# Famous novels you just couldn't get through **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [May 29, 2008, 4:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/famous-novels-you-just-couldnt-get-through/451027 "2008-05-29T16:23:15Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Little\_Bird](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/3ec8ea/32.png) [@Little\_Bird](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Bird)\ **Post date:** [May 29, 2008, 6:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/famous-novels-you-just-couldnt-get-through/451027/41 "2008-05-29T18:25:19Z")
[QUOTE=Anaamika] Sense and Sensibility Pride and Prejudice [/QUOTE] I find Jane Austin’s books much much easier to get through if I’ve seen the movie first. Characters and motivations are already laid out for you, so you can spend more time appreciating the language. I stopped 3/5 the way through Catch-22. Couldn’t fucking stand it, it was like homework! :mad: ---
**Author:** ![Biffy\_the\_Elephant\_Shrew](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/e47c2d/32.png) [@Biffy\_the\_Elephant\_Shrew](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Biffy_the_Elephant_Shrew)\ **Post date:** [May 29, 2008, 6:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/famous-novels-you-just-couldnt-get-through/451027/42 "2008-05-29T18:26:11Z")
I’ve read _Gravity’s Rainbow_ three or four times. I’ve read _Moby Dick_. I **love** _Finnegans Wake_ (and _Ulysses_). I managed to get all the way through the _Gormenghast_ books (and promptly sold them). But I could barely make a dent in _Tristram Shandy_. ---
**Author:** ![Astroboy14](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/df705f/32.png) [@Astroboy14](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Astroboy14)\ **Post date:** [May 29, 2008, 6:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/famous-novels-you-just-couldnt-get-through/451027/43 "2008-05-29T18:29:44Z")
[QUOTE=Anaamika] That horrid book with the leper rapist - Thomas something or other [/QUOTE] That would be Lord Foul’s Bane, the first book of the Chronicles of Thomas Covenant. I loved them in high school… re-read them last year and they didn’t hold up well at all. ---
**Author:** ![Cisco](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/ccd318/32.png) [@Cisco](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cisco)\ **Post date:** [May 29, 2008, 6:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/famous-novels-you-just-couldnt-get-through/451027/44 "2008-05-29T18:30:16Z")
[QUOTE=Little Bird] I stopped 3/5 the way through Catch-22. Couldn’t fucking stand it, it was like homework! :mad: [/QUOTE] Perhaps my favorite book of all time! If you don’t mind, are you male or female? It’s definitely a guy’s book. My wife couldn’t get more than 30 or 40 pages. ---
**Author:** ![WormTheRed](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/bbe5ce/32.png) [@WormTheRed](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WormTheRed)\ **Post date:** [May 29, 2008, 6:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/famous-novels-you-just-couldnt-get-through/451027/45 "2008-05-29T18:41:43Z")
[QUOTE=Astroboy14] That would be Lord Foul’s Bane, the first book of the Chronicles of Thomas Covenant. I loved them in high school… re-read them last year and they didn’t hold up well at all. [/QUOTE] Yeah - that one to! Just couldn’t muster any sympathy for a rapist - even though he figured it was all a fantasy. Just plain disgusting. I like my heroes at least a little bit heroic. ---
**Author:** ![Rocketeer](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/rocketeer/32/4437_2.png) [@Rocketeer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rocketeer)\ **Post date:** [May 29, 2008, 6:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/famous-novels-you-just-couldnt-get-through/451027/46 "2008-05-29T18:51:29Z")
[QUOTE=plnnr] **Gravity’s Rainbow** I’ve tried. Lord knows I’ve tried. [/QUOTE] Paul Fussell made **Rainbow** sound very interesting in **The Great War and Modern Memory** (which is a great book) so I gave it a whack. I made it about halfway down the first page. It was completely impenetrable. But then again, my reading in my formative years was 50s sci-fi, where the premium was on clarity and brevity… 😉 ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Bird](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/3ec8ea/32.png) [@Little\_Bird](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Bird)\ **Post date:** [May 29, 2008, 6:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/famous-novels-you-just-couldnt-get-through/451027/47 "2008-05-29T18:52:28Z")
[QUOTE=Cisco] Perhaps my favorite book of all time! If you don’t mind, are you male or female? It’s definitely a guy’s book. My wife couldn’t get more than 30 or 40 pages. [/QUOTE] I’m a female, but I only attempted to read it due to the urging of several female friends…so I don’t know what to tell you. 😃 ---
**Author:** ![An\_Gadai](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/d6d6ee/32.png) [@An\_Gadai](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/An_Gadai)\ **Post date:** [May 29, 2008, 6:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/famous-novels-you-just-couldnt-get-through/451027/48 "2008-05-29T18:53:39Z")
It’s rare I’ll find a book that I won’t read entirely. I lasted about two pages of _The Catcher In The Rye_. It annoyed the fuck out of me. ---
**Author:** ![Justin\_Credible](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/a8b319/32.png) [@Justin\_Credible](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Justin_Credible)\ **Post date:** [May 29, 2008, 6:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/famous-novels-you-just-couldnt-get-through/451027/49 "2008-05-29T18:55:05Z")
[QUOTE=Cisco] The prologue and first few chapters of Fellowship are horrible and not representative of the rest of the book, IMO. It took me 10+ years to get through that and then another ~3 days to finish the series. [/QUOTE] I’ll give it another try someday. Maybe I’ll just start at Rivendell and go from there. ---
**Author:** ![Malthus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/85f322/32.png) [@Malthus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Malthus)\ **Post date:** [May 29, 2008, 6:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/famous-novels-you-just-couldnt-get-through/451027/50 "2008-05-29T18:58:54Z")
[QUOTE=WormTheRed] **Malthus** , does Gormenghast get any better once Whatshisname grows up or is it more of the same? By which I mean, should I give it another chance? [/QUOTE] Heh, it certainly gets _faster_. 😉 I suspect one has to love the purple prose to really enjoy Gormenghast, but Steerpike is the real protaganist of the story - and his various plots become more frenzied and murderous in the second volume. For me, it’s a hoot - I love every moldering, decadent detail. Who could not like stories like the duel of cleaver and sword between the hideously bloated head cook Swelter and the stick-dry chief butler Flay in the deserted Hall of Spiders? Or the taunting of Flay by Swelter that precedes the duel … the deranged cook sneaking up to place a single decorated cup-cake each night ever closer to Flay’s sleeping head? 😃 Another favorite detail is the truly perverse nursery rhymes the Duke’s daughter Fuschia keeps in her attic - the one about the cake and the knife being particularly Freudian. ---
**Author:** ![plnnr](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/7ea924/32.png) [@plnnr](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/plnnr)\ **Post date:** [May 29, 2008, 6:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/famous-novels-you-just-couldnt-get-through/451027/51 "2008-05-29T18:59:28Z")
[QUOTE=Rocketeer] Paul Fussell made **Rainbow** sound very interesting in **The Great War and Modern Memory** (which is a great book) so I gave it a whack. I made it about halfway down the first page. It was completely impenetrable. But then again, my reading in my formative years was 50s sci-fi, where the premium was on clarity and brevity… 😉 [/QUOTE] Yep. Reading it (and Joyce) were too much like work and I work hard enough doing my job. For me, reading is an escapist experience and I don’t enjoy it near as much if I have to keep stopping and saying “OK - I don’t get this reference at all” or “I don’t speak Italian so this means nothing to me.” I can certainly appreciate the craft involved, the sheer labor and intelligence it took to write them, but they don’t connect with me and I give up on them. ---
**Author:** ![Two\_and\_a\_Half\_Inches\_of\_Fun](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/ea666f/32.png) [@Two\_and\_a\_Half\_Inches\_of\_Fun](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Two_and_a_Half_Inches_of_Fun)\ **Post date:** [May 29, 2008, 7:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/famous-novels-you-just-couldnt-get-through/451027/52 "2008-05-29T19:01:02Z")
[QUOTE=Biffy the Elephant Shrew] But I could barely make a dent in _Tristram Shandy_. [/QUOTE] This is what I came to mention. I have made more than a dent, but I doubt I will ever finish it. ---
**Author:** ![Anaamika](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/5f9b8f/32.png) [@Anaamika](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Anaamika)\ **Post date:** [May 29, 2008, 7:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/famous-novels-you-just-couldnt-get-through/451027/53 "2008-05-29T19:01:40Z")
[QUOTE=WormTheRed] Yeah - that one to! Just couldn’t muster any sympathy for a rapist - even though he figured it was all a fantasy. Just plain disgusting. I like my heroes at least a little bit heroic. [/QUOTE] Of course, it doesn’t matter that he thought it was fantasy! Because, yeah, the first thing I do when I think I’m in a fantasy is rape a perfectly nice young girl. :rolleyes: It was unbelievable and it didn’t sell, in my mind. To me it shows he was either an incorrigible pyschopath or just…you know, the premise was idiotic. And yes, I like my heros to have some redeeming qualities. Lord Foul’s Bane set him up to be as much of a bastard and arrogant shit as possible. I get mad just thinking about the book. grrr… So I don’t just continue with the hijack, I’ll add: The World According to Garp. That whole book was just one massive WTF? ETA: never mind, I did slog through Garp eventually. ---
**Author:** ![Catamount](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/catamount/32/2840_2.png) [@Catamount](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Catamount)\ **Post date:** [May 29, 2008, 7:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/famous-novels-you-just-couldnt-get-through/451027/54 "2008-05-29T19:05:42Z")
[QUOTE=burundi] _Look Homeward, Angel_. I couldn’t make it through the first chapter. I live in Thomas Wolfe’s hometown, so I really felt obliged to read it, but _damn_. Life’s too short, you know? [/QUOTE] It is one of my life goals to find Thomas Wolfe’s grave and kick it very hard. My friend who lives in Asheville refuses to tell me where it is. My list: \*_Heart of Darkness_: I can see why so many African writers were inspired to refute this novel: it suck-diddly-ucks. So very boring and so very pointless. \*_Lord Foul’s Bane_: I have never read such a misanthropic fantasy novel as this. I do, however, like [Fantasy Bedtime Hour](http://www.fantasybedtimehour.com/), which manages to make the story halfway interesting. \*Vladimir Nabokov: I’ve tried to read a couple of his novels, but I keep getting bogged down in his language. I’d like to find a story in there somewhere, but there are too many words in the way. I’m going to try _Lolita_ and then I’m done with him. FWIW, there’s a very good hamburger recipe in _Grapes of Wrath_. I made a burger according to the description of the one in a roadside diner and it was wonderful. ---
**Author:** ![Biffy\_the\_Elephant\_Shrew](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/e47c2d/32.png) [@Biffy\_the\_Elephant\_Shrew](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Biffy_the_Elephant_Shrew)\ **Post date:** [May 29, 2008, 7:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/famous-novels-you-just-couldnt-get-through/451027/55 "2008-05-29T19:12:38Z")
[QUOTE=SpazCat] It is one of my life goals to find Thomas Wolfe’s grave and kick it very hard. [/QUOTE] LOL. Funny how both Thomas Wolfes have shown up in this thread. ---
**Author:** ![woodstockbirdybird](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/woodstockbirdybird/32/7905_2.png) [@woodstockbirdybird](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/woodstockbirdybird)\ **Post date:** [May 29, 2008, 7:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/famous-novels-you-just-couldnt-get-through/451027/56 "2008-05-29T19:26:50Z")
**Lolita** - many people whose opinions I respect love it, but I’ve tried it three or four times and it bores me to tears. Anything by **Nathaniel Hawthorne** or **Thomas Hardy**. **A Confederacy of Dunces** - tried to slog through it, found it terminally boring and unfunny (and not terribly well-written). OTOH, I actually enjoyed **Heart of Darkness** , **Gravity’s Rainbow** (once you make it past the first 300 pages, it clicks somehow), and **Ulysses** (nobody’s mentioned this one, but most people seem to find it impenetrable). ---
**Author:** ![InappropriateHumor](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/eb8c5e/32.png) [@InappropriateHumor](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/InappropriateHumor)\ **Post date:** [May 29, 2008, 7:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/famous-novels-you-just-couldnt-get-through/451027/57 "2008-05-29T19:32:11Z")
I’ll probably be flogged for this but here goes: 1. _The Sun Also Rises_ - I do believe I eventually made it all the way through this one by virtue of sheer bullheadedness, so it doesn’t technically count. Didn’t give a crap what happened to any of the characters because I didn’t like them. 2. _The Hunchback of Notre Dame_ - I’ve given this one a stab on several occasions. I bought a beautifully bound copy cheap, but it has too many extraneous words. At least as far as I remember. It’s like trying to quit smoking is for some; I’ll give it a try periodically (but not for a couple of years now). It still looks pretty on my bookshelf. ---
**Author:** ![Cisco](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/ccd318/32.png) [@Cisco](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cisco)\ **Post date:** [May 29, 2008, 7:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/famous-novels-you-just-couldnt-get-through/451027/58 "2008-05-29T19:42:05Z")
[QUOTE=Little Bird] I’m a female, but I only attempted to read it due to the urging of several female friends…so I don’t know what to tell you. 😃 [/QUOTE] Well, I’m baffled. Did you not find it funny at all? There were times, especially in the first 100 pages, that I literally had to set the book down and just laugh for a minute. Then, later in the book, it gets serious enough to save it from burning out. ---
**Author:** ![Lunar\_Saltlick](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/977dab/32.png) [@Lunar\_Saltlick](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lunar_Saltlick)\ **Post date:** [May 29, 2008, 7:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/famous-novels-you-just-couldnt-get-through/451027/59 "2008-05-29T19:49:34Z")
[QUOTE=Anaamika] But I HATE reading online. I mean, I have done it - the first time I read Count of Monte Cristo I did online, and loved it, as well as the Frank Baum Oz books, and also Fanny Hill. But it isn’t pleasant and not anywhere near as enjoyable as reading at home. Sigh. [/QUOTE] I don’t enjoy reading online either. But when it’s a choice between reading online or working? Well, I’ll take the Dope, really, but reading novels comes in a long way before working. ---
**Author:** ![Shodan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9f8e36/32.png) [@Shodan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shodan)\ **Post date:** [May 29, 2008, 7:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/famous-novels-you-just-couldnt-get-through/451027/60 "2008-05-29T19:56:23Z")
_Emma_. I have come to the grim conclusion that Austen is a one-hit wonder. _Pride and Prejudice_ is one of my favorite novels, but I have never been able to finish anything else she wrote. And a second for _Confederacy of Dunces_. A guy who worked for me raved about it. It was **dull** and I just gave up. > [@CalMeacham](#): > > I also loathe Henry James. The Turn of the Screw No kidding - turn that damn screw a bit faster there, Henry! Loved _Moby Dick_, and slogged all the way thru _Tristam Shandy_, which is - well, odd. All that stuff about fortifications. :puzzled: I never even tried with Joyce, or _War and Peace_. Not that much of a masochist, I guess. I tried to read _The Bourne Supremacy_. I’ve seen the movie, and I couldn’t make it to the hundredth page. It is supposed to be escapist - I don’t want to have to take notes. Regards, Shodan [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/famous-novels-you-just-couldnt-get-through/451027.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/famous-novels-you-just-couldnt-get-through/451027.md?page=4)