Siddartha by Hess??
The Stranger by Camus

on Bless Me Ultima. I read that for a Lit class a few years ago and loved it.

I also enjoyed (from the same class), Fools Crow.

I too have been increasing the amount of classics that I'm reading. I recently read Catcher in the Rye for the first time, as well as A Confederacy of Dunces, several Dickens, Lord of the Flies, and others. I tried to read A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court, but unfortunately I just couldn't get through it.

I'm planning on checking out The Great Gatsby. Has anyone here read it?

Honk!

what were your thoughts? for a long time i've had dunces on my shelf but have yet to pick it up and read. my b'friend loves catcher in the rye so i'm curious about this too.

Yes, it's a good read.

(the movie is disappointing though)

After hearing about it (including here) quite a bit, I finally broke down and picked it up for a buck at a library sale. Have to say, it's pretty damn funny, but the "protagonist" is one of the most repulsive characters I've ever come across. Then again, most of the characters in the book are pretty repulsive to begin with -- guess that's why it's so funny.

Tuan Jim

Catcher in the Rye (GREAT)
Grapes of Wrath (GREAT if you skip every other chapter that talks in general terms about the Sooners and not the story at hand)
Three Musketeers (Long but GREAT)
Animal Farm (Very FUN)
A Separate Peace (HEARTBREAKING)
Ethan Frome (HEARTBREAKING)
The Hobbit (WONDERFUL)

my all-time favorite classic book is Bridge of San Luis Rey by Thornton Wilder...others i love include Silas Marner by George Eliot, Treasure Island by Robert Louis Stevenson, and i'll second The Picture of Dorian Gray

The best classics I have ever had the pleasure of reading (in no particular order):

The Count of Monte Cristo
Catcher in the Rye
The Call of the Wild

As for your picks:

To Kill A Mockingbird - Read it one sitting back in high school, VERY strange for me back then (I don't like being forced to read)

1984 - Great pick, a must read, but I found some parts a little "preachy" (don't know if thats the right word, maybe slightly textbook-like)

Other books not mentioned, but a pretty good read:

Cold Sassy Tree - (good story about little girl and grandpa)
The Yearling
Sybil - (multiple personalities, very engaging work, don't know if it's "classic" material yet though, maybe)

<small></small>It has been years since I read it. If it is as you describe, then I suspect that le mot juste would be.... didactic.

Is there a "best classics" thread? I.e. the ones you DID like?

I'd put "To Kill A Mockingbird" there (even though it was often required reading in high school) as well as 1984 (which was also required reading for me).

.... yes.

Huckleberry Finn by Twain
One Flew Over the Cuckoos Nest by Ken Kesey
Treasure Island by Robert Lewis Stevenson

Northern Lights
Subtle Knife
The Amber Spyglass

Ok - 5 1/2 years - hope it was ok I asked!

Things have moved on. You should be able to get it in HD now!*
I would add Pickwick Papers to this list - quite easy to read, funny, and it's "episodic" - each chapter being pretty much readable in its own right. Probably since it was first published in parts that way in his magazine.

*One of the advantages of books, of course, is that they have always been in HD!

A couple of my favorites:

These are classics I liked that were "assigned reading" during high school. I didn't necessarily read all these in high school:

Catch-22 (probably my favorite book)
Watership Down
The Bridge of San Luis Rey
Travels with Charlie
Brave New World
Lord of the Flies

I was reading Mockingbird, which I know was about a court case that Gregory Peck was defending an african-american (I caught the tail-end of the movie), but while reading I never did get to that particular section...........I put the book down and haven't picked it back up yet. All it tells, so far, is about the brother and sister (who call their pa by his first name for some reason not told yet) and their friend who visits for the summer. They are afraid of Boo Radley, a not-to-distant neighbor who doesn't show himself. The story praddles on and on about this, and I soon grew weary.

After watching Capote, with Philip Seymour Hoffman, I saw that his companion to Kansas was Nell Harper Lee, the writer of To Kill A Mockingbird, and that fueled my interest in the book. Ah, well, I may pick the book up again.

But right now i'm reading Lord of the Flies for the first time, and am really into it. Great little story.

But a classic book I'd recommend is: The Lion, The Witch, And The Wardrobe. That was one classic book I read (on my own - not because it was assigned book reading from school) as a kid, and loved it then, and love it now.

I didn't discover "Catcher in the Rye" until a co-worker who's 26 years younger than me recommended it in a way that made me want to read it. So I did and it was great. Why had no one recommended it to me earlier in my life? Not my siblings, not my classmates, no teachers. Why was it never assigned to me? It perfectly caught my attitude at one time in my life (one which still holds over to a certain extent today).

If just for the beautiful prose Lolita should be on everyone's to read list. Nabokov has many other great works as well.

My personal favorite Twain is A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court.

Paradise Lost by Milton is great.

It really is excellent, and is unfortunately the only work of Heller's that I enjoy. (To be fair, most of his other works aren't supposed to be fun. I hope.)

Faulkner is conspicuously absent from this thread, but As I Lay Dying is required reading, in my opinion.

I wasn't much of a book reader in school. But after reading the harry potter books, the first classic novel i read was Dracula. Very surprised how enjoyable and easy to read the book was.

Just how old are you anyway?

not as old as the guy who read Dracula upon its initial release...