English Literature 101: Essential Reading

Cafe Society
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I’m looking for recommendations in English Literature, NOT American or Canadian or Australian or whatever – I need it to prepare for my final exams. Here’s the deal:

We have a huge list of reading suggestions that we could plow through, alas, there’s only so much time in a life and I just don’t know which of the ones they suggest would make for good reading. So I’m turning to you guys to tell me which of the classics you thought good reading. If you’d rather I post my preliminary (long) list, I’ll do so, but I’m looking for any recommendations that you can offer. If you could post your reason for recommending it, I’d be delighted.

The University’s Reading List

Thanks much in advance!

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The 19th Century will have the most readable stuff in all probability. You might want to skip Jane Austen and the Brontës unless you are into books about people dating. (Personally, I’d vote that you’re better to go with Russian literature if you’re big on books where nothing happens but internalised moping.)

I’ve heard that The Pilgrim’s Progress isn’t terribly good and is more interesting for its historical interest than litarary.

I’ve read some 20th Century stuff and didn’t find any terribly readable, but that may just have been poor luck (Joseph Conrad, William Golding, James Joyce, and Peter Shaffer)–though still better than American.

I could list fun reads out of the things I have read, but that seems a bit like cheating.

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I’ve stood Hamlet, so I can deal with moping. I’ll have to read one of the Austen/Brontes, so I’m wondering which to read (I haven’t read any so far). Wuthering Heights was suggested as a good one – thoughts?

What about 18th century, anything you can particularly recommend? I guess I need on Fielding, Defoe, Swift, probably Tristram Shandy as well, what else…any drama recommendations? Any poetry? Alexander Pope?

I’ve read Pilgrim’s Progress, and it’s definitely more of a culturally-important book in and of itself, but it had huge influence on the literature on both sides of the pond, so there’s that to be said for its literalness.

Really? I loved Shaffer’s Equus, and there’s always Stoppard and Pinter for Drama, so I think I have that pretty well covered (although a short play or two isn’t much work and will maybe help). I have Ian McEwan for my late 20th century novelist read, and plan on reading Rushdie (but which…), and I have done Conrad, Golding, Orwell, Kipling for early 20th century. I may have my bases covered there.

I know it won’t help if I assure you that there’s no cheating involved, because why should I not tell you, but really, this is just to get some well-read people’s advice on what I should spend my rather limited time on to get a fair overview of the overwhelming amount of reading that could be done. Of course, I’m looking for seminal reads as much as for fun reads, but it sure HELPS if it’s also fun…otherwise I’ll still read stuff, but maybe stuff that’s not as good or fun, just because I don’t know better…

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Pride and Prejudice or Emma. They are both fun and funny.

I have read The Venerable Bede, which they call Bedas–I recommend that, or selections. It is easy and interesting, if you find a good translation*.

I have read a few Robin Hood ballads, and I would recommend one of those. They are all by the same guy–“Anon”–and I can’t recommend any in particular.

I could never get into Fairie Queene at all.

John Donne and Andrew Marvell are great. Make sure you pick the poems about sex; that way the imagery will be easy to follow. “To His Coy Mistress” was redone by Billy Joel as “Only the Good Die Young.”

I know Tristram Shandy and Humphrey Clinker are both very heavy going. They are funny, though, if you can get into them.

What you have here, of course, is a list of the acknowledged classics of English literature throughout history, so it is a little unfocussed. Good luck!

  • On the subject of translations–Modern English speakers cannot read Old English without translation. Most could puzzle out Middle English without too much trouble, I think–it often helps to read aloud. On the other hand, you seem to be in a German university. I assume you are reading these works in English, and that you are a native German speaker–that is going to add challenge, of course.
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Do you need to read things solely off the recommended reading list, or do you have free reign? I’m imagining that it’s the first one if you’re going to be tested on it, so I’m looking at your list and recommending things off that. I’m kind of surprised the list is arranged chronologically, rather than by movement.

I also really hope that your final exam isn’t two weeks from now, because there’s no way you can cram a millennium of English literature into two weeks of reading.

For the 18th century, I like Alexander Pope, Robert Burns, and William Blake. Robert Burns might be a little hard to understand, thanks to the fact that he’s writing in Scots, but if you have a good annotated copy, it won’t be bad.

For the William Blake, you can just read “Songs of Innocence and Experience” in full. There aren’t that many poems, and none of them are all that long. The most famous poems are “The Lamb”, “The Tyger”, “The Chimney Sweeper”, “The Little Black Boy”, “The Sick Rose”, and “The Poison Tree.” But, like I said, the poems are all pretty short, so it shouldn’t take you very long to read all 50 or so.

For drama, Sheridan is hilarious. Really. Read either of the plays suggested on your school’s list (“The Rivals” or “The School for Scandal”). “She Stoops to Conquer” by Oliver Goldsmith is also a safe bet.

You should try “A Modest Proposal,” if only for the understanding that the original satirical proposal was to have the Irish sell their children to the English to be used as food. “A Vindication of the Rights of Women” by Mary Wollstonecraft is important, too, at least as far as feminism is concerned.

As for novels, I pretty much hate all 18th century novels. I couldn’t stand “Moll Flanders” and do not understand why “Robinson Crusoe” is so popular. The exception to this is “Gulliver’s Travels,” which is amusing.

Returning soon with the 19th century.

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For poetry, it would probably take you longer to read an explanation of which poems/poets you should read and why than just to read the poems themselves. Get yourself a good anthology and do some browsing. Give yourself plenty of time and quiet, pay attention to both the meanings and the sounds of the words, and maybe read the poem through more than once before you go on to something else.

For novels, there’s some good discussion and recommendations in the thread Classic novels that have aged well, although it’s not confined just to Brit Lit.

One thing that becomes clear in threads like these is that tastes differ! For just about anything on your list, you’ll find some people who love it and some who hate it. If you were to give us some idea of your own tastes, examples of things you have personally found to be good (or bad) reading, we might be able to give you more personalized advice.

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I’ve got pretty much free reign, as I will be handing in a list of things that I have read for the finals, and they will select from that list the topics of my oral exam. Written exam topics are usually so broad (like “Haunted Houses in Literature”) that, a sufficiently broad reading assumed, you will be able to find stuff.

I’ve got a year and then some, and of course I’m not starting from scratch, but see below.

Miss Purl, thank you for your kind suggestions! I’ll look into them, and would be delighted for the 19th century suggestions!

I’ve found that really depends on the poetry. With Whitman, for example, it was very useful that someone pointed out a couple of central poems to me…I can’t imagine having to wade through Leaves of Grass without some idea of where to stop and linger a while.

I thought about that, but figured the post would get longish. Here’s some things I read and what I thought about it:

Canterbury Tales, meh, but for 700 years old, not too bad.
Shakespeare’s plays: loved most, except Hamlet, which I grant is a good play but which I detest, and haven’t read any comedies but A Midsummer Night’s Dream. Shakespeare’s sonnets I like exceedingly.
I have read some Congreve, Wycherly and Aphra Behn, which was okay, but really not something I would have to read again. I have read Robinson Crusoe and A Modest Proposal, both of which I liked. I’ve read some of Burke’s essays, which were okay, but virtually nothing between 1750 and 1840, except for Burke and Tristram Shandy, which I couldn’t get into after a hundred pages and dropped to return later, and De Quincey’s Opium Eater, plus Wordsworth and Coledridge poetry. I have read A Tale of Two Cities, which I enjoyed, and Oliver Twist, which I didn’t; Conrad’s Heart of Darkness, which was good, and Lord Jim, which wasn’t. I’ve read Kipling and Rider Haggard and some Virginia Woolf essays, and then Orwell, Burgess, McEwan, Shaffer, (forgot to but Bernard Shaw in there chronologically, and Oscar Wilde, both of whom I liked)…all of which were good (well, I didn’t like A Clockwork Orange).

So maybe that helps…thanks to all of you so far!

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Beowulf is a classic. It’s a great example of the Old English imagination.

Most English majors go nuts over Canterbury Tales. I read it in high school, but I don’t remember anything about it.

Never read Hobbes, but I’ve always meant to because, hey, if it’s good enough for Bill Watterson, it’s good enough for me.

A Modest Proposal is pretty awesome, and a classic in argumentative prose.

Samuel Taylor Coleridge is cool stuff. He had a gift for spilling his bizarre drug visions out onto a page for everyone to see–not many people can do that.

A Clockwork Orange is sheer brilliance. Definitely read it. (OK, reading your last post, it looks like you don’t like it. Oh well.)

I see Joseph Conrad is listed–try his classic Catch-22 if you can get away with it. One of the funniest books I’ve ever read.

1984 is absolutely a must-read. I’d bet that almost every single literate person who grew up in an English-speaking country has read it. As someone wrote in a foreword (I’m paraphrasing), “The year 1984 has come and gone without incident, but this story is just as important today as it was when it was written”. It and Animal Farm have a lot of meaning about 20th-century German history to squeeze out, too. I think Politics and the English Language is bollocks, though. (But if you do read it, make sure to read “The Horrors of the German Language” by Mark Twain too. :wink: )

The Time Machine is another classic. H.G. Wells sure as hell knew how to tell a story.

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• Geoffrey Chaucer, The Canterbury Tales. SparkNotes.
• William Shakespeare, among the plays, The Merchant of Venice, Romeo and Juliet, Henry IV (Parts 1 and 2), Hamlet, Troilus and Cressida, Measure for Measure, King Lear, Macbeth, Antony and Cleopatra, Othello, and The Tempest. Among his poetry, read the Sonnets. For all the above, I recommend No Fear Shakespeare.
• John Donne, Songs and Sonnets, the Elegies, the First and Second Anniversaries, the Holy Sonnets, the Devotions Upon Emergent Occasions.
• Thomas Hobbes, Leviathan (some of the most difficult English prose I have ever read).
• John Milton, Paradise Lost (SparkNotes), Lycidas, On the Morning of Christ’s Nativity, Sonnets, Areopagitica.
• John Bunyan, The Pilgrim’s Progress. SparkNotes.
• John Locke, Second Treastise of Government.
• Daniel Defoe, Robinson Crusoe. SparkNotes.
• Jonathan Swift, Gulliver’s Travels. SparkNotes.
• David Hume*, An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding.
• Henry Fielding, Tom Jones. SparkNotes.
• Laurence Sterne, Tristram Shandy. SparkNotes.
• James Boswell*, The Life of Samuel Johnson.
• William Blake, of his poetry, Poetical Sketches, Songs of Innocence, Songs of Experience, The Everlasting Gospel, and the Preface to Milton. Of his prose, The Marriage of Heaven and Hell, All Religions Are One, There Is No Natural Religion, and Annotations to Sir Joshua Reynolds’s Discourses.
• William Wordsworth, The Prelude, Preface to the Lyrical Ballads.
• Samuel Taylor Coleridge, The Ancient Mariner, Christabel, Kubla Khan, Biographia Literaria, Writings on Shakespeare.
• Jane Austen, Pride and Prejudice (SparkNotes), Emma (SparkNotes).
• John Stuart Mill*, On Liberty, The Subjection of Women.
• Charles Darwin*, The Voyage of the Beagle, The Origin of Species (SparkNotes ).
• William Makepeace Thackeray, Vanity Fair.
• Charles Dickens, The Pickwick Papers, David Copperfield (SparkNotes), Great Expectations (SparkNotes), Hard Times (SparkNotes), Our Mutual Friend, The Old Curiosity Shop, Little Dorrit.
• Anthony Trollope*, The Warden, The Last Chronicle of Barset, The Eustace Diamonds, The Way We Live Now, Autobiography.
• Charlotte Brontë, Jane Eyre. SparkNotes.
• Emily Brontë, Wuthering Heights. SparkNotes.
• George Eliot, The Mill on the Floss (SparkNotes), Middlemarch (SparkNotes).
• Lewis Carroll*, Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland, Through the Looking-Glass. SparkNotes.
• Thomas Hardy, The Mayor of Casterbridge. SparkNotes.

  • Authors not on your recommended reading list.
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Joseph Heller.

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:smack:

And what a better thread to look like an idiot in, right?

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You’d probably like Gulliver’s Travels then.

Walloon’s list is good, although a few of the names on there fall more properly under the category of Philosophy than of Literature and thus may not be the kind of thing you’re “supposed” to be reading.

Personally, I quite like Samuel Johnson (some of his essays, for example). He’s one writer that’s worth reading with a highliter pen handy.

You probably really ought to try some Jane Austen: many people even today are big fans of hers, and even those who aren’t acknowledge that she was very good at what she did. Pride and Prejudice is her most popular and enjoyable work.

Of the 20th century stuff, I recommend Huxley’s Brave New World and Golding’s Lord of the Flies, especially if you liked Orwell’s dystopian 1984 and/or Animal Farm. E. M. Forster is good. And for goodness sake, if you try reading James Joyce, go with Dubliners (short stories) or A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man, not Ulysses or Finnegan’s Wake!
(p.s. Hostile Dialect: that wouldn’t have been a bad recommendation anyway, except for the fact the Heller wasn’t British.)

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“I’m looking for recommendations in English Literature, NOT American or Canadian or Australian or whatever.”

Or Irish, presumably.

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I wondered about that too, but he was on the list. (As were Yeats, Shaw, Wilde)

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(Heh. That reminds me of Christy Moore singing about Seamus Heaney being Irish until he won the Nobel Prize, when suddenly he was British.)

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:dubious: Really? Is that because of my being non-native English speaking, or because you actually recommend them? I took a look at some at a local bookstore, and was, quite frankly, appalled…it seems like a good annotated version (I use New Cambridge) would be the preferable choice. Henry IV, incidentally, is on my list, although I seem to have covered a different line than you’d recommend with the plays: I did read MacBeth, King Lear, and Antony and Cleopatra, but that’s all of those you list. I’d list mine, but this reply is going to get long anyhow :)…
(BTW, that dubious smily was not meant personally, I just found it odd that you’d recommend that – I’d love to know your reasons!)

I have these two already, though unread.

Ah, I’ve read that.

I believe the rule of thumb is either the Brontes (or one of them) or Austen – and frankly, I’d rather pick one, than do both.

I completely forgot Huxley, I’ve already read Brave New World, and Lord of the Flies as well. So that’s good :-). I have, but haven’t read, A Passage to India – good choice for Forster? I’ll need some Forster essays, too, now that I think of it. And your Joyce recommendations are appreciated, and necessary.

As for the English/Irish (but not Canadian) literature stuff, I believe that the Department subsumes Canadian literatures under American Studies, Australian/New Zealand literatures under whichever Professor will deal with it, and everything on the Isles as “English Literature”, with a shy nod to modern times by calling the Department “British Studies”. Apologies to all Irish on the board, and thanks again for your help.

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You sure know how to kick a guy when he’s down. :wink:

Not to mention that the website says British, not English.

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Sorry it took me so long to get back, Enterprise. I had dinner to make and chores to do last night and then I had to chuck a roast in the slow cooker this morning, but first I had to figure out what do with it. I also wanted to try and find my syllabus for Survey of British Literature II, which covers the 19th and 20th centuries, but no dice.

I’d like to agree with everyone saying that Irish writers usually get lumped in with British literature, regardless of national sentiment. Unless you’re taking a course specifically dedicated to Irish writers, you’ll cover them in a Brit Lit course.

I’m also very surprised that Walloon recommended “Troilus and Cressida,” which is a pretty zany choice for a highlights of English literature list. If I were to assemble a list of Shakespeare’s plays, I don’t think I’d pick “Troilus and Cressida,” just because it’s not one of the major plays. You’d be better off spending your time reading “Much Ado About Nothing.” It’s more enjoyable, at least.

Since Enterprise asked about Forster, I’d like to recommend Where Angels Fear to Tread, Howards End, and A Room with a View . “Angels” and “Howards End” are both pretty depressing, so you’ll need “A Room with a View” to get the taste out of your mouth. I haven’t read any of his essays, so I can’t help you there. If you find you are not sufficiently ground down by the cruelties of the well-meaning upper classes at that point, read Maurice. Or read it if you’re interested in homosexuality in post-Victorian Britain.

For Virginia Woolf, I’d recommend Mrs. Dalloway, A Room of One’s Own, and maybe To the Lighthouse. I didn’t enjoy “Lighthouse” as much as the other two. You might also like Orlando, though it’s a bit different from her other works, even if it covers the same ground of gender identities. For her non-fiction, I’d recommend her examination of the causes of war, Three Guineas. I also ran across this compilation of her essays/journal entries, Women and Writing, while on Amazon. It looks very promising, and I’ve added it to my wishlist.

I honestly started this post meaning to recommend 19th century works, but somehow that turned into the 20th century. So let’s continue in that vein.

For poetry, look for a collection of poems by W.H. Auden. His favorite of mine is the very well-known “Funeral Blues,” which is simply a wonderful poem about grief. Definitely read “Musée de Beaux Arts” as well as “September 1, 1939,” which has recently become popular for reasons that will be obvious upon reading. Other than those, skim through an anthology and choose according to taste.

While we’re on Auden, then look for T.S. Eliot, who was much admired by Auden. Of his, you’ll definitely want to read “The Lovesong of J. Alfred Prufrock” and “The Hollow Men.” The Waste Land is much longer, so you can decide to read it or not depending on how much time you have. Eliot’s hard, though, so do try to find a good annotated copy.

And now I’ve got to run, but before I do: If you absolutely must choose between Austen and a Bronte, choose Austen. There will be plenty of mopishness in the later Victorian and early 20th century authors, so grab a little lightness while you can. Of Austen’s works, I’d recommend “Pride & Prejudice” and “Persuasion”. Read them both and compare them; they have similarities but also significant differences.

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For both reasons. I am a native English speaker, and I thought I was good at reading Elizabethan syntax until I read the No Fear Shakespeare guides for Hamlet and Othello. I realized that, while annotated editions can help with individual words and phrases, sometimes the meaning of a sentence as a whole was lost to me, even if I read it two or three times. Verse does that: it takes the normal subject–verb–object arrangement of an English-language sentence and makes it object–verb–subject, or subject–object–verb. Just to confuse me. :confused:

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Joyce Carol Oates wrote about the play: