About the 100 Book meme

[misanagi]

The 100 Book meme thing going around is quite fun to read. I get to see what my friends like to read and what not. I've noticed a few things:

1. None of my friends (who did the meme) has read One Hundred Years of Solitude - Gabriel García Marquez. I'm not pimping the book only because he is Colombian. I tell you, it's a very good book so if you get a chance, give it a try.
2. I'm apparently the only one who has braved Joyce's Ulyses.
3. His Dark Materials seems to be a favorite. I started reading the first one years ago and got bored, so maybe I missed something... then again, I didn't manage to get pass the prologue of Lord of the Rings *dodges tomatoes*
4. It took me 20 minutes to remember why Of Mice and Men sounded familiar and a whole day to remember what it was about... and I only read it last year.
5. There's no Stephen King there and that makes me sad.
6. There aren't many Spanish speaking writers there either...
7. I guess for English speaking people many of these books are school requirements, very few of those were included in my school reading list, though.
8. Where's Milton?
9. Where's Don Quixote?

Comments

[lil-1337.livejournal.com]

I felt the same way about his dark materials. I got past the rescue of the kids and my intrest nose dived in a big way. I do want to get back to it at some point, but it's not high on the list.

*adds hundred years of solitude to my to read list*

[misanagi.livejournal.com]

I don't really remember much about His Dark Materials... I think the girl was riding a bear when I gave up. I do remember it was the book I took to the USA embassy when I went to renew my visa and it failed to entertain me for the hours I was there. And I didn't even get the visa... bah. ^-^

[lil-1337.livejournal.com]

I'm not sure if that was before or after I quit. I kept pushing through because I wanted to make sure the kids were okay even though my interested waned quite a bit before that.

[misao-duo.livejournal.com]

I was wondering about 'One Hundred Years of Solitude', too. I didn't post the meme - fear of showing the world how little I read :/ - but when I checked the list I was like: 'WOW! 'One hundred years of solitude' I wonder if someone read that', cause I did :3
And yes, it's a very good book!

I'm sad about the lack of Stephen King too. They should have added, at least, 'The Shinning' to the list.

As for spanish speaking writers, I wish they had added Carlos Ruiz Zafón. I've only read ONE of his books but I adored his style :3

[misanagi.livejournal.com]

The list, as Merit pointed our, is very much English canon with a few other know "international" books there so it's not so difficult not to have read many if English isn't your mother tongue.

*loves Cien Años de Soledad*

The Shining wasn't my fave but I enjoyed it and it's famous and important enough I think. *fangirls IT like mad*

[meritjubet.livejournal.com]

The majority of the books were English canon, with a smattering of more recent popular books.

I thought there was too much Thomas Hardy, could have certainly put Milton or someone else instead of Jude of the Obscure.

[misanagi.livejournal.com]

*nodnod* You are right. I got the English canon thing since it's a publisher's list but I did miss Milton, and not just because I wrote my thesis on Paradise Lost.

[lukon-idein.livejournal.com]

I just took the challenge myself - and I spent a bit of time pointing out my problems with it too, though it really is hard to pick only 100 and please everyone. And it is true that many of the ones I got to check off were indeed ones that had been assigned to me in school. But some of those I read again later and adored, so I guess they get on these lists for a reason. No Twain I found interesting, since he's always getting banned here.

I do think there should be a more international range. The French were pretty well represented, and there were several Russian novels, but I didn't see any Germans (Goethe? Mann? Hesse?), Spaniards or Italians. There were only the 2 Spanish language ones by Marquez, and no Quixote is surprising. There are some other various internationals, such as Vikram Seth, Khaled Hosseini and Salman Rushdie, so it looks like there was some attempt to branch out a bit. But there are great books from all over the place - China, Japan (I adore Haruki Murakami), Scandinavia, Africa - one wonders how best to handle it. Should there be a quota? Weight each country by population? And as it's an English-speaking organization that made the list, the books they choose pretty much need to have been translated into English, which I'm sure leaves out a whole bunch of other great works. Basically, I think 100 just isn't enough, but a longer list would be overwhelming for practical purposes.

I never did attempt Ulysses. We read Dubliners and Portrait of an Artist As a Young Man in college, and I kind of had enough Joyce by that point. Catholic coming-of-age angst is just not my scene. Maybe I should check it out.

One Hundred Years of Solitude has been recommended to me many times over, but I can never bring myself to commit. I have a fear of abject depression from serious books. Hence my love of Jane Austen. :) Will it break my heart if I read it?

I'm with you on His Dark Materials! And yeah, Tolkein puts me to sleep pretty darn fast!! (Poor Of Mice and Men. Ouch!)

[misanagi.livejournal.com]

*nodnod* picking just 100 canon books should be quite difficult. I think, as Merit said, non English books are only recent popular, which might explain the no Quixote or Death in Venice or Divine Comedy.

Ulysses is not quite Catholic coming of age, actually has a bit of Jewish references in there. It's slow and quite dense so be prepared for that. Takes patience to read.

One Hundred Years of Solitude will not break your heart. It'll make you think and laugh and cry and smile and wonder. Just check out the first sentence: "Many years later, as he faced the firing squad, Colonel Aureliano Buendía, was to remember that distant afternoon when his father took him to discover ice."

Aren't you hooked already?

(Of Mice and Men wasn't bad, it just took me surprisingly long to remember it, not sure why)

[lukon-idein.livejournal.com]

I'm not sure I'm up for slow and dense right now. Maybe after my thesis is finished! ;)

I've read that opening line before. It's gorgeous! But when the story starts with someone about to die I tend to shy away - why should I let myself get invested in this character just to watch him die? (Yes, I'm a total WUSSSSSSSS.) But, I really should give it another chance. How about Love in the Time of Cholera? Have you read that one too?

[misanagi.livejournal.com]

Every story would have something sad but I can tell you One Hundred Years of Solitude isn't a tragedy. All this talking about the book is making me want to re read it... Love in the Time of Cholera us cool too, if you rather start there.

[aka-anonymous.livejournal.com]

I haven`t heard of the Solitude one. I`ll have to look it up when I`m bad stateside. ^_^

Joyce...I could only handle his short stories. The clips of Ulysses I had to read for my Irish Lit class made me head all spinny.

HDM--only got through the first book. The first thirty pages were difficult to get into, but the rest was decent. It was BUTCHERED in the movie.

Of Mice and Men.../twitches/...high school language class flashback. Ugh.

Only Stephen King books I got through were the Dark Tower books and Firestarter. Other than those...meh.

Don Quixote...I saw the musical, does that count??? ^_^;;;

[misanagi.livejournal.com]

Oh, One Hundred Years of Solitud it's a wonderful book! Give it a chance.

Ulysses is quite dense, that's true. Takes patience to get through it.

I love Stephen King's IT. I can't fangirl that book enough.

Oh and I don't even want to picture a Don Quixote musical *shudders*

[fractured-sun.livejournal.com]

Echoing everyone else, it was a rather unbalanced list a mix of lots Dickens, Hardy and Austen alongside a mixture of bestsellers and children's books. I wonder what criteria they used, particularly with the addition of The Bible (which although it is probably the most widely read book in the world is hardly a literary great or an enjoyable read, one might as well add the dictionary to the list).

I love Stephen King they should have added The Dark Tower series, instead of repeating things. It seems redundant to have both The Chronicles of Narnia and the lion the witch and the wardrobe, surely reading the former indicates you have read the latter. Likewise with the complete works of Shakespeare and Hamlet. Oh well it gave me an excuse to talk about books.

[misanagi.livejournal.com]

Well I have to disagree with you with the Bible. Sure, some Leviticus and parts of Deuteronomy can bore you to hell but the book has everything, intrigue, romance, war, conspiracy, poetry, suspense, horror, you name it. Well, that's just me ^^;;

I love Stephen King's IT. I have the Dark Towers in my to read list. Which isn't quite flowing right now because I'm stuck in Wicked and it's going quite slow...

And yeah, any chance to talk about books is good ^-^

[fractured-sun.livejournal.com]

Oh sure as a set of stories/historical retelling the Bible is an epic, but the writing style is..... hardly accessible.

The Dark Tower series is fantastic, it's his version of epic fantasy and actually winds itself through just about ever other book he's written, it'll make you reassess all of his other books too.

I've never read Wicked is it any good?

[misanagi.livejournal.com]

Wicked is nice, just haven't managed to catch my interest yet. So the reading is going a bit slow because I don't have the urge to read and read. I might just get to work so I can read Dark Tower now...

[tyreling.livejournal.com]

Oooh, I did that meme last year.

1) 1. None of my friends (who did the meme) has read One Hundred Years of Solitude - Gabriel García Marquez. I'm not pimping the book only because he is Colombian. I tell you, it's a very good book so if you get a chance, give it a try.
Actually, I've read it at high school. It was quite a novel with 500+ pages. The beginning was a bit slow in my opinion but somewhere in the middle I was starting to see the thread in the story and then all pieces fell right into place why the family was so cursed.

[misanagi.livejournal.com]

Yay! You've read it! I really love that book. I couldn't put it down when I read it. It's been a while since I've read it and I think it's tome to re read.

[tyreling.livejournal.com]

After I finished it, I was glad I'd picked the book for my oral exam. The book is layered with so many things/themes it's hard to explain it in just a few words.
I found out I was the only one in my year to have chosen the novel. ^-^ It was quite a challenge.