:55:50Z")
> [@CBCD](#): > > OK, I’ll admit to having read The Song of Roland, and Proust (the whole thing), and The Man Without Qualities, and Ethan Frome and The House of Mirth by Edith Wharton, and The Idiot, and War and Peace, and Bleak House, and My Antonia, and Jude the Obscure, and The Woman in White, and Livy’s History of Rome and Yeat’s Mythologies, and a few other books I could mention, but I horrify myself with even this list! Whoa. I have to bow my head before this. You are a paragon of well-readness. On Hardy: I read the Mayor of Casterbridge and then I read Jude the Obscure and then I shot myself. Seriously, don’t get near this stuff without a lot of Prozac handy. Some of you may enjoy this: [http://www.mcsweeneys.net/2000/09/15adaptations.html](http://www.mcsweeneys.net/2000/09/15adaptations.html) ---
**Author:** ![pokey](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/ebca7d/32.png) [@pokey](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pokey)\ **Post date:** [September 21, 2005, 6:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-classic-read-only-by-you/322292/114 "2005-09-21T18:22:29Z")
> [@Sal Ammoniac](#): > > Okay, here’s another one: _Dangerous Liaisons,_ by Laclos. Or how about _Philosophy in the Boudoir_ by the Marquis de Sade? It’s a classic of its own very narrow genre. I read those. I read Justine, too and I’m a bit embarassed about it. It was a long time ago. Pierre Louys and The Story of O, too. It was a phase! I’ve read Nathanel West, I love him! I don’t know if Jean Cocteau’s fiction is “classic” but I read The Holy Terrors. ---
**Author:** ![Hung\_Mung](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/a88e4f/32.png) [@Hung\_Mung](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hung_Mung)\ **Post date:** [September 21, 2005, 6:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-classic-read-only-by-you/322292/115 "2005-09-21T18:44:10Z")
> [@CBCD](#): > > In defense of **Hung Mung** , he’s a teenager. An adult’s list and a teenager’s lists will be different. Well, I’m 23. But close enough. > [@zweisamkeit](#): > > Some of these I hesitate to call “classics”. The Mists of Avalon (which I have read and really enjoyed) was written just in 1982. Is that enough time to really determine if it will have staying power and become a classic? I’ll concede Mists of Avalon and Book of the New Sun and Gaiman, I obviously misunderstood the OP somewhat. Since my tastes skew to the modern, perhaps I’ll just keep my nose out. Most of my ‘classic’ reading came in school (and is thus disqualified by the OP). Also, I detest most 19th century literature because I find large amounts of exposition tedious. ---
**Author:** ![Amok](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/f17d59/32.png) [@Amok](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Amok)\ **Post date:** [September 21, 2005, 7:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-classic-read-only-by-you/322292/116 "2005-09-21T19:14:12Z")
Here’s one I haven’t seen mentioned: the play _The Way of the World_ by William Congreve. It’s a Restoration comedy, and I know it’s still occasionally performed, so persumably its read, but I’ve never met anyone who has. ---
**Author:** ![Quercus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/q/7ab992/32.png) [@Quercus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Quercus)\ **Post date:** [September 21, 2005, 7:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-classic-read-only-by-you/322292/117 "2005-09-21T19:18:18Z")
I’ve read a few (bunch?) of these, but I think the only one that hasn’t already been seconded is The Twelve Caesars, Suetonius. I haven’t read any of the mentioned Greek classics, but did read Lysistrata. If I can slide away from classics, many, many people have read Neal Stephenson’s Cryptonomicon or Snow Crash. But fewer have read his earlier book, Zodiac. And I doubt many even know of his first book, The Big U, let alone admit to having read it. But I do often wonder if there’s anyone who like me not only read it, but also the entire length of the book that inspired it “The Origin of Consciousness in the Breakdown of the Bicameral Mind” For the record, Zodiac is great, The Big U has a couple moments of good satire but probably not enough, and the Bicameral mind is almost (but not quite) worth looking at just for the sheer wonder of seeing someone stretch the most ridiculous thesis you could imagine into a many hundred page book that almost makes it seem plausible. ---
**Author:** ![CBCD](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/9fc348/32.png) [@CBCD](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CBCD)\ **Post date:** [September 21, 2005, 7:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-classic-read-only-by-you/322292/118 "2005-09-21T19:28:17Z")
The Dusty Classic Tag, You’re It game thread is now [here](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?p=6605996#post6605996) Yee-haw! ---
**Author:** ![Maeglin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/8baadc/32.png) [@Maeglin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Maeglin)\ **Post date:** [September 21, 2005, 7:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-classic-read-only-by-you/322292/119 "2005-09-21T19:39:09Z")
> [@Hung Mung](#): > > Well, I’m 23. But close enough. > > I’ll concede Mists of Avalon and Book of the New Sun and Gaiman, I obviously misunderstood the OP somewhat. > Since my tastes skew to the modern, perhaps I’ll just keep my nose out. Most of my ‘classic’ reading came in school (and is thus disqualified by the OP). Also, I detest most 19th century literature because I find large amounts of exposition tedious. I wouldn’t be so quick about striking Book of the New Sun. Even if it’s not a classic now, it sure will be in 50 years. ---
**Author:** ![twickster](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/ec9cab/32.png) [@twickster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/twickster)\ **Post date:** [September 21, 2005, 7:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-classic-read-only-by-you/322292/120 "2005-09-21T19:51:39Z")
> [@Quercus](#): > > But I do often wonder if there’s anyone who like me not only read it, but also the entire length of the book that inspired it “The Origin of Consciousness in the Breakdown of the Bicameral Mind.” I have read the Jaynes – in hardback, when it first came out. Sigh. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-classic-read-only-by-you/322292.md?page=5) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-classic-read-only-by-you/322292.md?page=7)