h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

The first Dickens I was assigned to read and liked was "A Tale of Two Cities". I don't remember liking "David Copperfield" very much... I finished the book, but managed to block the experience so well that I have almost no recollection of it.

Oliver Twist is my favourite, followed by Little Dorrit. But I hate Pickwick Papers - I wish I'd abandoned that.

I quite liked David Copperfield the second time. Never read the Pickwick Papers, but A Tale of Two Cities isn't a bad read. It's probably better if you forget all about 'Literature' and just enjoy the story.

Moby Dick

I've never finished Moby Dick either, though I've started it a few times (hope Blues doesn't read this!)

az

Scarlet and Black by Stendhal. It just failed to keep me interested. Did everyone else like it???

The first book I couldn't finish was The Hobbit I was about 8 and my Grandma was desperately trying to stop me reading back to back Enid Blyton.

I never finished Lord of the Rings either. I have to admit I give up on most books now as I tend to get distracted by other books, I do finish books for my BookGroup and if it's something really exceptional!

I remember having to read 'A Tale of Two Cities' at school and being surprised how much I enjoyed it.

I have read LOTR once, after seeing the first film (so a very new convert )but have to admit it's not really my thing.

Maybe when I look up from my latest RL stresses I should try War and Peace once more - give it a second chance. It's SO long though! Also, someone recommended not paying attention to every little detail, something I'm quite obsessive about, so don't know if I'd be able to do. I don't feel as though I've read a book if I haven't taken in and thought about every sentence.

Maybe that's why I take so long over books and Spouse seems to race through them?

Jules

read Anna Karenina instead (if you haven't already,if you have it's always worth a re-read) or if you insist on a Russian author I'm sure you're well aware that Chekhov and Turgenev are far superior to Tolstoy

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I like Dostoevsky. I remember one very heated debate in my younger years with a Tolstoy fan over who was the better writer. I also like Chekov.

As for Dickens.....one of my all time favorites. I loved him as a child and still reread him occasionally.

Chekhov.

sighing over Chekhov?



I love his short stories.

Sho, sighing because I must be the worst typist on h2g2.

Yes, and a little sigh over Chekhov. So many wonderful short stories. All modern wirters owe him a debt. And the plays are marvelous. He was an amazing talent.

and a doctor to boot, if I recall correctly

and you can't stop one of his stories before the end, they're only a few pages long.

It was Chekhow who said, "The aim of fiction is absolute and honest truth." And yes, he was a doctor. There are stories of him abandoning his writing to work with the poor during a cholera epidemic. He was quite a social activist. An admirable man on many fronts.

I wonder if students today still read Chekhov? Pity if they don't.

I can't remember, but I think it was Middlemarch. I do intend to finish it... eventually. Maybe. One day. I started North and South, too, and unlike Middlemarch, I emphatically do *not* intend to finish it.

It's interesting to see how different people respond differently to the same books. We could almost compile a list of 'most impenetrable stories'. The LOTR and War and Peace seem like the most notorious.

With LOTR, I came up with a strategy. I alternately read one chapter of LOTR, then one chapter of a light comedy, so that all through reading LOTR I was hanging on the thought of being able to switch to something good. But eventually I found myself actually wanting to continue with LOTR, which just goes to show that some stories take more than one book to get interesting.

I could almost change the title of the thread to "The first book you wish you hadn't finished".

Although this paraphrases other comments here.

I read and really enjoyed Umberto Eco - Foucault's Pendulum.

I bought Baudolino - and forced myself to finish it - utter tosh imho.

I started LOTR three times, failed to get beyond a hundred pages twice, and finished it once.

The first book a distinctly recall giving up on permanantly was 'Clear and Present Danger' by Tom Clancy. My cousing loaned it to me, and he loved it, but, and this may be an odd point, I found the swearing too overpowering, started to get depressed about it, and couldn't bring myself to carry on. Normally swearing in books doesn't worry me, but I remember feeling that there was too much in that book, and that was why I stopped. I told my cousin as much too, and he looked rather non-plussed at the news.


Geggs

I've just given up on Rousseau's 'Social Contract and Discourses'. I found some of it hard going, but some of the points he makes are interesting, so carried on, but about halfway through I decided that I had got to gist of what he was saying. Plus I'd just bought Christopher Lee's 'This Sceptred Isle', which I really wanted to read.