# You had to read/see it, it was a classic! **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [April 13, 2005, 4:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/you-had-to-read-see-it-it-was-a-classic/299083 "2005-04-13T04:25:01Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Mal\_Adroit](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/df788c/32.png) [@Mal\_Adroit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mal_Adroit)\ **Post date:** [April 13, 2005, 8:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/you-had-to-read-see-it-it-was-a-classic/299083/41 "2005-04-13T20:34:23Z")
> [@Not A Tame Lion](#): > > I slogged through about 3/4 of Faulkner’s **The Sound and the Fury** many years ago. It was bad enough that it put me off Faulkner forever. Faulkner: “Hey, I know! I’ll write about a quarter of this book as a retard’s stream of (semi)consciousness. Everyone will love it!” > > Uh, no. Yyeeah, errrr, some of us found that brilliant. 🙂 Especially when you figured out what he was saying. Will second _Old Man and the Sea,_ though. That put me off Hemingway for eons. ---
**Author:** ![Indygrrl](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/58f4c7/32.png) [@Indygrrl](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Indygrrl)\ **Post date:** [April 13, 2005, 8:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/you-had-to-read-see-it-it-was-a-classic/299083/42 "2005-04-13T20:36:27Z")
> [@yellowval](#): > > Other than that, I generally have liked everything I’ve been required to read. I guess that makes you and I both geeks, **Indygrrl**. I’m comfortable with my book geek status. hee hee. ---
**Author:** ![aaslatten](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/f14d63/32.png) [@aaslatten](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/aaslatten)\ **Post date:** [April 13, 2005, 8:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/you-had-to-read-see-it-it-was-a-classic/299083/43 "2005-04-13T20:44:18Z")
> [@Robot Arm](#): > > In high school - **The Old Man and the Sea**. He’s old, he’s trying to catch a big fish, he likes DiMaggio, now please just get on with it. Yes, but you must agree that (like Catcher in the Rye) at least it’s short. I don’t see how anyone could think reading either of these books is a “waste of time.” Would you have been better off watching three hours of television? ---
**Author:** ![Lamar\_Mundane](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/85f322/32.png) [@Lamar\_Mundane](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lamar_Mundane)\ **Post date:** [April 13, 2005, 8:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/you-had-to-read-see-it-it-was-a-classic/299083/44 "2005-04-13T20:45:23Z")
**A Confederacy of Dunces**. Never been so underwhelmed in my life. I seriously had to reevaluate some freindships based on my friends raving over this book. I like all kinds of offbeat stuff, but I do not know what kind of sense of humor you have to have to get this book. Not a classic, but **After Sunset** was on a lot of critics ten-best films lists last year. I liked Before Sunrise and thought this was a great idea for a sequel, especially after I read the reviews. Another stinker. The dialogue was so forced and the acting so unnatural. It was like watching an episode of The West Wing in fast forward. ---
**Author:** ![yellowval](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/y/919ad9/32.png) [@yellowval](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/yellowval)\ **Post date:** [April 13, 2005, 9:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/you-had-to-read-see-it-it-was-a-classic/299083/45 "2005-04-13T21:01:02Z")
> [@Indygrrl](#): > > I’m comfortable with my book geek status. hee hee. As am I. I’d feel pretty silly about that degree in English Lit if I wasn’t. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Smeghead](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/f1d935/32.png) [@Smeghead](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Smeghead)\ **Post date:** [April 13, 2005, 9:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/you-had-to-read-see-it-it-was-a-classic/299083/46 "2005-04-13T21:28:45Z")
Books I hated in high school and still proudly hate: Frankenstein and I Am the Cheese. Dickens, on the other hand, I hated in high school, but am now reading voluntarily and enjoying very much. Reading stuff written back then just requires a whole different mindset. ---
**Author:** ![OtakuLoki](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/ac8455/32.png) [@OtakuLoki](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/OtakuLoki)\ **Post date:** [April 13, 2005, 10:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/you-had-to-read-see-it-it-was-a-classic/299083/47 "2005-04-13T22:28:47Z")
> [@Dewey Finn](#): > > Ethan Frome, Moby Dick, Emma, Pride and Prejudice. All for high school English class. Oh, and Billy Budd (in which the entire class found a gay subtext that the teacher denied was there). Denied the gay subtext? Denied? _My_ English teacher made sure to point out every little bit of it. Just in case we might have missed any of it. With the exception of One Day in the Life of Ivan Dennisovitch, nothing that I read for school did I enjoy. ---
**Author:** ![asterion](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/4da419/32.png) [@asterion](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/asterion)\ **Post date:** [April 13, 2005, 10:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/you-had-to-read-see-it-it-was-a-classic/299083/48 "2005-04-13T22:37:17Z")
> [@aaslatten](#): > > Yes, but you must agree that (like Catcher in the Rye) at least it’s short. I don’t see how anyone could think reading either of these books is a “waste of time.” Would you have been better off watching three hours of television? Which show(s)? ---
**Author:** ![Scott\_Plaid](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/258eb7/32.png) [@Scott\_Plaid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Scott_Plaid)\ **Post date:** [April 13, 2005, 10:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/you-had-to-read-see-it-it-was-a-classic/299083/49 "2005-04-13T22:37:29Z")
I must have been in Dewey Finn’s class, and I wish I was in OtakuLoki’s. ---
**Author:** ![Hamish](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/a5b964/32.png) [@Hamish](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hamish)\ **Post date:** [April 13, 2005, 11:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/you-had-to-read-see-it-it-was-a-classic/299083/50 "2005-04-13T23:04:54Z")
The unabridged, original **Robinson Crusoe** reads like Ayn Rand written by a robot that failed the Turing test, with just a little bit of This Old House and Crocodile Hunter thrown in. It’s meant as proof that the courageous individual, working alone, can do anything he puts his mind to… …as long as he has a giant island, lots of goats, a cargo hold full of supplies, and an indigenous slave. I tried very hard to like Wordsworth, but **The Prelude** is agonizing. Fourteen books written about his poetic genius, his superiority to the common man, and _writer’s block_? On top of it all, it was intended just as the introduction to a larger work, which he fortunately never lived long enough to write. ---
**Author:** ![DaphneBlack](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/daphneblack/32/5389_2.png) [@DaphneBlack](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DaphneBlack)\ **Post date:** [April 13, 2005, 11:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/you-had-to-read-see-it-it-was-a-classic/299083/51 "2005-04-13T23:28:51Z")
_Great Expectations_ is certainly my worst experience with assigned reading. I have never recovered… I did like _ToTC_ but I have never finished anything by Dickens aside from those two and _Oliver Twist_. The other book that I profoundly hated (there were many that I just didn’t like that much, but overall I usually found something worthwhile, in e.g. _Of Mice and Men_ or _Catcher_) I hated much more than _GE_, but it doesn’t have pride of place because it is hardly (I hope) a classic, is _Ellen Foster_. It was pretty lazy of my teacher to put this book on our list, but she must have done because it was a) short and b) from ‘Oprah’s Book Club’. Ugh - Daphne ---
**Author:** ![MacSpon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/34f0e0/32.png) [@MacSpon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MacSpon)\ **Post date:** [April 14, 2005, 12:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/you-had-to-read-see-it-it-was-a-classic/299083/52 "2005-04-14T00:57:28Z")
The new _Battlestar Galactica_. Sorry to ye fans, but I’ve watched the first half-dozen episodes now, and it just annoys me. However technically superior to the original it may be, there isn’t a single character in the whole series that I actually find _likeable_, and that destroys the series for me. ---
**Author:** ![PastAllReason](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/f07891/32.png) [@PastAllReason](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/PastAllReason)\ **Post date:** [April 14, 2005, 1:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/you-had-to-read-see-it-it-was-a-classic/299083/53 "2005-04-14T01:29:51Z")
The only Dickens I’ve ever been able to finish is The Mystery of Edwin Drood. I really tried with Tale of Two Cities, but I found it mostly the worst of times and couldn’t go on. Oh, and I’ll echo those who mentioned The Old Man and the Sea. I found it mind-numbingly boring. Since then I’ve read nothing by Hemingway, and plan to carry on that way for the next 50 years. ---
**Author:** ![Scott\_Plaid](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/258eb7/32.png) [@Scott\_Plaid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Scott_Plaid)\ **Post date:** [April 14, 2005, 1:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/you-had-to-read-see-it-it-was-a-classic/299083/54 "2005-04-14T01:46:21Z")
As I recall, Drood was only half Dickens. I believe it was his last work, and was finished by someone else. ---
**Author:** ![don\_Jaime](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b4bc9f/32.png) [@don\_Jaime](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/don_Jaime)\ **Post date:** [April 14, 2005, 4:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/you-had-to-read-see-it-it-was-a-classic/299083/55 "2005-04-14T04:29:38Z")
I can’t say I’ve ever regretted reading a classic book, though I’ve put down several and felt I wasn’t ready for some. For instance, I plowed through _Crime and Punishment_ when I was 17 and I doubt I got any of it. I may try again sometime. The worst book I ever read was a psychological study of Andrew Jackson for a history class. Definitely not a classic. The movie that got shoved down my throat was Tim Burton’s _The Joker_. My mother made me watch it. She said I needed to be familiar with movies other people my age were going to, instead of the dull flicks I kept wandering to. I hated that movie. A lot of people claim to like it, but they also seem to think it was about Batman. I barely remember Batman being in it, if indeed he was. And as for TV, _Cheers_, _Seinfeld_, _Fraser_, _Family Guy_, and _South Park_ are overblown garbage. There may be one good episode out of the whole lot. But I still keep getting told how funny they are. ---
**Author:** ![ouryL](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ouryl/32/6067_2.png) [@ouryL](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ouryL)\ **Post date:** [April 14, 2005, 5:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/you-had-to-read-see-it-it-was-a-classic/299083/56 "2005-04-14T05:45:12Z")
Catcher in the Rye :dubious: ---
**Author:** ![wolf\_in\_second\_hand\_clothing](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/9d8465/32.png) [@wolf\_in\_second\_hand\_clothing](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wolf_in_second_hand_clothing)\ **Post date:** [April 14, 2005, 6:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/you-had-to-read-see-it-it-was-a-classic/299083/57 "2005-04-14T06:08:46Z")
Great Expectations and Huckleberry Finn ---
**Author:** ![Marley23](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@Marley23](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Marley23)\ **Post date:** [April 14, 2005, 6:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/you-had-to-read-see-it-it-was-a-classic/299083/58 "2005-04-14T06:12:36Z")
A lot of my top choices have all been posted. I hated Great Expectations, was bored by Wuthering Heights - and I liked Jane Eyre, I read that for fun when I was 11 and read it again in high school - and didn’t like Ethan Frome one bit. Heh, I wonder about the reaction I’ll get to this one: Night, by Elie Wiesel. Maybe if someday I could separate it from the teacher I had that year, I’d feel differently about it. We also had to read The Chosen and The Assistant, and I didn’t care for those either. Nobody did. ---
**Author:** ![OtakuLoki](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/ac8455/32.png) [@OtakuLoki](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/OtakuLoki)\ **Post date:** [April 14, 2005, 9:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/you-had-to-read-see-it-it-was-a-classic/299083/59 "2005-04-14T09:51:15Z")
> [@Scott\_plaid](#): > > I must have been in Dewey Finn’s class, and I wish I was in OtakuLoki’s. **Scott\_plaid** , I’m not sure you understand the true horror of my 12th grade English class - the teacher was obsessed with sex. To give you an example we did Hamlet in about three weeks. As I remember it, we spent two weeks obsessing on the incestuous relationship between Gertrude and the king, and how that related to Hamlet, then we spent 2 days on the incestuous relationship between Ophelia and Lysander, and the other three days on the rest of the play. And that’s what he did with Hamlet, you can imagine what Billy Budd was like. \ ---
**Author:** ![picunurse](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/7bcc69/32.png) [@picunurse](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/picunurse)\ **Post date:** [April 14, 2005, 10:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/you-had-to-read-see-it-it-was-a-classic/299083/60 "2005-04-14T10:39:25Z")
_Silas Marner_, _Red Badge of Courage_, _Cancer Ward_ I was reading _Atlas Shrugged_ my senior year. My English teacher took it away from me. We were reading _Green Mansions_ in class, which I’d finished. That didn’t matter. She handed me _Catcher in the Rye_. Which I’d already read. Still didn’t matter. At least she admitted the irony when she gave it back at the end of class. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/you-had-to-read-see-it-it-was-a-classic/299083.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/you-had-to-read-see-it-it-was-a-classic/299083.md?page=4)