I re-read way too much stuff to list; though some of what I most re-read has been listed here already. Things I re-read come into two categories:
– books I re-read because I really like them, and I want to revisit the place/characters and/or think some more about the ideas;
– and books I re-read because they were miscellaneous fun but mostly forgettable reads, and I’ve forgotten enough of them that I can read them again for relaxation.
I’m actually a bit puzzled by people who never want to re-read anything. People who like music listen to the same piece of music more than once. People who like paintings, sculptures, etc. look at the same piece of art more than once. Why not read the same book more than once?
I’ve read both at least twice, Watership Down maybe three times. I’ve reread all of Umberto Eco’s novels.
My favorite book is the Grimm Brothers’ “Kinder- und Hausmärchen”, and I reread it every few years. I’ve also read the whole Bible three times, though I have to confess that half of it is always a slog. But some books are really juicy and interesting, my favorites are Genesis, Exodus, Joshua, Judges and Samuel. The gospels are also not bad (best are the Acts), except for the epistles, they are almost as boring as the Old Testament prophets. I’ve always liked old myths.
On the Beach by Nevil Shute. The great end-of-the-world dramatic novel. The 1959 movie made quite an impression on me back in the Cold War days.
Catch 22 by Joseph Heller. Many people hate this book. I love it.
Slaughterhouse 5 by Kurt Vonnegut. Ditto my Catch 22 comment.
The Great Escape by Paul Brickhill. The 1963 movie is a favorite, but the real story is even more incredible.
I Am Legend by Richard Matheson. No movie version has ever captured the darkness of this story, though 1964’s “Last Man on Earth” with Vincent Price came closest.
Who Goes There? (actually a novella) by John Campbell. It’s the basis of “The Thing,” and John Carpenter’s 1982 film captures the horror of the story perfectly, though the ending was changed.
I also have a volume of 4 Raymond Chandler mysteries I re-read occasionally.
I’ve used the exact same argument with friends of mine - “you don’t listen to a CD once and then throw it into recycling etc”
This is a cool thread to me as I was mulling starting up something similar. I have a number of books (maybe ten-ish) that I have re-read a numerous times, even re-read back-to-back with a few of them.
Boat of a Million Years by Poul Anderson
Time Wars anthology edited by Poul Anderson
Aurora by Kim Stanley Robinson
Existence by David Brin
Childhood’s End by Arthur C Clarke
Mars trilogy by Kim Stanley Robinson
The Fourth Pan Book of Horror Stories edited by Herbert van Thal
Short Stories:
The Receivers by Alastair Reynolds
Dog-Eared Paperback of my Life by Lucius Shepard
Sleepover by Alastair Reynolds
This Peaceable Land, or, The Unbearable Vision of Harriet Beecher Stowe by Alastair Reynolds
Beyond the Aquila Rift by Alastair Reynolds
The Custodians by Richard Cowper
Not kidding, Marx’s Capital. Learn something new every time. I admit, I don’t read it cover to cover very often, but will read big chunks. Pro tip: don’t start at the beginning. Start with section 8, Primitive Accumulation. Send me a note when you get to the oral sex reference.
A hard question, because there are a lot of them. The Narnia books, the James Herriot books, the earlier Stephen King books, etc. But to narrow it to the top three:
Jane Eyre. My comfort read. I didn’t like it at first, but at one time in my life it was one of the few books I had access to and I read it over and over until I loved it.
Watership Down. I feel sorry for people who don’t read books about rabbits.
Gone With the Wind. I received a copy for Christmas when I was ten, and have read it possibly hundreds of times since. I see the racism now; I didn’t always. For good or ill, I’ve practically memorized it.
One of my favorite passages from all the books I’ve read is the bit where Billy Pilgrim watches the war movie in reverse. Planes fly backward and suck bombs up from the ground, then they fly, still going backward, to their airbase, where the bombs are removed from the planes and sent back to the factory to be disassembled by the workers. And the fliers go back home and become high school kids.
Every year or so:
The Lord of the Rings (In the original Spanish, for some reason I can’t read it in English, probably because I read it in Spanish the first 20 times or so and now the English text “feels wrong”)
The Silmarillion (oddly I can read it in English with no problems, even when I did read it in Spanish the first 20 times too).
The whole Vorkosigan Saga (except a book or two) by Louis McMaster Bujold.
Every 2 or 3 years:
The Dresden Files (except the first 2 books that are not worth the time) by Jim Butcher.
Every 5 years or so:
The name of the Rose.
John Julius Norwich history books about the East Roman Empire and the Normans in Sicily.
Every 10 years or so:
I get the Battletech itch and re-read the Warrior Trilogy, the Gray death legion books and perhaps some others, then I tackle everything that got published since and try to get up to date with the state of the Inner Sphere.
surely there are others but I don’t remember right now.
I’ll agree with this. I read the first paperback version that I bought at a yard sale so may times it fell apart. I’m constantly amazed at the cleverness and resourcefulness of the POWs. I’m also annoyed at the movie for making too many characters Americans, and for creating the Steve McQueen role up, for the most part.
Oh – another series of books I have to add – Robert Hans van Gulik’s Judge Dee series of historical mysteries.
Every year or so I’ll pick up a mystery series that I first read 20 or 30 years ago and reread it, having forgotten most of it. That’s often fun, like the John Rebus series; other times I’ll learn that they’re really badly written or dated, like Peter Banks, and I’ll abandon ship.
I’ll also recycle an old literary book or series every year; I’m thinking of either Proust or Robertson Davies this year, haven’t decided.
I reread Ulysses every two years or so.
I have once in my life finished a book and then reread it immediately, and that was A.S. Byatt’s Possession, about a decade ago.
I read that, but as “Medieval Woman” (I think they retitled it at some point.). Very interesting book. If you liked that, you might like the “Time Traveler’s Guide to” series- they’re written as if you’re a time traveler, and it’s a guidebook for how to dress, behave, etc… in whatever century they’re talking about.
I don’t have a problem re-reading books, so if I enjoyed a series the first time around, I’ll come back in a few years and re-read it. I usually catch a few details I missed the first time around and have forgotten enough to make it enjoyable the second time around.
Ones I’ve re-read at least twice that I can think of - the Aubrey-Maturin novels by Patrick O’Brian, the Hornblower novels by CS Forester, the Fafhrd & the Gray Mouser stories by Fritz Leiber, the Hitchiker’s Guide series, the Warlord Chronicles (seriously underrated- it’s Bernard Cornwell’s take on the Arthurian legends written as if it was historical fiction), the Ringworld and Moties series by Niven/Pournelle, the Uplift books by David Brin, and the Black Company series by Glen Cook.
I am re-reading Proust after a gap of 10 years or so. As a cancer patient, I need to get a wriggle on with it – I doubt there’ll be a third traversal. (Not asking for sympathy – just explaining that I want to do it while I have the concentration.) I am reading the Penguin translations this time around. I got about half way through the first volume on my last attempt, but I felt I needed to start again from the very beginning. If other people can intersperse reading him with reading other authors, good luck to them. I can’t really read anyone else at the same time; I need time to get my eye back in with his style. Just starting to happen.
Catch-22 is one of the biggies. One of the things I like about it as a “re-readable” book is that because it is not chronologically ordered, and because so many scenes are complete in themselves, you can just open it anywhere and get a chuckle.
Speaking for myself, it is primarily an issue of time. I have nothing against re-reading, but I cannot remember the last time I re-read a book. I have so many books waiting on deck that I really want to get to that a re-read would delay all these new adventures.
Relevant: I’ve not read any Vonnegut nor Elmore Leonard although I’ve been meaning to for several years. This thread ignited that thought in me again. So, more reasons to not re-read something else.
My reading time is limited. Perhaps after I retire I will re-discover some old favorites.
I do re-watch a select few movies. And, perhaps oddly, I usually choose familiar rather than new music to listen to.