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Thoughts What Modern Classics Would You Recommend For Someone Who Usually Hates Classics?

ChemicallyEnhanced

ChemicallyEnhanced

Bluelighter
Joined
Apr 29, 2018
Messages
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What would you guys recommend of modern classics for someone who hates classics? lol

No Dickens, please! Worst author I have ever read (yes, I know, you're "supposed" to think he's great...but, just no)

One's I've read and actually liked are:

Junkie, William S Burroughs
Queer, William S Burroughs
Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas, Hunter S Thompson
1984, George Orwell
Animal Farm, George Orwell
Rosemary's Baby, Ira Levin
The Stepford Wives, Ira Levin
One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest, Ken Kesey
The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, Robert Louis Stevenson
Anything by J G Ballard
Cat's Cradle, Kurt Vonnegut
Slaughterhouse-Five, Kurt Vonnegut
The Catcher in the Rye, J.D. Salinger
The Bell Jar, Sylvia Plath
A Clockwork Orange, Anthony Burgess
The Hobbit, J.R.R.Tokien
Everything by S.E. Hinton

Already plan on reading:

Everything else by Ballard
The Picture of Dorian Grey
Frankenstein
Dracula
Lolita
The Count of Monte Cristo
 
I think Frank Herbert's Dune is required reading for the 20th century. After you read it you'll never look at sci-fi post 1970 the same lol. My wife just read it and as we watched the latest Star Wars offering we were both like... *cringe* didn't I read this book?

Also I really like Douglas Adam's works, call me a nihilist.

Oh and I feel On the Road by Jack Kerouac is required reading, if you liked Catcher in the Rye you should love On the Road.
 
Cream Gravy? said:
I think Frank Herbert's Dune is required reading for the 20th century. After you read it you'll never look at sci-fi post 1970 the same lol. My wife just read it and as we watched the latest Star Wars offering we were both like... *cringe* didn't I read this book?

Also I really like Douglas Adam's works, call me a nihilist.

Oh and I feel On the Road by Jack Kerouac is required reading, if you liked Catcher in the Rye you should love On the Road.
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I literally bought Dune last weekend lol, so will definitely read that. I think I have On the Road on my kindle, too :)
 
Not in order..

Infinite Jest.. Wallace
The Stand.. King
The Gunslinger and if you enjoy it the whole run..King
Tropic of Cancer and Capricorn.. both by H Miller
The Jungle.. Sinclair
A Brave New World.. Huxley
Crime and Punishment.. Dostoevsky
Grapes of Wrath.. Steinbeck
As I lay Dying.. Faulkner

That’s a few..

..
 
Also no matter your take on Dickens.. and he has failed to get me through many a voyage of his words.. but Great Expectations is certainly something very special.
 
Atomic_Decay said:
Nineteenth Century French literature in translation in the Penguin Modern Classics series has some gems. It’s not like Dickens.

Honor de Balzac, Lost Illusions and then The Harlot High and Low. Pere Goriot is also a good read.

Emile Zola, L’Assommoir
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I assume "in translation" means Penguin published them in English? If so I'll check one of those out (I might even if not, but my French isn't fluent so I probably couldn't understand fully, especially if it's 19th century nomenclature as well).
 
neversickanymore said:
Not in order..

Infinite Jest.. Wallace
The Stand.. King
The Gunslinger and if you enjoy it the whole run..King
Tropic of Cancer and Capricorn.. both by H Miller
The Jungle.. Sinclair
A Brave New World.. Huxley
Crime and Punishment.. Dostoevsky
Grapes of Wrath.. Steinbeck
As I lay Dying.. Faulkner

That’s a few..

..
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Loved The Stand (M-O-O-N, that spells "The Stand" ;) )
Wasn't a huge fan of The Gunslinger, but really liked most of those books (I persevered as someone described The Gunslinger as more of as a prologue to the other Dark Tower books, and I would say that's accurate). I actually really liked the ending of the series, too (apparently, a lot of people did not).
 
neversickanymore said:
Also no matter your take on Dickens.. and he has failed to get me through many a voyage of his words.. but Great Expectations is certainly something very special.
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I f'ing HATED that book lol. We had to read it in school when I was ~13 and I gave up on it lol. Kinda proud of myself there TBH as I just watched the movie instead (the version with Gwyneth Paltrow shows almost-nudity) and got a B+ on the exam haha.
 
ChemicallyEnhanced said:
I thought Bel Ami was an American gay porn thing?
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?? Never heard of it... Only thing I see on Google by that name besides the Maupassant book is a 2012 movie adaptation starring Robert Pattinson. Oh wait, if I search "gay" also, I see there's some gay porn studio called BelAmi, but it's based in Bratislava, Prague, and Budapest.

The book is about a guy who goes around seducing women who can further his career as a hack newspaper editor in 1880s Paris. It's much bleaker than most Anglo-American novels of the period, with no moral comeuppance at the end that sets everything to rights.
 
JTemperance said:
?? Never heard of it... Only thing I see on Google by that name besides the Maupassant book is a 2012 movie adaptation starring Robert Pattinson. Oh wait, if I search "gay" also, I see there's some gay porn studio called BelAmi, but it's based in Bratislava, Prague, and Budapest.

The book is about a guy who goes around seducing women who can further his career as a hack newspaper editor in 1880s Paris. It's much bleaker than most Anglo-American novels of the period, with no moral comeuppance at the end that sets everything to rights.
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Ahhh, yeah that was it. I've never watched it/been on their site but I've seen pop ups etc for Bel Ami.

The books sounds like I'd like it 👍 I don't like when (mostly American) novels have either a happy ending (unrealistic) or a "moral lesson" (patronizing)
 
ChemicallyEnhanced said:
I assume "in translation" means Penguin published them in English? If so I'll check one of those out (I might even if not, but my French isn't fluent so I probably couldn't understand fully, especially if it's 19th century nomenclature as well).
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Yep. Penguin Cassics is a whole series of the world’s greatest literature all in the best available English translation. When I was a teenager and had no friends on account of being commonly perceived as a dangerously crazy drug-fucked nut job I first read all the nineteenth century French ones and then all the Russian ones. Totally opened my mind and changed my life.

I was looking through the Penguin website to remind myself of anything else you might like and found these great lists you might find something in:

Vintage Classics

If it’s beautiful, it’s bound to be Vintage
www.penguin.com.au www.penguin.com.au

Penguin Classics hipsters love

Books coveted for their eye-level bookshelf real-estate.
www.penguin.com.au www.penguin.com.au

https://www.penguin.com.au/books/lists/604-high-times (all drug-related)

Classic book recommendations from our authors

Celebrating the 75th anniversary of Penguin Classics.
www.penguin.com.au www.penguin.com.au

At home with the Classics

Tackle the classics you’ve been putting off forever.
www.penguin.com.au www.penguin.com.au

Penguin English Library

Iconic books, beautifully designed.
www.penguin.com.au www.penguin.com.au

Vintage Classics Russians

Discover the epic masterpieces of Russian literature.
www.penguin.com.au www.penguin.com.au

2020 Classics of the Month recap

12 classics revisited – perfect inexpensive Christmas stocking stuffers for the literature lovers in your life.
www.penguin.com.au www.penguin.com.au

www.penguin.com.au

Honore de Balzac

<p>The son of a civil servant, Honoré de Balzac was born in 1799 in Tours, France. After attending boarding school in Vendôme, he gravitated to Paris where he worked as a legal clerk and a hack writer, using various pseudonyms, often in collaboration...</p>
www.penguin.com.au www.penguin.com.au

Also, it’s not really ‘modern classic’ but if you want something lighter and enjoy history and satire then I really recommend trying the first book in The Flashman Papers, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Flashman_Papers?wprov=sfti1, I liked it so much I couldn’t read anything else until I’d read the whole series. It’s a bit like the Sharpe series of books by Bernard Cornwall but tongue in cheek and much funnier.
 
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