So I was reading Kris' blog at http://onehundredbestnovels@blogspot.com, and she threw out the question to her readers of what they considered the worst book of all time. I've read about and heard from tons of people how awful the obvious books like Ulysses, Augie March, Finnegans Wake, etc are. What I'm wondering from you guys is, besides those books, are there any others on the list you feel have no business being there??
Wednesday, February 10, 2010
Libris Interruptus...Worst ML Book of All Time?
So I was reading Kris' blog at http://onehundredbestnovels@blogspot.com, and she threw out the question to her readers of what they considered the worst book of all time. I've read about and heard from tons of people how awful the obvious books like Ulysses, Augie March, Finnegans Wake, etc are. What I'm wondering from you guys is, besides those books, are there any others on the list you feel have no business being there??
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I could not stand The Magus! It may be the only book that I actually hate. Those pompous nitwits running around that stupid island playing games with each other! And all the time spouting humanistic gobblygook about the death of God, or whatever they were prattling on about. It has a cult following, but I thought it was overwrought nonsense.
ReplyDeleteI could not agree more. I think it is one of those books people either love or hate...I am definitely in the hate camp.
ReplyDeleteOh no! I am just about to start the Magus for my ML list blog.
ReplyDeleteI know most people loved it, but I really really hated Sophie's Choice. Like really hated it.
I can't think of another book I had such a negative reaction to. I read a book a long time ago called 'Geek Love', but I don't know if I hated it -- I just thought it was gratuitously weird.
Don't be discouraged...you may LOVE "The Magus". Someone on LibraryThing.com said it 'changed their life forever' and it influenced their present career choice (that statement may really creep you out once you read the book :). Maybe it's just me that's weird!!
ReplyDeleteI never expected to like "Sophie's Choice"...in fact I had been dreading reading it. It's not the world's happiest book...and Nathan's character is really angering at times.
I just finished "Heart of Darkness" again and had to struggle to do so. I honestly had to force it, and I usually don't bother, but I promised myself I would give it my best shot. Trying to stuff all the superfluous language into some kind of meaning is even more difficult as an adult, which I didn't expect.
ReplyDeleteI have to admit that I wouldn't read most of those on the board's list unless it was mandatory. I read for pleasure, and not to prove my literary worthiness. Why read "Sophie's Choice" when you can read "Pride and Prejudice and Zombies"?
I couldn't agree more with you on Conrad's writing style. "Lord Jim" was painful.:)
ReplyDeleteNormally I read for pleasure too...and honestly most of the books on the list have been really good (I LOVED "Sophie's Choice"!). The list was intriguing to me, not so much to prove literary worthiness but to see what others considered classic tomes of literature, and to see if I agreed with them.
How is "Pride and Prejudice and Zombies" by the way?
I would disagree that Ulysses is the worst book ever. And I didn't even like it! It is CLEARLY important, if for no other reason than its influence on other works and writers. Most of the time it made no sense, but Joyce was doing SOMETHING, and that something is much grander than I could ever appreciate (IMO).
ReplyDeleteNow what books I think REALLY shouldn't be on there include The Ginger Man, Angle of Repose, Wapshot Chronicles, Zuleika Dobson, all the DH Lawrence and all the Henry James.
I also question some of the books that I enjoyed - like Green's Loving. Decent book, but I'm not sure it's one of the Top 100 of the 20th century. I would definately swap it for a number of others. Like To Kill a Mockingbird, The Well of Loneliness, etc.
Also - don't give up on Conrad. Nostromo was the worse of his I have read yet, but The Secret Agent is AWESOME.
Thanks for your encouragement on Joseph Conrad and Ulysses. I have Angle of Repose as my next book and reviews have been pretty mixed on that one, so I'm looking forward to seeing how it pans out for me. I have heard lots of negative things about Henry James, particularly The Ambassadors, which some say should be a candidate for THE worst book of all time so you are in good company!!! :)
ReplyDeleteThanks for commenting.
Hi all. I also disagree about Ulysses. After years of avoiding it because of popular opinion, I finally got up the courage to start it. I only finished Part 1, so my opinion may change, but I really love it so far. Not sure why it has a bad rep.
ReplyDeleteThanks for your comment Juanita. I have a long, long way to go before I get to Ulysses, so I will look forward to hearing from you how you liked it. :) Do you have a blog? Let me know, I would love to check it out.
ReplyDeleteI only just started reading the list, and true to form, I am starting at 1 and moving to 100. My blog is juanita-life-at-home.blogspot.com. It doesn't have much related to books yet, but that should hopefully change in the near future!
ReplyDeleteThe worst book on there is (by a wide, wide margin) Brave New World by Aldous Huxley. It's over-the-top, self-important, dull, and maudlin. It might make it into the top 100 sci-fi novels of the 20th century, but it has no business being on the Modern Library's top 100.
ReplyDeleteOther clunkers: The Moviegoer by Walker Percy, Lord of the Flies by William Golding, The Call of the Wild by Jack London, and anything by awful, awful Ernest Hemingway.
I couldn't agree more on the Hemingway--I have "A Farewell to Arms" coming up and I am just dying--and I remember disliking Lord of the Flies in high school. Call of hee Wild was ok for me but I hate animal stories, so it wasn't my thing either.
ReplyDeleteThanks for commenting!