Must read classics

What are the classic novels and stories that everyone ought to read? Those essentials for any good literature fan? What are the literary classics you would name as prerequisites for enjoying literature today? What are the essential classics of general literature, and what are the genre-specific essentials?

Miss Shelf PM'd me this question once and said she would include the works of Dan Brown, especially The DaVinci Code. You know.......he did a lot of meticulous research on the book adn and it has been vetted countless times. The few errors he does make...well....it's just a book!. I agree with Miss Shelf.

I think everyone should read Daphne Du Maurier's Rebecca.

Pride and Prejudice

To Kill a Mockingbird, 1984

1984 certainly is a classic. It recently placed 3rd on our SF Novels list. I never got around to reading it, though. Oddly enough, all my years of schooling kept me away from reading, or at least kept me limited to reading for assignments. I'm trying to catch up now.

A modern classic

I just finished reading Watership Down. I think it's by Richard Adams. If you've never read it, then it's a must read. The story is about a group of rabbits and their quest for life. It get's very thrilling.

The Quiet American. I was very surprised by how it grabbed me and pulled me in. Fantastic story!

In all seriousness, Vladimir Nabokov's Lolita. What a stunning book written in a wonderful way. The sublimated themes and many topics that he touches on without so much as leaving the plot. That, and The DaVinci Code as recommneded by MissShelf.

Paul Auster's New York Trilogy. I think it's a classic, anyway.

And the more i think about it, Nevil Shute's On the Beach. I recently finished it, and it's kind of haunting me right now.

Great Expectations - Dickens
Fathers and Sons - Turgenev
Frankenstein - Mary Shelley
To Kill a Mockingbird - Harper Lee
Animal Farm - Orwell
Lord of the Flies - William Golding
Catch 22 - Joseph Heller
The Awakening - Kate Chopin

As a child preferably:
Greyfriars Bobby - Eleanor Atkinson
The Railway Children - Nesbitt
The Jungle Book - Kipling

Plays:
Pygmalian - George Bernard Shaw
One tragedy, one history (Henry V maybe?) and one comedy from Shakespeare
The Rover - Aphra Benn
A Doll's House - Ibsen

At least one novel by:
Joyce, Edgar Allen Poe, Charles Dickens, Dostoeyevsky, Tolstoy, Nabokov

One of:
Rebecca - Daphne de Maurier
Orlando - Virginia Woolf
Room of One's Own - Virginia Woolf
The Color Purple - Alice Walker
Top Girls - Carol Churchill

Modern stuff:
Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close - Safran Foer
The God of Small Things - Roy
The Handmaid's Tale - Atwood
Sophie's World - Gaarder


But those are just what I've read, there are most definitely many many more.

pride and prejudice
the count of monte cristo/the three musketeers
ivanhoe
robinson crusoe
macbeth and other shakespeare
the illiad/the oddyssey
catcher in the rye(i hate it but well, it's kinda a classic, i guess)
david copperfield
great expectations(i have yet to read it)
animal farm
call of the wild

I won't claim to know all of the essentials, but here are some titles that are on my permanent list:

Joseph Conrad - Victory
Joseph Conrad - Lord Jim
Gabriel Garcia-Marquez - 100 Years of Solitude
Walker Percy - The Moviegoer
F. Scott Fitzgerald - The Great Gatsby
Franz Kafka - The Trial
Fred Exley - A Fan's Notes
Jack Kerouac - On the Road
Jack Kerouac - Desolation Angels

funes said:

I won't claim to know all of the essentials, but here are some titles that are on my permanent list:

Joseph Conrad - Victory
Joseph Conrad - Lord Jim
Gabriel Garcia-Marquez - 100 Years of Solitude
Walker Percy - The Moviegoer
F. Scott Fitzgerald - The Great Gatsby
Franz Kafka - The Trial
Fred Exley - A Fan's Notes
Jack Kerouac - On the Road
Jack Kerouac - Desolation Angels

Click to expand...

Interesting choices, I'd substitute Metamorphosis for The Trial, but that's just me.

the books of steinbeck

Interesting choices, I'd substitute Metamorphosis for The Trial, but that's just me.

Click to expand...

Well, I think they're all good choices, but I keep thinking of books I should have thought of. Just last night as I wqas nodding off I thought "How could I forget Shakespeare?" I very nearly forgot Exley, Fitzgerald, and Kerouac. But then, my brain doesn't always work.

Among more recent "classics" I found Solzhenitsyn's Ivan Denisovich to be particularly intriguing. It was one of the books I was required to read for school, but surprised me that I actually ended up liking it.

older stuff: anything Dumas
newer stuff: anything Vonnegut

Firstly, let me say that I apologize for not posting in such a long while! My monitor is busted, and I've had to come to the Library (how nice!) to get online.

Now, let me say that I'm rather shocked that only one person so far has mentioned Homer's works!! I would think these nigh on canonical!! In addition to them, I would add:
Classics:
1. The Bible (Biblical allusions are ubiquitous in Literature).
2. The Divine Comedy of Dante.
3. Paradise Lost
4. The Pilgrim's Progress
5. Canterbury Tales
6. Le Morte D'Arthur

I suggest the above, because they are so often alluded to or imitated, that a good knowledge of their contents seems necessary to fully enjoy many later works.
Children's Books:
1. Charlie and the Chocolate Factory (or, anything by Roald Dahl)
2. The Adventures of Alice-Lewis Carrol
3. The Harry Potter Series
4. My Side of the Mountain
5. The Sign of the Beaver ( I apologize for my forgetting the authors' names).
6. The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe (at least this, if no other Narnia books), by C.S. Lewis.
Fairly Modern:
1. Fahrenheit 451-Ray Bradbury
2. Anything from Steinbeck
3. Anything from Agatha Christie (she did revolutionize mysteries, after all!!).
4. The Lord of the Rings-Tolkien
5. The Great Gatsby